How The Workplace Harassment Advisory Standard Works For You
You’ve been at work and seen the signs: a look that unnerves someone; a touch that was unwanted; hostile, offensive words that were uncalled for; threatening actions. All these are signs which point to harassment in the workplace. Everywhere you go, people face hardships when they must deal with colleagues who may bother them and prevent them from being able to execute their duties, or enjoy their work time, or even make people fearful of coming to work at all, knowing the sense of dread which looms over them and the day at the workplace. In Australia, such concerns helped lead to the creation of the Prevention of Workplace Harassment Advisory Standard. This law – now referred to as a Code of Practice – lists info on policies along with just what your workplace should include in its own policy. One thing to keep in mind is that any harassment policy should include consistency alongside the health and safety policies already implemented by your office. It needs to be clear and understandable, and on open display. Support must come for it from management, and the policy needs to be properly followed, as well as applied consistently, in a fair and just fashion. It also needs to be relevant to the environment of the workplace and employees and crafted with input from the workforce. There are also laws such as the Workplace Health and Safety Act which obligates employers to make sure that their workers are in a healthy, safe environment that isn’t hindered or disrupted by a particular person or group of people. If the Act contains a code of practice regarding a particular risk to the employees’ well being, then that code must either be followed or must be replicated by standards which provide equal protections. Basically, you are experiencing workplace harassment if you are dealing with unwanted, unsolicited behavior coming from colleagues or superiors. This definition of workplace harassment doesn’t happen to include sexual harassment, nor would it cover discrimination based on age, race, ethnicity, or such; these are addressed by other laws. Primarily, the Advisory Standard handles cases of intimidation, humiliating and abusive actions, and acts of sabotage, among other incidents. In order to qualify as harassment, actions must repeated, and must involve issues irrelevant to the workplace and unrelated to actual job performance or such, unless performance issues are carried out with negative intent. The effects of workplace harassment can bring down not merely the performance of an individual, but that of a whole department – and perhaps eventually, the entire company. Following the Workplace Harassment Advisory Standard is a way to ensure that these things don’t happen to you or your workplace.
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