We Must Empower Employees To Confront Sexual Assault: Huffington Post

Sexual harassment in the workplace is latent, pervasive and transcends industry. While many women have known (and suffered) this fact for decades, it has recently come to light via powerful social media movements (notably, #metoo and #TimesUp) that have been unrelenting in the call for action.

Exposure and public discourse have been important first steps in confronting this issue, but equipping and empowering people to act in the face of harassment is the only way in which we can begin to truly make our workplaces safer.

And the time is certainly ripe for action. Employers and organizations are undoubtedly feeling the pressure of having their response to allegations of sexual misconduct intensely scrutinized. Turning a blind eye is no longer acceptable. Companies that overlook and dismiss harassing behavior as an immutable component of workplace culture are chided as archaic and being a part of the problem.

A Vancouver employment lawyer at Samfiru Tumarkin LLP discussed in her blog on The Huffington Post exactly what employers need to do when allegations of sexual misconduct surface in the workplace.