In most organizations today, an employee spends close to 8 to 10 hours at the workplace. In some other organizations, depending on the industry, this also goes up to 12 to 15 hours. Given that these employees spend half of their lives at the workplace, it is natural that they would have social conversations with colleagues that keep them engaged and connected with each other.
In fact, senior officials in several organizations are often tasked with conducting activities, team-building exercises, games, etc. to ensure interaction between employees, as this ensures better teamwork, coordination, an active mind, and also keeps employees prepared for long hours of work. Such activities also present the overall idea that the work environment is happy and friendly.
However, depending on their comfort level with each other, when social conversations take place, many colleagues often become friends, which leads them to have friendly discussions and share details related to their personal lives, likes, dislikes, jokes, funny incidents, etc. (including sharing jokes with a sexual connotation, discussing sexual habits, experiences, etc.). This is also the time when the line between social and personal conversations begins to blur, thereby causing difficulty for an individual to pre-empt which conversations or jokes become unwelcome or unacceptable to the other person. And when conversations become unwelcome, two things happen: (1) it leads to shock and disbelief for the person making such a conversation who believes it was ‘friendly’ sometimes even to the extent of confusion, leading to the continuation of such behavior; and (2) it leads the recipient of the conversation to feel uncomfortable, even to the extent of feeling that it is an invasion into their private life. If the comfort level is such that the colleagues share their discomfort with each other and such conversations are stopped, then it may not lead to future problems; however, if the relationship is such that the discomfort arising from such conversations is not shared (due to fear of being judged or laughed at, etc.), such unwelcome behaviour continues, which eventually leads the recipient to feel frustrated and feel that the work environment has become unfriendly or ‘hostile’. If this is not addressed on time, it may also lead to the filing of complaints of sexual harassment if the recipient does not choose to simply leave the organization.
What is the solution? While stopping colleagues from having conversations may not be good for the business or the colleagues, having regular awareness sessions may be a good starting point to deal with such situations—to make employees aware that having conversations is good and having the right kind of conversation is also something to keep in mind. They should be told about individual boundaries and a healthy work environment, what a hostile work environment may mean for an individual, and that it is okay to share it with their colleagues if they are uncomfortable with having certain kinds of discussions.
Another important reason for having these sessions regularly is that in modern times, where workplaces are shifting to a more open culture with employee work stations being more open instead of having cabins, it has become important to understand concepts such as hostile work environments. Often, the connection between a hostile work environment and sexual harassment is not very clear, as sexual harassment is commonly understood to be something that one person does to another directly, and a hostile work environment is often given a more liberal interpretation, as it is commonly understood as fun or workplace banter or ‘boys will be boys’ behaviour. While the open work stations etc. come along with several positives, making it difficult for quid pro quo sexual harassment to exist, it does not insulate the employer from a hostile work environment kind of situation because open work stations mean open conversation, which could mean overhearing of gossip about others or themselves, being made fun of in big groups, etc., feeling left out or being bullied, especially if these discussions are of a sexual nature and the recipient is uncomfortable having such conversations. Awareness sessions, thus, bring the required understanding and maturity to employees by informing them about sexual harassment and hostile work environments, their connections, and the consequences of creating a hostile work environment.