Ask HR: Sexual Harassment via text


Dear HR,

We have a female employee who has reported being sexually harassed after hours by male employee. Our on site manager was able to obtain copies of the text messages and verified the phone number.

Due to the nature of the messages and the female employee being scared we let her go home and we waited before sending the other employee home only telling them they would be contacted by Cardinal on Monday.

Help! What’s next?

 

askHRAnswer:

Thankfully after reviewing the communication log of the incident that the manager submitted this is a fairly straight forward situation.

The proof was in the text messages that were very one sided (from the male employee) and confirmed via interviewing both employees. Due to the seriousness of the text messages, we terminated the male employee.

We recommend following up with sensitivity training with the rest of the crew to avoid the situation reoccurring in the future.