Sexual harassment – Is it really a workplace problem?

Yes it is. Trauma caused by sexual harassment can be extreme. It may result in humiliation, loss of dignity, psychological and, sometimes, physical injury, and damage to professional reputation and career. Inevitably, the victims face a choice between their work and their self-esteem. Sometimes, they face a choice between their jobs and their own safety.

Studies have shown that 40 to 70 percent of women and 10 to 20 percent of men have been the target of sexual harassment in the workplace. If numbers are anything to go by, approximately fifteen thousand sexual harassment cases are brought to the Equal Employment Opportunity Commission each year!

A telephone poll conducted by Louis Harris and Associates on 782 workers revealed that a total of 31 percent women and 7 percent men claimed to have been sexually harassed at work. Almost 100 percent women claimed the harasser to be a man, of which 43 percent pointed the finger at the supervisor, 27 percent at a senior employee, 19 at the coworker and 8 percent at a junior employee (now that’s real cheek!). In the case of men, 59 percent claimed the harasser to be a woman and 41 percent, another man. But the most alarming fact was that 62 percent of these sexually harassed people took just no action against their perpetrators!

A study conducted by the U.S. Merit Systems Protection Board in 1988 concluded that sexual harassment, resulting in sick leave and job turnover, had cost the federal government a whopping 267.3 million dollars in lost productivity, in just over two years!