Freada Kapor Klein in Newsday

Talking about workplace sexual harassment
Newsday October 15, 2007
BY PAT BURSON, pat.burson@newsday.com

If you've been at the water cooler recently, it probably came up: Sexual harassment is a hot topic at the moment. First there was the recent jury award to Anucha Browne Sanders over her treatment by New York Knicks coach Isiah Thomas and Madison Square Garden; then there was Supreme Court Justice Clarence Thomas' resurrection of accusations Anita Hill made years ago during his confirmation hearings - rehashed in a new autobiography in which he again maintains his innocence and questions Hill's.

And it appears that MSG executives' troubles aren't over yet. Courtney Prince, a former captain of the Rangers City Skaters cheerleading squad has a sex-discrimination lawsuit pending against the Garden and two of its employees.

When such high-profile incidents get people buzzing, legal and workplace experts say it's also a good time for employees and employers to revisit and re-evaluate their efforts toward eradicating sexual harassment on the job - whether in offices or ditches, on front lines or assembly lines, in halls of learning or houses of faith - anywhere men and women work closely together.

The issue isn't new, but approaches to it continue to evolve. We asked experts who deal with the issue of sexual harassment as part of their work to offer their insights.

Here's what they had to say:

The workplace-harassment researcher and trainer: Sexual harassment policies often are written to protect the company, not to give practical guidance to workers at all levels, says Freada Kapor Klein, founder of the Level Playing Field Institute in San Francisco, who studies sexual harassment on the job and works with companies to create bias-free environments.

Here's her approach:

Toss out the one-size-fits-all, zero-tolerance sexual harassment policies that amount to little more than a list of do's and don'ts. They "make no sense when you're talking about grown-ups who spend eight, 10 and 12 hours a day in the workplace, who come from very different cultures, and who ought to be allowed some latitude to decide for themselves which is appropriate and inappropriate," says Klein, who offers more options for handling difficult situations at work in her new book, "Giving Notice: Why the Best and the Brightest are Leaving the Workplace and How You Can Help Them Stay" (Jossey-Bass). It arrives in bookstores on Friday.

Create "people-friendly" policies that deal with real-life situations, including examples of "the gray area, where the workplace stops and starts," she says.

"For instance, if two people are walking to the train station after work, and they're talking about their weekend dates and somebody's offended by a comment that their co-worker makes, how do they handle it? Is this the business of the employer? Does it affect how they work together tomorrow?"

Establish safe and confidential places where employees can go informally to seek advice, ask a question or express a concern, as well as places they could go to file a formal complaint that would be investigated. "It's really letting the employee choose how to handle it," Klein says. "The choice should be the employee's."

Explain the differences between behaviors that are annoying, inappropriate and illegal. "There's a wide range of behavior, and it has a subjective part and objective part," she says. "The subjective piece means this is unwelcome to me. I don't like this joke. I don't like the way this person touches me. I don't want to hear about your dates. The objective part is, does it cross the line for most people? Would most people agree that this is out of bounds in a work environment?"

Urge employees to be clear about their boundaries and speak up respectfully if they feel their boundaries have been violated.

Let your employees know that you will enforce their boundaries. Klein says she thinks employees should be able to negotiate their own relationships with their colleagues without interference. But, she adds, if one employee already has warned another that he or she is doing something that's crossing the line and the person continues, then it's time for a higher-up to step in.

"When you say, 'Please don't touch me again,' then I understand that I'm risking getting in trouble when I persist because management has made it clear" that everyone's boundaries will be protected.

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