Wednesday, October 8, 2014

Are you risking an expensive lawsuit?

It only takes one uncomfortable look, one complaint, one inappropriate touch or off color statement for a single employee to file a harassment lawsuit. Do you want to risk the future of your business due to the lack of professional harassment training?
Sexual harassment in the California workplace continues to spur payouts in the millions! Supervisors can be personally liable for their actions and the acts of their employees if the supervisor failed to act. Business insurance may not pay judgments against supervisors.
There may be punitive damages claimed against your business for failure to provide adequate supervisor training.
Our best advice, provide on-site, interactive supervisor harassment training annually. By providing harassment training for your supervisors, they will understand how to identify potential harassment situations, thereby reducing your company’s liability.
Our recommended steps:
1.   Verify that your handbook is California compliant and includes a general and sexual harassment policy with instructions of how and who to report potential violations or questionable conduct.
2.   Annually review / update policy changes with your employees. We have discovered that often, employees do not understand what a harassment-free workplace is.
3.   Thoroughly investigate all claims. If severe or the claim involve a supervisor, see independent assistance. Many times, your attorney will retain an HR firm such as eqHR Solutions to conduct an independent confidential investigation.
4.   If you are a California employer with 50 or more employees, you must provide mandatory supervisor sexual harassment training every two years and new supervisors within six month.     
If you are a serious business leader, who understands the potential liability threat, you will not opt for an inexpensive online sexual harassment training course. You will retain your law firm or a professional HR consulting firm like eqHR Solutions. 

If you have questions about harassment claims or training, please call us.  There is no charge for your initial consultation.