Name: Turning Policy into Practice: Harassment & Discrimination Prevention in Action
Uploaded: 2025-10-16T19:06:05.761Z
Duration: 39 min 48 s
Description: Turning Policy into Practice: Harassment & Discrimination Prevention in Action

Transcript for "Turning Policy into Practice: Harassment & Discrimination Prevention in Action": One ounce Sprite. Here we go. Hi, everyone. Thanks so much for joining. I know we have a large group that will be attending today, so we'll give everyone just a few minutes to to get started and join. Today, wanna welcome everyone to our webinar. The topic topic we'll be discussing is turning policy into practice, specifically harassment and discrimination prevention in action, within the workplace. So take a few minutes, get settled in, and we'll get started, in just a few minutes. And as we have a few folks, still joining us, to kind of kick things off with a nice breaker, I'd love to learn where everyone's joining today. So feel free to place that in the chat. It should be located at the top right hand side of your screen. I see Texas, Florida, Kansas City. I'm based here in Charleston, South Carolina. We've got some California. I'm I'm in Austin, Texas. Oh, welcome, Elizabeth. Thank you for joining from Washington, DC. Hopefully, everyone's enjoying some great fall like weather. I know some parts of the country, experience the North nor nor'easter, I think, this past weekend. So hopefully, you've, since recovered from that, and, the weather is is nice across the country today. Well, looks like we've got a full house here today. And for the sake of time, let's go ahead and get started. Thank you again everyone for for joining. As I mentioned at the top of our call, our webinar today will be focused on turning policy into practice, and specifically around harassment and discrimination prevention in the workplace. My name is Dana Hauffe. I'm an account executive here at Everfi. As I mentioned earlier, I'm based in Charleston, South Carolina. And one of my favorite causes is a local cause here. I'm a a dog mom and and pet lover, and so my favorite cause is the Charleston Animal Society. Pedro is also joining us. Pedro, I'll let you, kick things off on your end. Sure. Thank you, Dana. My my name is Pedro Limon. I am currently at eight years with Everfi. I started off in the implementation team, moved up to professional services. So I have a good understanding on how the system works and how to best integrate it with your systems as well. Back to you, Dana. Thank you, Pedro. So before we begin, just wanted to, mention a few webinar housekeeping items. For the best experience, we we recommend using Chrome or another well known browser. Personally, I'm on Chrome, and I think, Pedro, you're you're using Safari. Microsoft Edge is another, preferred browser, so that'll just give you the best experience. Now if you do experience a lag in the broadcast, make sure that you check your Internet speed and and sometimes closing out other tabs or windows can also help. We do have the chat feature that's located at the top right hand side of your screen. You can use that chat feature just as you did in sharing your locations with us, and, you could speak with, myself or Pedro, and we'll both monitor that chat and and answer your questions accordingly. We also have a q and a option located just beside the the chat function, and that's where you can paste any specific questions. And, again, Pedro and I will will do our best to to answer those. And, again, for any additional troubleshooting help, there is that docs tab, and you can select that and that should help you, as well if you do experience any troubleshooting. That being said, let's go ahead and get started. So, again, today, we're talking about preventing harassment and discrimination in the workplace. And many, many professionals across different industries come to us with many of the same challenges, in today's landscape. And, we've listed them here. Number one, legal compliance. We know legal compliance is extremely important, and it varies from state to state. I see many of you are joining from from states that do have very specific mandates and requirements when it comes to the type of training that your employees must take. So we've made sure that our courses, of course, are designed to be compliant and, satisfy those many different state mandates. We also know that today, it's extremely important to create a positive internal work culture. Right? You you're focused on creating inclusive and respectful works workplaces. And you not only want to engage your employees, but you want to retain your top talent and attract new talent that really ties into that positive culture. We also are hearing that, you know, in tied to engaging, employees and learners want a very easy experience. You wanna navigate through your training, whether it's at self paced, on your own time, and you want content that is intuitive and and feels very relatable to today's environment. We know workplaces are very different today as they were even just several years ago. So in the new hybrid or even virtual environment, you want learners want to see content that really reflects those different workplaces. And one of the most important things I think that we're hearing is to be preventative. We know how costly, incidents can be, and the impact they can have on an organization's reputation. So in being preventative and proactive, our content has been designed to be just in time to ensure that you're able to do that. So I wanna share a couple of polls with you, starting with this first one. And and thinking about some of those things that we're hearing, I'd like to open it up to the audience and and ask which of these is most important to your organization's current training strategy. So I'm gonna share this poll and, give everyone a chance to answer. So the poll is located just in the top right hand side of your screen as well, next to the chat and messages tabs. Let's see. And I'm looking at the poll results now. Looks like we have quite a bit of you, have voted that creating a positive internal culture is important. Yeah. That's very important. And then followed up by legal compliance and preventing incidents. Looks like we're growing more, results now around creating a positive internal culture. Wonderful. I have a second poll for you. And that is when we're thinking ahead into next year, which of these best describes your organization's plans? So whether it's we are and expect to remain a fully remote workplace, are you currently and do you expect to remain hybrid, are you currently and expect to remain fully in office, Are you planning to increase employees office time, or do none of these apply to you? So I've opened the poll now. Love to see, what these results, bring us. Looks like we have a a pretty even spread, between fully remote, hybrid, and in office. Some of you have answered none none of above. Good. Great. And then finally, our last poll, in your opinion, do you think that compared to five years ago, workplace harassment or bullying today has increased in frequency, decreased in frequency, or has it remained about the same? Looks like we have many of you believing that it's increased in frequency. Some of you, yep, decreased in frequency. So pretty pretty evenly spread. Yep. Alright. So let's talk about conflict. And this image here sort of takes a look at conflict and and shows, you know, many of the recognizable types of conflict. But did you know that conflict can also be positive? So when we we think about conflict and we we consider the sort of negative types of conflict that can that one could experience in the workplace, we think about, of course, the the most negative being physical violence. And that's followed by different types of harassment or discrimination. And then disrespect, hostility, negative arguments. But what about the positive types of conflict that can exist? Like, maybe exchanging different ideas or making suggestions, recommendations, even asking questions. And then probably the most positive type of conflict is having a respectful debate, and even providing constructive concerns. So when we think about conflict, yes, the majority of of of conflict that we may experience or even consider can be negative. But let's when we think about conflict, you know, let's also keep in mind that it can be positive and and sharing different ideas. So these key stats here, are are are recent stats and and they can be quite alarming. But when we think about workplace harassment, nearly half the workplace, unfortunately, has experienced workplace harassment in in some type of form, whether it was a verbal abuse, sexual harassment, another type of harassment, discrimination, and bullying. And we've can we've we've seen such an uptick, of course, over the past five years in employees experience workplace harassment. And it has leaders like you questioning, you know, reasons why, you know, why one in four, employees have actually identified as being a target themselves. And according to the EEOC, a majority of harassment cases have gone unreported. And reasons behind that, can vary, often due to maybe fear of of the harasser retaliating or even maybe the victim of harassment, mistrusting in in how they report this this experience that they've had. And let's think about even the consequences that harassment can have on the employer. Right? Victims of workplace discrimination have been awarded a large lumps of of money. So it's certainly a costly impact on on the workplace and, knowing that the impact it has on, you know, almost even half of employees leaving an organization because of an unresolved harassment issue. That's why it's extremely important to be aware of, you know, what what's going on in your workplace and being preventative, having the right systems in place, being proactive in training your employees, how to recognize and spot harassment that does come in many different forms as well as discrimination and the appropriate channels to report when, of course, they do experience this. So in the news, most recently, there's been a shift in in the types of harassment that we're hearing and also on the the work population that is experiencing it. The most I would say the youngest, generation in the work workplace is Gen z. And Gen z workers have reported witnessing harassment at the highest rate. More than half of that were the their population have experienced harassment. And over half of them rely on anonymous reporting. So experts have have asked why is there such an increase in in Gen z employ employees experiencing harassment. And, you know, many believe that because there's been an increase in remote work, this has led to more channels for harassment and discrimination to take place. Thinking about digital and remote harassment. Harassment has seen significant increases in the digital space. These can take place over messaging apps, think about teams or slack, emails, zoom, or virtual calls. Even hybrid environments have made it even more difficult for HR leaders to monitor different types of misconduct, maybe because they're not in the office every day when some of these situations might be taking place. However, hybrid work environments have made it easier for victims to at least document it. So, let's think about the different types of workplace harassment and discrimination. Commonly, we think about verbal harassment as maybe derogatory remarks or language that might be specifically targeted towards, protected characteristics like race, gender identity, age, religion, or disability. And then, of course, physical harassment can be physical threats, even physical contact, even isolation. But what about digital harassment? Things like cyberbullying, cyber stalking, right, ways to create harmful contact. And the the challenge with digital harassment is it can impact targets all the time, right, twenty four seven. We think about digital channels and and the different types of digital channels that can exaggerate these issues. This poll here shows really it's it's pretty evenly spread across chat, email, and video meetings. Productivity, while it does constitute as a channel, it's it's about a quarter, versus nearly half for chat, email, and and video meetings. These channels have just made it easier for for targets to to for victims to be targeted. And additional risk factors in a digital environment are outlined here. Right? There's a lack of maybe in person witnesses. Those who are harassing might feel it a bit more casual and and they feel maybe hidden behind a digital channel. The the lack of of monitoring in these spaces can also lead to that additional risk. Right? There's no guidance sometimes or policies around online behavior and and furthermore, how do do we address it? And then the constant access to employees through digital channels offline, think about social media and more have also opened a gateway for digital, harassment to take place. We have some examples here of, different types of digital harassment that have taken place and and sometimes, they may be subtle or nuanced as you see. Few examples that might stand out are maybe muting or or maybe ignoring someone who's raised their hand. That's a type of discrimination. Maybe texting jokes, funny comments that can also be negative or derogatory. Even a quote here, this one stood out to me. Turn on your camera so I can see your pretty face. Right? It seems wholesome or or kind, but it's actually a form of harassment. Commenting on someone's background, using AI to create offensive content. We've seen certainly an uptick in that. Right? AI is is really changing the way, we communicate, but it also has a a ton of negative, risks involved when it comes to, how we use it. So we have to be mindful of what we're doing and and what we're saying. And we also have to think about, you know, the language that we're using or the comments that we're making and how they may be received. So we've gone through a lot of identifying what is harassment, how it can impact the workplace, and how it can really impact culture. So let's dig a little bit more into your own organizations and identify, does your organization have any of these risks? And this chart here, is again a study that was taken from the EEOC, and it sort of identifies points of risk. And, you know, I I love to open it up to you all to kinda take a moment and and see, do any of these resonate with you? Starting from the top right hand corner, we know when it comes to sales, client satisfaction, employees rely on on customer service and things. So if these are these are channels that can open up risk. Workplaces have significant power disparities. Right? So if we have sort of that that large gap and maybe senior leaders and employees that are under them that can also open up risk for harassment. Right? Maybe a senior leader, is utilizing their power, and it's impacting an employee in a negative manner. There are workplaces, that tolerate or even encourage alcohol consumption. These may be organizations that are in that space. But, of course, we know that alcohol consumption, can can open up the door to unnecessary language, negative comments that can lead, of course, to risk. If there is cultural or or language differences within the workplace, sometimes even subtle comments can can open up risk to to and open that door to to harassment or discrimination. For workplaces that are virtual or or maybe decentralized, if you have employees that are maybe isolated within their home or or, you know, an outside office, shared workspace, they can also experience, harassment. So knowing that that's a risk. And then finally, organizations that maybe superstar or, place high value on specific employees can can lead others to feeling maybe less less welcomed and and maybe not as acknowledged. And, of course, we know that is a type of discrimination. So, again, if any of these resonate with you, I would love to to, you know, see any comments in the chat. Yes, Elizabeth. Thank you so much. Yes. I I I know the EEOC has really identified such really interesting things that we may not even have been aware of that can can serve as potential risks. So what can you do as an organization or as a leader to to make this a priority? So these are just some examples. Again, I'd love to even see other ideas in the chat too, but some some examples or recommendations that that we've we've we share or maybe sending a video or or in person videos to staff from your CEO. A lot of our customers will open up our training with a message welcoming their employees to the course. They may even highlight the reasons why taking this training is so important. Having leader led conversations at meetings, having employees feel empowered and and recognized, and using strong language to ensure that this is a priority, that you you are a a workplace that does not tolerate unwelcome behavior behavior like harassment or discrimination. It starts from leaders and supervisors up, so having them participate in all of the training. So they too can collaborate with their employees and understand what they are learning. Holding employees, all types of employees, including leaders, accountable for their behaviors. You know, if something takes place that is not welcomed, that is not adhered to policy, we wanna make sure that accountability is is highly, focused on. So what are some other approaches for your workplace programs and training? Making training, of course, positive. In our training, when learners are going through even our skill checks or knowledge checks, we take a very positive reinforcement approach. We wanna make sure that we're focusing on upstream behaviors, not just what's illegal, but focusing on positive behaviors that can help avoid any of these non not not tolerated or unnecessary behaviors from taking place. Bystander intervention. The majority of the time, a lot of learners are going to see these types of situations from a bystander's perspective. So having your employees understand that it's more than just see something, say something. Oftentimes, stepping in when the time is right and the, of course, situation allows that bystander to do so can be the most important thing. If the time isn't right, following up with that coworker, ensuring that your peers do feel acknowledged and that you've you've recognized the behavior that's taken place that is not appropriate and being there for them to support them creates a positive workplace. And then, of course, positioning training from the perspective of the bystander or the witness. Understanding why. Why did this take place? As I mentioned, not only are people more likely to witness harassment, but it can also reduce discomfort, or or backlash from learners. I know we went through a lot. So, wanna sort of talk about as as I wrap up what to do, what not to do, and then when issues arise, knowing how to respond. So what can we do before harassment takes place to be preventative and be proactive? Number one, it starts with education. So educating your workforce, whether it's leaders or employees on what is acceptable behavior. And then setting clear expectations, establishing company policies, having employees acknowledge policies, whether it's within their training or even on an annual basis. And then as I mentioned, because so much of this takes place from a bystander's perspective, empowering those bystanders so they know what to do and how to respond. Having a positive workplace culture, we know, is extremely important and then, of course, tying in those legal standards. Whether you live in a state that has very specific, compliance requirements or you wanna sort of mirror those compliance, standards. You can do that, of course, and we're happy to to discuss what those are in the future. If you have any follow-up questions, we're happy to guide what states have specific mandates and so on. What not to do? Don't don't ignore boundaries. Right? We know boundaries are important and sometimes it's those subtle things that press just a little too hard and cross those boundaries and don't make assumptions. Not retaliating, of course, we know is very important. And, yes, if we see something, say something. Don't remain silent because, unfortunately, as we saw in the statistics earlier, many of these do go unreported with fear. So when these issues do arrive do arise, ensure that your employees know how to report, establish that channel of communication, and ensure that a proper investigation is done. Supporting your those individuals that have been victimized is extremely important because we wanna make sure that they are acknowledged. And if they need time, maybe just to reflect on what they've experienced, give them that time to do that and then take corrective action. We know that studies have shown that having appropriate training in place does improve culture. We do see behavior change. It does avoid any of those costly, situations and, of course, ensures that you're retaining your top talent. We're gonna transition over to Pedro, and Pedro is going to share his, demo video and a few additional slides that he has prepared. Pedro, I'll let you take it away. Thank you, Dana. Yes. As Dana mentioned, I did prepare a prerecorded video that will show some informational slides including, portions of our preventing harassment and discrimination bit, course, highlighting some of our important topics as well as some of our key features. Can you please play the video now? Since 02/2008, we've been working with corporations, universities, government agencies, and nonprofit organizations to solve some of the most challenging and critical social issues of today that impact their employees and the communities they serve. Specifically, our workplace training solutions help over 1,000 companies of all shapes and sizes build better workplace cultures through best in class courses. We approach course design through the lens of creating an engaging experience for your learners that maximizes their experience. Our courses are relatable and realistic. Our courses are also developed to ensure that learners are safe to make mistakes and try again, helping them build confidence and competence. We focus on bringing the courses to life with lots of tips and knowledge checks, helping your employees act on what they've learned. Our suite of courses for this topic area is designed to meet state specific content and seat time training requirements for supervisors and non supervisors. We also have condensed content in a non supervisors course covering the highlights called gateway, and we've recently added a gateway for supervisors course upon customer request for that content. The global version of the course has a very similar look and feel to The US version, so the customers with US based and global employees can feel confident knowing that they'll all receive the same content more or less. It's just crafted for specific audiences. Customers can also now finally request a course mod for the global version, like you can for The US version, so that you can add your own content for employees in specific countries. In addition to our global course, we also developed a Canadian version designed to meet training law mandates for federal and provincial territories. Over 1,200,000 learners take our courses every year. And of those that take our flagship preventing harassment and discrimination course, 97% report that they are motivated to promote a positive workplace culture. 88% feel better equipped to make reporting decisions, and 93% feel confident to intervene when they witness harassment. Without further ado, let's get right to our demo for preventing harassment and discrimination in the workplace. Today, I'm going to highlight all of the exciting changes that we've recently made to your preventing harassment and discrimination course. These changes are applicable to the other related content and courses on this topic, including bystander intervention, the global version of the course, and state supplements where applicable. While we are seeing a lot of positive impact from the existing course, these necessary changes ensure that the content remains up to date, engaging, and most importantly, compliant with legal mandates. Without further ado, let's dive in. First, we've improved the accessibility of the course by including a pop up when a learner starts that lets them enable autoplay, as well as audio descriptions that are helpful for those who have visual impairments. This will pause a video momentarily to audibly describe what's happening on screen. In addition to these features, this course was truly designed with screen readers in mind. So learners that leverage them will be very comfortable navigating the content and won't get lost on the page. The revamped course has a more modern, up to date look and feel. You can see diversity in types of employees represented in the thumbnails of each module. We've improved the survey experience for learners by reducing the length and no longer asking demographics questions. This is in direct response to customer feedback. However, like the previous version of the course, we've kept both pre and post course surveys to track knowledge gain and learner sentiment. In terms of the course content, much of it remains the same from the previous version. However, it is configured differently in many cases. This example shows a more interactive version of this page's content because it gives the learner the chance to click on something rather than a large block of text on the screen. Here, you see a new motion graphic that we've added to the course to increase the visual elements and make the content more engaging as opposed to basic text. In this page, you see an example of our efforts to reduce cognitive load in the updated version. In the past, these pages were very text heavy, but we've altered them to be more interactive and grouped topics together, as you can see in this example. We've also made it more clear which content is optional. Let's dive into the demo by first taking a look at our new interview videos featuring subject matter experts and employees across industries. These videos help share real individuals' personal stories of harassment and discrimination issues that they face. I'll first show you a roughly minute long video from our intro module, where experts talk about the importance of anti discrimination efforts in a workplace. There are many positive effects that antidiscrimination efforts can have on the workplace. It helps both employees and employers. For one thing, if employees know that their organization is concerned about discrimination, they may become more engaged. They may trust the organization a little bit more. It can help increase morale and productivity in the organization. The thing about our antidiscrimination efforts is that it's really respecting the individual and treating everyone as, you know, their own person. You're going to have different backgrounds, different experiences, and these leads to different voices, to more creativity, more solutions, varied solutions, which essentially just leads to a better workplace, a better work environment, and everyone just benefits from this. The workplace is for a lot of people. The first place that they're going to encounter someone who looks different than they do. So it benefits everyone, and it keeps us from having workplaces in which we are letting, offensive language or harmful stereotypes get in the way of the work that needs to be done and our ability to work as a cohesive team or community in reaching the goals of our organizations. For our next example, let's look at a video from our supervisor course on preventing retaliation. This is another example of subject matter experts sharing their strategies for handling a particular issue. It is really important for supervisors to actively prevent retaliation from happening if one of their employees has reported an incident at work. And there's several ways that they can do that. Number one, it's important for them to be on the lookout for potential retaliation from other people on the team. If they do spot potential retaliation, it is critical to report that promptly. Second, as a supervisor managing that employee, it's important to be business as usual to the extent possible. You know, after a complaint has been filed, it's not uncommon for supervisors to feel a little uncomfortable around an employee, especially if that employee filed the complaint about the supervisor. They may be wanting to keep them a little bit at arm's length or perhaps not talk to them as often as they used to. But it is really important to be business as usual with that employee. Finally, it's very important in moments where you're providing coaching or feedback or especially during performance evaluation time to take a look at at the coaching and feedback you're giving that employee and make sure it hasn't been impacted by the complaint. So for example, you would not wanna mention the complaint in your performance feedback and make sure that you aren't changing the nature of your feedback based on the complaint. These videos, supplemented by specific stories and scenarios throughout the course, help create trust for learners looking for guidance on more complex situations. In addition to this new video content, let's also review our updated multiple choice scenarios. These resemble actual situations inspired by feedback about common workplace concerns and emerging topics. They are memorable, helping learners practice identifying and responding to inappropriate behavior. This first scenario helps learners practice the skill of awareness and communicating with respect and inclusion. It demonstrates how one can maintain a positive work relationship and reduce tension even if they don't agree with a coworker. This scenario helps learners practice identifying warning signs for problematic behavior that can lead to discrimination. It demonstrates how discrimination can sometimes be subtle, but yet can still have negative effects on an individual. As you can see, Sumiko's supervisor is displaying a lack of understanding about her disability and doesn't support her need for accommodation because it's not visible. Scenarios like this let learners make mistakes in a no risk environment, then learn from feedback. This way, if they find themselves in real situations, it should help them gain confidence to know how to take appropriate action. This kind of content inspires action when they see or experience misconduct, rather than simply helping a learner internalize what harassment, discrimination, and retaliation mean for next steps. Thank you for watching this demonstration of the preventing harassment and discrimination in the workplace. Thank you so much. So as we wrap up, I wanted to share the SHRM activity ID to everyone. You will receive a copy of this in your inbox. I believe it should go out within the next thirty minutes. However, if you'd like to take note of the ID, I have it presented here. Give you all just a a bit just to jot that down. Oh, Pedro, it looks like we might have a question, from Roslyn. Oh, the answer is yes. We do have a different languages available and Spanish is one of them. Thank you all for joining us. Before we wrap up today, and we're running just a a few minutes early, I'd like to open the the floor to any additional questions that you all may have, and we'll be be happy to monitor either the chat or there is a q and a functionality as well. So feel free to to post your questions there, and we will monitor. It doesn't look like we have any questions. So I'd like to thank you all again for joining us today. It was a pleasure and hope you enjoy the rest of your afternoon.