Provide Multiple Employer Contact Options for Employees to File Harassment Complaints in Business and at Work

As a senior HR practitioner helping employers to prevent and stop workplace harassment, like many of my HR and employer-side lawyer colleagues, I’ve been busy preparing and providing the soon-to-be mandated (effective October 9, 2018) interactive NYS Harassment Prevention training, among other employer requirements.

In the course of meeting with current, prospective and new clients, there’s a common theme of confusion as to who in the organization can receive and take action (timely investigation and corrective action, if warranted) on employees’ (and non-employees’) harassment complaints.  A good percentage of employers believe that the employee should file their harassment complaint to their immediate manager first (and/or can only go to their immediate manager to file a harassment complaint). Other employers believe that harassment complaints must follow an organization’s formal chain-of-command, e.g., such as starting with their immediate manager.

None of these above options provide the best service for employee (and non-employee) harassment complaints or the best compliance for the employer. Such constraints can have a chilling effect on timely reporting, investigation and remediation of harassment incidents.  For example: if an organization requires that harassment complaints can only be filed to an employee’s immediate manager, and the immediate manager is the alleged harasser, it can frankly compromise the safety of both the employee and the organization.

In reality, best practice is to have multiple resources for employees to file harassment complaints, including but not limited to:

• Their immediate manager;
• A member of the Human Resources team;
• A member of the Leadership team;
• A member of the Board of Directors (if applicable); and
• A third-party resource (I’m the third-party resource for a number of my clients);
• Among other options.

Best practice is also to have a diverse mixture of gender and other protected class representation among these harassment complaint reporting resources, to maximize employees’ (and non-employees’) comfort in coming forward to file a harassment complaint.

How many different employer contact options does your organization provide for employees (and non-employees) to file harassment complaints, supporting the safety and productivity of all in business and at work?