Absolute morons!

[Edwina's Secretary]

I hate to interject some reality here....but the higher ups could NOT be confidential. Once you have told them of a complaint of sexual harassment they MUST investigate immediately. They cannot offer you confidentiality. How are they to investigate?

If they do not investigate IMMEDIATELY they become personally liable for knowing and not doing anything.

Of course a manager should do what he/she can to limit the exposure of the complainant. And cannot retaliate or permit retaliation because of your complaint.

But wasn't the purpose you told them to have something done? And you are unhappy they started to do something too fast?

[Laura's Babies]

I had a simalar thing happen to me on a boat I worked on with the engineer. No matter WHO was talking or what the conversation, he would come in and change the topic to sex! It made not only me uncomfortable but everyone he did it to. But he did target me and ask personal sexually explicit questions or or sexual comments. I bough a pocket size tape recorder and was fixing to nail his a*s to the wall by getting him on tape and NOBODY could shove it under the rug. Before I made the next trip with him, the transfer I had asked for a year prior came through and I was transferred off that boat. About a year after I left that boat, I got a call from human resources asking me didn't I use to ride with him and what I thought of him. I was BRUTALLY honest and quickly answered I thought he was a dirty minded OLD MAN! I was asked to tell what he had done or said to me and I repeted everything, incident by incident. The kicker to that whole conversation was as it ended, HR asked me "Is there anything you might have said or done that caused this to happen?"...LOL! I got him there and answered "Well SURE! I came to that boat and that is why I was fair game to him"...

A few days later he was FIRED! Sad thing was, that he was a 60 something year old creep that was married to a BEAUTIFUL 35 year old woman... Go figure !

Tomorrow or whenever you have to go back to work and everyone asks what you said, I would look at them and say "I thought it was YOU that told on him!".

[Oggyflute]

Of course the situation had to be investigated. But the issue was how it was done. These complaints are supposed to be kept in confidence as much as possible. There will come a time though when action would have to be taken. The point is, the person making such a complaint, must be kept in an environment that doesn't get worse whilst the investigation takes place. I've had to deal with a few of these in the past, I think the fellow who was investigating show little tack, and was obviously unprepared to deal with an issue as important as this.
I'm glad you spoke up though mate. This situation shopuld NEVER be tolerated.

[Edwina's Secretary]

She did not say they said ANYTHING to ANYONE.... I have been teaching managers how to handle sexual harassment for years. They should tell an employee that it is IMPOSSIBLE to investigate with confidentiality. IMPOSSIBLE! How are you suppose to ask...."did you see So and so touch Who and forth?" if you are keeping Who and forth's name confidential???

Sorry....but this is how I make my living and people's expectations of confidentiality can be very frustrating.

Her complaint was that he began investigating as soon as she left the office. That is the correct thing to do. If she had told them she had seen the manager stealing from the cash register should they wait a few days to investigate?

There is NOTHING absolutely moronic about a manager immediately investigating an allegation of a serious breach of company policy.

And if these managers had waited a few days and something had happened in the meanwhile....not only would THAT be moronic but those managers could be personally sued for breach of duty.

Furthermore, as with a teacher accused of inappropriate behavior with a student, at some point the accused has a right to know who the accuser is.

Let me be perfectly clear, I am not excusing the inappropriate behavior. I have seen enough of it in my career. I take offense to calling a manager who immediately investigating the accusation an absolute moron. Or accuse him/her of violating confidence because of assumptions other employees may make.

[Cataholic]

As a lawyer that handles discrimination suits, from both the employer's AND employee's 'side', I can only echo Edwina's Secretary's comments.

Once an employer is 'on notice' of a claim of discrim/harrassment, that employer MUST act quickly, and with purpose. Anything else and the company becomes the offender, in a manner of speaking.

[catnapper]

But folks, I filed my complaints TWO WEEKS ago. I verbally talked about it over the phone. They wanted to speak to me in person, so I did. Why did they not begin the investigation TWO WEEKS AGO then? Why not start this morning when they got to the store at 9:00 and ask around BEFORE I walked my butt into the store at 2:00? No, they waited to begin asking questions directly after I spoke to them. and trust me, the in-person conversation was two seconds long while the over the phone conversations (yes, multiple conversations) were a whole lot longer.

To me, waiting between my phone calls and meeting me in person was WRONG because they never took action. They had two weeks to act upon it and did not. Are verbal complaints not taken as seriously as face to face complaints?

And what my manager did was nothing limited to me. He makes sexual comments to every woman in the store, even the rescues have commented on his comments. Anyone could have approached the higher-ups about his innapropriate comments... yet its readily apparent I'm the one who came forward. I came forward knowing it was likely I'd be "outed" but I didn't expect the guy handling it being so obvious. Its honestly like a bull in a china store -- bounding and bumbling through everything.

[Edwina's Secretary]

How do you know they didn't do anything during the two weeks since you called?

Furthermore.... waiting two weeks was wrong so you wanted them to wait a few more days?????