Employers are under pressure to address workplace sexual harassment. It is thought by many to be the most important story of an already tumultuous year. Blanket statements about a zero-tolerance policy toward sexual harassment sound good. However, executing this type of policy is a nightmare without clear standards regulating what is prohibited and how it will be enforced. In other words, you can’t measure what you can’t define.
Source: Human Resource Executive, April 2018, page 26.
The variation in views as to what constitutes sexual harassment means that leaders have to begin by recognizing that no standard is going to make everyone happy. Also, the broader the standard, the more difficult it is to enforce because more judgments are involved, and the appropriate redress becomes more difficult.
Also see: Sexual harassment in veterinary medicine: Who cares?, VIN News Service, February 18, 2018. No group spearheads anti-harassment effort for the profession.