One Real-Life Example of the Actual Costs of Workplace Harassment in Business and at Work

I’ve been an HR practitioner for over 25 years. And in that same time-frame, I have:

• Conducted Harassment Prevention training on at least a monthly, at times weekly basis;
• Investigated employee reports of workplace harassment; and subsequently
• Stopped the reported harassment by counseling – or, depending on the severity of the harassment, termination of employment (termination is the typical response to workplace harassment violations of touching, abuse of power, threats, force / sexual assault).

I’ve written a number of posts on the costs of workplace harassment – financial, reputational, etc. This recent action by the EEOC against Draper Development LLC (a local Albany, NY Subway restaurant franchise) involves costs to the employer on a number of levels.

The (self-documented) sexual harassment by a Subway franchise manager:

According to the EEOC’s lawsuit, filed in the Northern District of New York (EEOC v. Draper Development, LLC Civil Action No. 1:15-cv-877), Nick Kelly, a former general manager at Draper’s Rotterdam Square Mall location, sent text messages to two female applicants offering a job in exchange for sex, both of whom were 17 years old at the time. In one case, Kelly’s text message said, “Bang my brains out, and the job is yours.” In both cases, when the young women did not comply, they were not hired. 

(I’m continue to be appreciative and simultaneously amazed how harassers conveniently document their own policy violations / bad behavior. It always makes investigation work efficient.)

Because workplace harassment by managers results in automatic employer liability, it was literally effortless for the EEOC to pursue legal action against the employer on behalf of the above 2 young women, which resulted in:

In addition to paying $80,000 to the two victims, Draper will:

• distribute a revised policy prohibiting sexual harassment;
• conduct anti-harassment training for managers and employees;
• post a public notice about the settlement; and
• report all sexual harassment complaints to the EEOC.

The $80,000 payment to the 2 young women, the reputation-damaging EEOC publicity and the requirement for the employer to report all sexual harassment complaints to the EEOC are particularly painful costs. The latter EEOC requirement effectively makes the EEOC the company’s new HR manager.

“No teenager who is just beginning to navigate the working world should ever have to deal with unwelcome sexual advances as part of the hiring process,” said Charles F. Coleman, Jr., the EEOC lead trial attorney. “The remedial provisions of the consent decree are designed to ensure such behavior never occurs again at this restaurant.”

EEOC Regional Attorney Jeffrey Burstein said, “Conditioning hiring in exchange for sexual favors, known as quid-pro-quo sexual harassment, is exactly the type of behavior that has made the deserved momentum around #MeToo continue to grow stronger. The EEOC is determined to do its part to ensure sexual harassment of this kind is eradicated from the workplace.”

How do you avoid the actual / multiple costs of workplace harassment, in business and at work?