What a Good Sexual Harassment Training Should Include

Presented by Jennifer Hancock, author

of The Bully Vaccine

What is the Point?Harassment Training is designed to prevent abusive behavior in the workplace.

We all sit in a room once every 2 years and are told it’s against the law, so don’t do it.

It doesn’t work & nothing changes

We all know that.

So, why do we do it?

The truth about harassment training

Harassment training is conducted to help provide legal cover for a

company.

Harassment/bullying and retaliation are really hard to

stop.

So hard that despite our best intentions, people still get

bullied and harassed.

Training doesn’t stop that – but it at least shows the company

is doing it’s best to protect employees

It doesn’t have to be that way

We can use science to get these behaviors to stop!

Topics and information that should be included if you want

your sexual harassment training to

actually stop harassment

State or Country Specifics3 US States have laws requiring sexual harassment training. (CA, ME, CT)

Canada and Australia also have laws regarding training

These laws require that specific information be taught.

If you are in one of these places, make sure the course is specific to your state

General Information About the LawA good sexual harassment training will include information about the law

• What sexual harassment is

• Who is covered by the law• How to seek remedy if

your rights have been violated

Your Harassment PolicyThe main purpose of this training is to prevent harassment & retaliation in the workplace.

However, if you fail to do that, harassment training will also help you prove to a judge – well – at least you tried.

For this reason – it’s important that you include a copy of your organizations harassment policy so that you can prove that the employee in question had been formally told – not to do that.

Specific ExamplesIt’s also a good idea to provide examples of the sorts of behavior that is prohibited.

You might be surprised at how clueless some people are at not realizing their abusive behavior is, you know, abusive!

Will any of this information prevent bullying/harassment or retaliation

from happening? • Telling people it’s

against the law isn’t enough to change behavior

• People who are abusive don’t realize their behavior is problematic

• They have no incentive to change

No! Of

course

not.

Which is why you also need to include…

Specific training on how to stop abusive

behaviorThis is why California changed it’s law in 2015 (AB 2053) to require that harassment training now include “specific training and education on how to prevent abusive conduct,”

But what does this mean?It means that

harassment training that covers the law and

nothing else, is no longer compliant.

It also means that HR managers need to learn

what it takes to get harassment and other

abusive behavior to stop because – it’s no longer

just about sexual harassment!

How do you get abusive behavior to stop?Use Behavioral Psychology

Specifically an Operant Conditioning technique called:

Extinguishing a Behavior

Note: This is the only known way to get unwanted behaviors to stop. There is no other method that works.

There is decades of research on this subject that backs this up. Don’t believe me? Look it up!

How does it work?An Extremely Simplified Explanation of the Technique1) Remove the reward2) This triggers an

escalation of behavior known as an extinction burst

3) Keep not rewarding the behavior until the bully blows out

The most important part!Retaliation!

Whenever you try to extinguish unwanted behavior, you trigger an escalation of behavior known as an extinction burst. This usually manifests in bullying and harassment situations as retaliation.

What you need to understand is that this is predicted to occur and any strategy to stop it needs to take this fact into account!

How can I tell if my training program teaches this?

Does your training program include any behavioral information?Does the training pay specific attention to the retaliation dynamic and teach you how to control it?Do they use the words operant conditioning in their training?

How can you learn more?Professional Development Training:• Perfect for HR and

training professionals • We are an HRCI & SHRM

approved provider of continuing education credits.

Hire us to conduct your harassment training!• Convenient• Online• Facilitated• Full Reporting• Customizable• Includes expert training

on behavioral conditioning

https://humanistlearning.com