Does Your Sexual Harassment Prevention Training Prevent Sexual Harassment?Dear HR Professional: You want your employees to participate in Sexual Harassment Prevention training that has a proven record of influencing attendees to take appropriate action (such as talk with a manager and/or consult human resources) and not ignore sexual harassment. Training Q and A Consulting offers such a program. Data Collection A total of 687 people were surveyed before and after attending a two-hour Sexual Harassment Prevention Training program conducted by Training Q and A Consulting to determine the action they would pursue if they felt sexually harassed. Training program participants were mixed groups of males and females, managers and non-managers, from all departments of several different organizations. Group sizes ranged from fifteen to fifty attendees. All training programs had identical topic agendas. At each training session, after introductory remarks, the facilitator made the following statement to the group: “Assume for a moment that you currently feel you are being sexually harassed at work. On a scale of 1 to 5, with 1 being highly unlikely and 5 being highly likely, write on the blank piece of paper in front of you the probability that you would take each of the following six actions: (1) talk to a manager (assuming he or she is not the harasser); (2) report the incident to human resources; (3) contact an attorney; (4) confront the harasser; (5) ignore the behavior; or (6) discuss the incident with a co-worker.” Trainees were asked not to put their names on their papers to maintain anonymity and confidentiality. Trainees then attended a two-hour instructor-led Sexual Harassment Prevention classroom training program conducted by Training Q and A Consulting. At the conclusion of the two-hour session, just before distributing reaction evaluation sheets, the trainees were asked to take out the piece of paper they had previously completed and revisit their answers to the hypothetical situation: What would they do if they felt they were being sexually harassed at work? They were asked to write their new (post-training) 1 to 5 ratings for each action next to their original (pre-training) rating, even if it was the same as their original response. All papers were collected. Data Results and Analysis All trainee pre- and post-training mean scores for each action were compiled and analyzed for statistically significant differences. Statistically significant differences would indicate divergence that is not likely the result of a random event. For the option talking to a manager, the mean pre-training rating was 3.4, as compared to a mean post- training rating of 3.7, a statistically significant change at p <0.001. For the option reporting the incident to human resources, the mean pre-training rating was 3.1, as compared to a mean post-training rating of 3.7, a statistically significant change at p <0.001. For the option contacting an attorney, the mean pre-training rating was 1.8, as compared to a mean post-training rating of 2.0, a statistically significant change at p<0.01. For the option confronting the harasser, the mean pre-training rating was 3.8, as compared to a mean post-training rating of 4.0, a statistically significant change at p<0.001. For the option ignoring the behavior, the mean pre-training rating was 2.5, as compared to a mean post-training rating of 2.2, a statistically significant change at p<0.001. Summary Before attending Sexual Harassment Prevention training, trainees anticipated that if they were confronted with sexually harassing behavior, they would respond, in descending order of preference, in the following ways:
After attending Sexual Harassment Prevention training, trainees anticipated that if they were confronted with sexually harassing behavior, they would respond, in descending order of preference, in the following ways:
Results indicate that the Sexual Harassment Prevention Training program conducted by Training Q and A Consulting achieved the goal of increasing the likelihood that attendees would contact a manager and/or human resources if sexually harassed. The training program also achieved the goal of decreasing the likelihood that trainees would ignore sexually harassing behavior. You want your employees to participate in Sexual Harassment Prevention training that, as advertised, reduces the chances for sexual harassment to occur. Contact Training Q and A Consulting for more information. I look forward to hearing from you. Regards,
Michael Moskowitz
Contact Training Q and A Consulting for more information.
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