How Does Your CEO Proactively Prevent Harassment in Business and at Work?

The problem with Uber CEO Travis Kalanick’s response to former Engineer Susan Fowler’s account of harassment and Uber’s failure to effectively stop the harassment is that Kalanick’s response was reactive, not proactive. Even calling in Eric Holder and Ariana Huffington to investigate Uber’s harassment issues on the back end does not change that fact.

Workplace harassment at all levels and on all bases is not only:

  • Culture-killing
  • Recruitment / Retention-killing
  • Customer Service-killing
  • Morally bereft; it’s also
  • Illegal and Expensive.

When a CEO proactively (and effectively) acts to prevent and remediate workplace harassment at all levels and all bases, the following factors are usually at play:

  • The Chief HR Officer reports to the CEO;
  • Anti-Harassment Training is conducted for all new hires; and all supervisors (including the CEO) and employees receive Anti-Harassment Training on at least an annual basis;
  • All employees sign off on and are held accountable to Anti-Harassment and Anti-Discrimination policies – and violations of these policies are subject to corrective action up to and including termination;
  • There are multiple options to report a harassment complaint;
  • When a harassment complaint is reported to Human Resources, there is an immediate and thorough investigation – and if harassment has taken place, corrective action is taken, up to and including termination – e.g., Human Resources, in partnership with the CEO, follows its own policies; and
  • When all of the above happens, the CEO and their Chief HR Officer are proactively doing their jobs to keep their employees and the organization safe.

How do your CEO and CHRO proactively prevent harassment in business and at work?