The Equal Employment Opportunity Commission expects general contractors to take the lead in preventing workplace racial and sexual harassment in the construction industry, part of recently released guidelines that call for a committed leadership against harassment, clear procedures for complaints and effective ways of ensuring compliance. raised and investigated.
Construction-specific details include specific recommendations to avoid taunting someone who performs a dangerous task, vandalizing a worker’s toolbox, or retaliation that includes assignments to less desirable work shifts.
The new EEOC document, “Promising Practices to Prevent Harassment in the Construction Industry,” does not have the force of law or add new mandates for employers, but it is the result of agency hearings that showed extensive construction harassment, he says.
The document describes a holistic approach in which project owners, crew leaders and union stewards “send messages and demonstrate clearly, frequently and unequivocally that harassment is prohibited.”
Many construction employers already have anti-harassment policies and procedures in place, but the EEOC document captures much of what is being done and goes further to describe other steps they might take in the future .
For example, anti-harassment policies and practices should be required in contract bids, the commission says.
The measures should also include a discipline policy that is “prompt, consistent and proportionate to the seriousness of the harassment or related misconduct, such as retaliation,” the EEOC document states.
Training in spectator intervention
Among the prevention measures planned for general contractors is bystander intervention training, which the document says “typically enables bystanders to recognize problem behaviors, motivates them to intervene, conducts skill-building exercises to provide [them] with the tools and confidence to step in, and provide [them] with the resources they can turn to [to] to support his intervention”.
Training could include interventions such as “getting other people together, including those in positions of authority, to step in and check in with the harassed person.”
An anti-harassment policy, the EEOC wrote, should include a “clear description of the prohibited conduct, with examples tailored to the work environment, such as making fun of coworkers when they perform a difficult task or dangerous, or vandalizing Black Workers’ toolboxes or personal protective equipment.”
“Certain conduct is more likely to constitute unlawful harassment when it occurs in high-risk environments such as construction,” the EEOC continued.
The commission also makes specific recommendations for unions to commit to harassment-free workplaces, including “consistently fulfilling the commitment to prevent and remedy harassment in their governing documents and negotiated labor agreements.”
