I often have business owners ask why should they spend time and money reviewing and updating their employee recruiting, hiring, promoting, and training policies and processes.  Here are some statistics that may help answer that question.

In fiscal year 2010 a total of 99,922 charges of discrimination were filed with the EEOC. These resulted in recoveries of over $400,000,000.00.

Some examples of EEOC litigation recoveries in 2011:

Title VII – Failure to hire women for order filler positions – $11.7 Million

Title VII - Failure to hire women in sales/services – $2 Million

Title VII - Inappropriate sexual assaults, inappropriate touching, crude sexual comments – $8 Million

Title VII - Workplace harassment because of race and national origin, graffiti, slurs – $8.9 Million

ADA – failure to accommodate a disabled sales manager – $600 Thousand

Title VII – same sex harassment, superintendent harassed and taunted iron worker – $250 Thousand punitive, $200 Thousand emotional distress

Title VII – Sex and gender harassment, $55 Thousand.

Title VII – Sexual harassment – $1.5 Million

Title VII -  Sexual harassment – $1.26 Million

Not having up to date policies and not training employees and supervisors to follow them can have significant and adverse results for employers.

If you have any questions about compliance with Title VII, the Americans with Disabilities Act, the Age Discrimination in Employment Act, or other anti-discrimination in employment laws, give me a call.  I can provide counseling, training, response to claims, and claims investigation on behalf of your business.

Under the Election Code, Texas gives employees the right to vote. Since November 3 is Election Day, now would be a good time to review employee policies and procedures to make sure they comply with Texas requirements. The Texas Election Code requires all employers in Texas to allow employees time off to vote unless the polls are open for two consecutive hours outside of the employee’s work day. If so, then no time off is required. This means that if the polls open either two hours before the employee’s work day starts or if they remain open more than two hours after the work day is over, then no paid time off is required. This applies to all employee, regardless of whether full-time or part-time, temporary as well as permanent.If you would like more information or have any questions, please give me a call. I always enjoy discussing how I can help you achieve your business goals and develop your strategies.

In order to be effective and place employees on notice of what is improper, an anti-harassment policy should clearly explain what constitutes prohibited conduct. The policy should clearly define and describe a process that employees can use to bring their complaints to the attention of the company. The policy should assure complaining employees and those providing information relating to harassment claims that retaliation will not be tolerated and that the company will protect them from such retaliation. As a part of such protection, the policy should provide for confidentiality to the extent possible, taking into account the company’s need to disclose the information to its employees and officials with a need to know in order to carry out the investigation and complaint resolution process. This process should make available an investigation that is prompt, thorough, and impartial. Finally, the process should set forth the corrective process that the company will follow if the investigation reveals that harassment did occur. It is not enough that the company has a written policy. The company must follow the policy and train its supervisors, managers, and employees to make sure they understand their responsibilities, obligations, and duties under the company’s anti-harassment policy and complaint procedure. The company’s goal in formulating and implementing such policy should be to take immediate and appropriate corrective action, including the use of disciplinary actions, to prevent improper conduct from reaching the level of “severe or pervasive.”

Many people are surprised to find that an employer is automatically liable for harassment by a supervisor that results in a negative employment action such as termination, failure to promote or hire, and loss of wages. This requires employers to be diligent and proactive, that is, to train supervisors on what constitutes harassment and to respond quickly and effectively to complaints to prevent such negative employment actions in the event the complaint is valid. If the supervisor’s harassment creates a hostile work environment, then in order to avoid liability, the company must convince the court and jury that the company used reasonable efforts to prevent and acted promptly correct the harassment. Further the employer must demonstrate that the company provided preventive or corrective procedures and that the employee unreasonably failed to take advantage of such procedures.

For these reasons, it is important for companies to implement effective anti-harassment policies and complaint resolution procedures and to train both supervisors and employees on them.

If you would like more information or have any questions, please give me a call. I always enjoy discussing how I can help you achieve your business goals and develop your strategies.

The best tool in the employer tool box for eliminating harassment is prevention. The first step is having clear ant-harassment policies that comply with anti-discrimination laws. Once appropriate policies have been formulated and put in place, the company should make sure employees know what is expected of them. In particular, they must be taught what constitutes unlawful conduct and what are its consequences. This requires effective training programs for both supervisors and employees. The anti-harassment policies must contain an effective complaint process that permits fast and fair resolution to harassment accusations, one that allows the company to take appropriate action when it receives a complaint. An essential component of an effective complaint resolution process is the fostering of an atmosphere that permits complaints to be made and provides for impartial resolution to the complaint, with appropriate remedial or disciplinary actions being taken when warranted. The training program should encourage employees both to tell the harassing person when actions are unwelcome, and, should the conduct continue, to report the conduct to prevent its becoming more serious.

If you would like more information or have any questions, please give me a call. I always enjoy discussing how I can help you achieve your business goals and develop your strategies.