Evidence of meeting #80 for Status of Women in the 41st Parliament, 1st session. (The original version is on Parliament’s site, as are the minutes.) The winning word was sexual.
A video is available from Parliament.
Associate Professor of Management, College of Business, Western New England University, As an Individual
Yes, that is true. There are a lot of negative psychological and even physical elements that occur when someone is sexually harassed.
There is avoidance of the perpetrator. The person who is being harassed tries to avoid that person and if the person is someone they need to interact with to do their job effectively, it can affect their job performance as well. Often, it is the female who is the one who bears the burden of leaving the company or the organization.
NDP
Anne-Marie Day NDP Charlesbourg—Haute-Saint-Charles, QC
In the studies you published in 2006, you recommend that workplaces consider organizational factors like policies, procedures and practices for everyday use in order to create a climate in which discrimination will not be tolerated.
Working through the Treasury Board, we have put in place a series of actions and policies along those lines. Yet you could say that there is a gap between the desired outcomes of those policies and their real effect.
Have you observed things of that kind?
Associate Professor of Management, College of Business, Western New England University, As an Individual
Associate Professor of Management, College of Business, Western New England University, As an Individual
I don't have much to expand upon, other than the fact that often there are policies in place that, for whatever reason, are not followed or acted upon, and I don't know why. I don't know if it's reluctance on the part of the people who are handling the complaints, because maybe it involves one of their friends. It could be something like that, of a political nature.
I really can't comment further on that. I don't have knowledge in that area.
NDP
Anne-Marie Day NDP Charlesbourg—Haute-Saint-Charles, QC
Okay. What if we tightened the system with a zero tolerance policy? After one or two warnings, you would be gone. That might reduce the number of sexual harassment cases.
Do you feel that it is necessary to have different approaches in a workplace such as the RCMP, where, in a way, the members are guardians of justice and public protectors?
Associate Professor of Management, College of Business, Western New England University, As an Individual
I'm not sure what you mean. Do you mean that because sometimes it's the citizens that are harassing them? Is that what you're saying? I'm not clear on that.
NDP
Anne-Marie Day NDP Charlesbourg—Haute-Saint-Charles, QC
I am talking about situations where the members of the RCMP themselves are responsible for the harassment.
Do you not believe that we should act differently in cases like that?
Associate Professor of Management, College of Business, Western New England University, As an Individual
For some reason I'm not understanding the intent of the question.
NDP
Anne-Marie Day NDP Charlesbourg—Haute-Saint-Charles, QC
Fine. Let me ask you another question.
You have conducted research on the role of witnesses and on making ethical decisions. What can you tell us about ethical decision-making in a work environment like the RCMP?
Associate Professor of Management, College of Business, Western New England University, As an Individual
It's really the way that a person who's a witness frames the incident that they witnessed if they think it has an ethical dimension to it. That's a dimension where it's labelled as wrong in a moral sense rather than just wrong because there's a policy against it. If they have a belief that the behaviour is harmful, that it's not a proper behaviour, or that it's a behaviour that causes harm to the other person, that is usually how they define it when talking about ethics. If the person sees harm coming from the behaviour, then it's classified as unethical behaviour.
NDP
Anne-Marie Day NDP Charlesbourg—Haute-Saint-Charles, QC
You have also stated that, as a way to putting a stop to sexual harassment, measures primarily based on reporting are very likely to fail because most victims do not report it. Instead, you are proposing a mechanism based on the involvement of witnesses. But, just like victims, witnesses are often afraid of accusing a colleague, because they fear reprisals from their employers.
In the case of the RCMP, a number of victims have stated that they suffered reprisals from their colleagues or their superiors. What do you see as the solution to avoiding reprisals in that kind of environment?
Did you not tell us about external observers just now?
NDP
Associate Professor of Management, College of Business, Western New England University, As an Individual
I don't know if this would be possible. Theoretically, if there was a different body investigating the complaints rather than the people who are within the organization, maybe some external force might be taken more seriously because they don't have those personal connections to the people who are doing the harassing.
NDP
The Chair NDP Lysane Blanchette-Lamothe
Thank you. Your time has expired.
Madam Young, you have seven minutes.
Conservative
Wai Young Conservative Vancouver South, BC
Thank you so much for your testimony. It was actually quite brilliant. We've been needing this kind of information, because testimony from previous witnesses has raised a lot of questions, and today I want to thank you for being here and giving us some of those answers.
I think there is a lot of misinformation in this committee regarding what's happened before. Right now we're hearing from the public and from different federal departments—because obviously this study looks at sexual harassment in federal workplaces—that historic cases are now coming forward. We are very glad about that, because we don't want sexual harassment in the federal workplace, so it's good to know about this, but some of these cases stem from 10 or 15 years ago. I think there is some disconnect between what happened 15 years ago and the processes that took place then, and the current situation in the federal government.
I want to make that distinction. I think it's very important for you when we ask our questions, because otherwise things get a little confusing.
I wanted to let you know I'm really impressed by your work and your studies in this area. I wanted to ask you if you feel the federal government is on the right track on this.
Since we've come to government, we have identified, accepted, and determined to address this issue of having zero tolerance in the federal workplace. No person should go to work and feel sexually harassed or have to look at that. I think you stated very clearly that it provides a toxic work environment, which is very discouraging and leads to all kinds of stress and other work risks.
Second, we have to develop and implement policies and standards, and that's where I think as a federal government we're going to zero tolerance. Third, we must determine the outcomes we want. That is where I think some of your work is really important. You talked about mandatory training.
I'm just going to outline some of the steps our government has taken and ask you if you have further suggestions for additional steps we can take, because that's what this study is all about. We would welcome any further submissions you want to make to this committee, because we are taking this issue very seriously.
We have taken several steps. We have developed a Treasury Board policy that will cover all federal departments and crown corporations. Second, we have mandated sexual harassment and respectful workplace training. I think you talked about the importance of that. Third, we have incorporated and included management leadership to change the culture. We've heard from various big giant federal departments at which, when the management gets involved in this, the workplace culture does change. They are leaders and champions within their workplace. Fourth, there are optional methods for reporting. They have now also implemented formal and informal reporting. Some departments have specific sexual harassment advisers and units that deal with these complaints and processes. There are employee assistance programs as well for counselling and different other kinds of support, and of course there are legal supports as well.
In addition to that, I really liked your notion of making this not a personal issue. I think we need to somehow infuse that this is a social or work issue. Obviously the harassers have issues with women or power, and that's something we could perhaps look at a bit more. I really like the notion you mentioned about observers also being responsible for reporting.
We have also implemented penalties for sexual harassment. Notes can go on somebody's personnel file, and we are pushing for actual firings, although the unions are pushing back. They usually support the harasser, so I think that creates a difficult situation in the workplace.
So could we have comments from you on all of the above?
Associate Professor of Management, College of Business, Western New England University, As an Individual
Okay. That was a lot.
I think the most important thing is having some kind of discipline in place. By discipline I mean disciplinary action taken against the harassers as you mentioned, whether it's a verbal warning or a termination.
Once they have been trained, there's really no excuse. If there's no training they can always say they didn't know, they didn't understand, they didn't realize that was harmful. But once the training has taken place there goes that excuse. So if you have the training for all the people who could potentially be doing the harassing—not just the managers, because sometimes they just train the people at the top and it doesn't trickle down. Everyone needs the training in my opinion. I think having zero tolerance is pretty much what needs to happen.
In terms of informal and—
Conservative
Wai Young Conservative Vancouver South, BC
Given that the federal government is the largest employer in all of Canada, it is a good thing that we mandated the training and mandated zero tolerance, don't you think?
Associate Professor of Management, College of Business, Western New England University, As an Individual
To me, in my eyes, yes, because without those steps.... If you're trying to change a culture, it's not an easy thing to do. You mention that you need to have the managers and the people at the top on board. That's definitely true. But you need to have ways to reach the people who aren't at the top. Having policies and training are ways that.... If they know that they can get in trouble or be reprimanded for something, they're more likely to think twice.
Associate Professor of Management, College of Business, Western New England University, As an Individual
If the union is supporting the harasser, though, that's a really bad situation. I think you'll have your work cut out negotiating. I don't know. Probably things have to occur through negotiation, if it's like how you deal with unions in the United States.
Conservative
Wai Young Conservative Vancouver South, BC
Because you've done studies on this and you're an expert in this area, what would you recommend to the federal government of Canada, then, in terms of additional steps we can take?
NDP
Associate Professor of Management, College of Business, Western New England University, As an Individual
In terms of additional steps, I honestly think you're doing everything that should be done. The only thing I can think of is finding some way for the reporting to be external to the organization, so that no politics are involved and it would be objective. I don't know if that's possible. That's the only thing I could add.
NDP
The Chair NDP Lysane Blanchette-Lamothe
Thank you, Madame Bowes-Sperry.
Now Madame Sgro, you have seven minutes.