Iowa Hostile Work Environment
Posted by Tamara
Jon’s boss is a jerk who micro-manages, yells, and throws things. She verbally abuses workers of both sexes and of all ages, races, colors, religions, and national origins.
Is she creating a “hostile work environment?”
Betty’s boss has had it in for her ever since Betty began “slipping” and making some errors on the job. One of Betty’s mistakes cost the firm more than $7,300, and Betty is afraid her boss is out to fire her.
Is Betty’s boss creating a “hostile work environment?”
The answer in both cases is “no.”
Many workers and employers in Iowa would have gotten this one wrong, because the concept of the hostile work environment is one of the most misunderstood in the Human Resources field.
Why does neither of these cases amount to the creation of a hostile work environment?
It is because neither one meets the two major criteria. In order for action to be considered the creation of a hostile work environment, two conditions must be met:
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An employee is the target of negative behavior by a supervisor or co-worker because of his or her sex, age, color, race, disability, national origin, pregnancy or religion.
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The employer knows about the activity but is making no attempt to stop it.
No matter how obnoxious or incompetent a manager may be, if the two criteria are not met, the behavior would not amount to the creation of a hostile working environment.
The Equal Opportunity Employment Commission (EEOC) is the federal enforcement body for complaints regarding hostile work environments.
Here are two cases won by the EEOC demonstrating how costly hostile work environment complaints can be.
An executive chef at a hotel in Lisle, Illinois regularly called his Latino employees “dumb Mexicans” and “wetbacks.” At a Pennsylvania bakery, and African-American worker was repeatedly subjected to racial slurs by co-workers, including the n-word. The employee complained to management, but the behavior continued.
In both cases, EEOC found a hostile work environment had been created. The companies in both instances paid out more than $1 million per worker for allowing a hostile work environment to continue.
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