Sexual harassment is still a hot button issue

June 19, 2006 · Filed Under Stupid Employee Tricks 

Recruiting Animal responded to a series of posts I made regarding the termination of an employee for offering “copious BJ’s” to other employees for taking a shift of his. The discussion that unfolds is very interesting. There seems to be two schools of thought unfolding. One is that the language he used was obviously crude but also obviously joking. While inappropriate, what he said was not firing worthy. The second thinks this guy is an idiot and deserved to be treated to a lesson before he started his real career.

I understand the first school of thought very well. HR is often the business end of the political correctness fostered by a company’s legal department, lawmakers at state and US capitals and judges and it irritates me as well. That being said though, the point is moot. That is the business environment we operate in and as I commented, our legal system rewards employers that over-enforce sexual harassment law. End of story. Do any of your legal departments want to take a principled stand and fight for the right for this guy to say “copious BJ’s” as he pleases? Perhaps if he is the CEO but not if he is an easily replaced, entry level employee.

The fact of the matter is that employers are fairly risk adverse on any potential sexual harassment behavior. Could this guy have sued us for firing him inappropriately? Perhaps. The chance of it going to court and getting heard is pretty slim, the chance of him winning it is slimmer. Could someone plop a sexual harassment suit on us based on this e-mail? Perhaps. The chance of it going to court and getting heard is much better than the employee who got fired. Furthermore, if this guy had made previous advances towards other employees that the supervisor was unaware of, this could further the case of harassing behavior and not an innocent joke. Not to mention, there is very little tone in e-mail to go off of. If this were a conversation with witnesses, perhaps it could be more easily defended as a joke. Black and white text gives little indication of the jist of his statement. His intentions of a joke is unclear enough to raise a valid point.

So I guess that’s the long way of stating my view on it. Did I agree with it in principle? No, I thought it was an over-enforcement. Does it matter whether I agree in principle? Not really. Why? Because in practice, over-enforcement is encouraged and makes much more sense than rolling the dice with sexual harassment. Were it my business, legal department and money on the line, the choice is obvious. If some other HR guy wants to play with fire on that one, please go ahead and let me know your results and ROI on it. This was an easy decision to support. There are much more compelling cases out there where there is an obviously wronged person on the business end of political correctness but I am confident in saying this isn’t one of them.

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