As more and more people share their experiences of sexual harassment in the workplace, leaders must be prepared to navigate several kinds of difficult conversations with their teams. Specifically, leaders should consider how they will respond if an employee discloses an incident, how they will intervene if they see inappropriate behavior taking place at work, how they will proactively build a culture of respect, and how they will respond if an employee shares a past experience of harassment. In the #MeToo era, good leadership means not just responding to problems when they occur, but actively initiating the uncomfortable conversations that are essential to build a safe organization.
The #MeToo movement broke the silence on sexual harassment in the workplace, inspiring leaders in every industry to reckon with their organizations’ culture — and their own behavior — to build a work environment that’s safe and supportive for everyone. And as more and more people open up about their experiences with harassment and abuse, leaders can pretty much guarantee that they’ll find themselves dealing with these issues at one point or another.
But good leadership is not just about responding to incidents when they occur. It’s also about being prepared to navigate the difficult conversations that help prevent sexual harassment in the first place. The more you practice and prepare for these uncomfortable conversations, the more likely you are to respond in ways that support your team and make your organization a positive place to work.
1. The disclosure conversation
Both culturally and legally, a disclosure is the ultimate high-stakes conversation. Without formal reports of harassment, companies cannot hold perpetrators accountable and prevent them from continuing to behave inappropriately. However, there are real reasons why employees are reluctant to report, including a fear of not being believed, fear of retaliation, and fear of too small or too big a response. Each time a disclosure is handled with empathy and respect, it helps to rebuild organizational trust.
Consider these four steps:
- Express empathy. It takes a lot of guts to report sexual harassment. Thank the person for sharing the information with you and validate their emotional response. You can acknowledge their feelings while still ensuring a fair process for deciding what to do next.
- Assess safety. Does the person feel emotionally and physically safe? Do they have the ability to stay safe until the next step in the process? If physical safety is an issue, follow your workplace guidelines and create a safety plan. If the person needs emotional support, ask whether they have someone to call, offer an internal resource such as an EAP, and/or recommend an external hotline.
- Give them their power back. Even if you are required to report the incident to human resources, offer the person whatever options are available to them. For example, the employee may be able to choose who will speak to human resources first, or whether the report will be made by email or by phone. Even a small choice can feel empowering for someone who has experienced loss of control.
- Know your own policies, compliance advice and reporting guidelines. If you know these policies cold, it will be easier to adhere to them while still expressing empathy and sounding human.
Finally, recognize that a disclosure conversation is NOT a human resources investigation. Most likely, it’s the first of many conversations required to address a sexual harassment incident. There will be time for additional conversations, so focus your response to the initial disclosure on conveying deep empathy and setting up future conversations for success.
2. The intervention conversation
There is a spectrum of problematic behavior in the workplace, ranging from minor red flags to obvious harassment or even violence. The earlier you intervene, the better positioned you will be to prevent major problems. Many leaders confuse an intervention conversation with a call-out conversation, which is the most direct form of intervention. The purpose of an intervention conversation is to restore safety and promote a culture of respect.
Imagine attending a charity dinner on behalf of your company. A young staff member from the charity is seated at your table. One of your colleagues, a peer, is leaning pretty close to her and commenting on her appearance and attire. She keeps inching her chair away from him, and he just continues moving closer and closer. What do you do? What do you say?
There are four strategies you can employ when you witness a situation that seems unsafe or disrespectful:
- Direct: Say something directly to your colleague, such as, “I guess you missed the memo about appropriate conversations.” If you prefer a less direct approach, you could also make a pointed joke about his inappropriate behavior, or request that he switch seats with you.
- Distract: You can create a distraction that interrupts the behavior. For example, ask the staff member to introduce you to her boss at another table, or offer to introduce her to one of your colleagues.
- Delegate: Invite someone who has a closer relationship with either person to participate in the intervention. For example, you can ask the person sitting next to you if they also find the situation inappropriate, or text the staff person’s boss to ask for their assistance.
- Defer: If all else fails, you can approach the young staff member after the fact, check if she is okay, and make sure she has a safe way home.
Let me be clear. None of these options will feel comfortable. And all come with some risk of one or both of your colleagues getting upset. But risking a minor conflict to ensure the safety of someone with less power than you is the responsibility of a strong leader. It’s also important to note that an overzealous or inappropriate intervention runs the risk of making the situation more volatile or unsafe, so you should do your best to consider how your actions will make them feel before rushing to their defense.
3. The culture conversation
As a leader, it’s up to you to proactively signal that safety and respect are important to the culture you want to build. When leaders wait until an incident takes place to discuss sexual harassment with their teams, they often come across sounding opaque or defensive. Skilled leaders find ways to broach the topic of sexual harassment – and its impact on the team – on a regular basis. Do you ever talk about sexual harassment at your all-hands meetings? Have you asked human resources to brief the executive team on your current policies and reporting structures? Have you asked sales managers what they are doing to prevent sexual harassment with clients or customers? Does your company participate in sexual assault awareness month?
Don’t wait for people who are harassed – or at risk for harassment – to break the ice for you. By broaching this topic on a regular basis, you signal to employees that building a safe culture is important to you, and you make it significantly easier for people to feel comfortable coming forward to you if an issue does arise.
4. The support conversation
Disclosures aren’t always about incidents that happened at work. Given that one in four women, one in six men and one in two transgender employees will experience sexual abuse or assault in their lifetime, this topic may arise in the course of your working relationships. When someone shares something like this from their past, it’s a moment to express empathy by saying something like, “I appreciate you trusting me enough to tell me,” or “I’m sorry that happened to you.” It’s also worth checking in on their safety and support network. You can simply ask, “Are you receiving the help and support you need right now?” Or, “Do you have people in your life that you can talk to about this?”
Finally, while it’s not your place to provide counseling to an employee, it’s valuable to offer to check in at a specific time in the future – and follow through. Doing so demonstrates that you take their disclosure seriously and value your relationship with them. And if no one has ever shared this type of information with you before, it’s worth examining whether you are proactively signaling that it’s a topic you are prepared to discuss.
Being able to initiate and navigate uncomfortable conversations is a critical skill for effective leaders. Avoiding or mishandling any of the above discussions will create a culture of silence and an environment that’s not conducive to safety or productivity. But luckily, handling these conversations is a learnable skill that can be developed with practice. It’s on you as a leader to take this on.