Why raise employee awareness around harassment at the workplace?

Harassment at the workplace affects between 22 and 30% of the French working population, according to the surveys carried out. These figures are constantly increasing. The same trend of year-on-year growth in hostile behaviour and work situations leading to psychological injuries and occupational illnesses can be seen in the figures published by the social security system for accidents at work.

Dysfunctional or organisational problems in the company can lead to a deterioration in working relations between employees and generate tensions. When left unmanaged, these tensions sometimes degenerate into violence. Not being able to do one's job properly, lack of autonomy, lack of room for manoeuvre and/or constraints in terms of working hours or schedule all contribute to the deterioration of the situation encountered by the employee. The lack of social support, solidarity and counter-power in the company also plays a role, both in the occurrence of such violence and in the ability of employees to deal with it.       

Les différentes formes de violences internes au travail peuvent avoir des répercussions importantes et rapides sur la santé physique et psychologique des salariés qui en sont victimes. Elles peuvent également affecter la productivité globale et l’ambiance générale de l’entreprise. 

So why is it important to take action against harassment at the workplace? Why is it important to raise employees' awareness around harassment in the workplace? How to recognise a situation that could be described as harassment? What is the legal framework and what are the penalties?

Why is it essential to take action against harassment in the workplace?

This is mainly for reasons of employee health and safety, sometimes for reasons of productivity and for reasons of civil and criminal liability of the employer in particular.

• From a health point of view, a situation of harassment may initially cause symptoms of stress: nervousness, irritability, anxiety, sleep disorders, heartburn, high blood pressure, muscular pains, hypervigilance or hyperactivity, fatigue, consumption of alcohol or psychotropic drugs, etc. When this situation persists, without any support or consideration, these symptoms can turn into full-blown psychological or somatic disorders after a few months, sometimes leading to suicide;
• For employer's liability reasons, as it is the employer's responsibility (Labour Code) to protect the physical and mental health of the company's employees.

The employer has a free hand in choosing the means to be used to prevent and raise awareness around this type of behaviour among employees. The scientific literature on work has for a long time developed studies and reflections, tools to help employers and those responsible for designing and implementing work organisations in the company, to apprehend these situations and prevent them, in particular in the context of risk assessment.  (Gollac Report - Measuring psychosocial risk factors at work to control them for example).

Definition of harassment

Moral harassment is one of the forms of internal violence that can be encountered in the workplace, within a company. This psychological and sometimes physical violence refers not only to situations of moral or sexual harassment but also to situations of exacerbated conflict between colleagues, work teams, etc. 

The Labour Code and the Criminal Code define moral harassment in the workplace as repeated acts which have the purpose or effect of causing a deterioration in the working conditions of the person experiencing such acts, and which may : 

• infringe on their rights and dignity, 
• d’altérer sa santé physique ou mentale 
• or endanger their professional future 

How to recognise a situation of harassment?

Three cumulative conditions are necessary to recognise a situation of moral harassment:

• Repeated acts (at least two) ;
• AND a decline in working conditions;
• AND an infringement of the victim's rights or health ( which has occurred or is likely to occur).

Case law has clarified and reinforced the outlines of this definition, in particular with regard to the intentional or unintentional nature, number of acts, nature of the acts, and whether or not harassment acts are organisation-related or institution-related.

• Vexatious behaviour ;
• Repeated or single serious conduct ;
• Remarks, gestures or infringement of the employee's dignity or integrity ; 
• Misuse of work organisation authority ;

What are the sanctions against such behaviour?

In industrial relations, the recognition of moral harassment by the judges leads to the nullity of the dismissal and is not subject to a ceiling on compensation. For work-related accidents and illnesses, this may constitute inexcusable fault on the part of the employer.

De plus, l’employeur est en obligation de sanctionner un salarié coupable de harcèlement moral.  Celui qui ne le ferait pas n’a pas assuré son obligation de sécurité de résultat et peut être accusé de négligence.

Why raise employee awareness around harassment at the workplace?

Sensibiliser et former ses salariés sur ces sujets permet de diminuer le risque que ce genre de comportements se produise ou se reproduise par la suite. Les collaborateurs reconnaîtront plus facilement ce genre d’agissements et seront comme réagir qu’ils soient victimes ou témoins.

It can also contribute to the measures taken by the employer to prevent this risk and, under certain conditions, to limit the responsibility for it. In addition to being an obligation for the company, it helps to ensure employees' healthy working conditions and better collective productivity.

Work and play and Souffrance et Travail: the Blended Learning course on harassment

Work and play and Souffrance et Travail have created a training course based game-based learning, specially designed for raising awareness about harassment at work. This training includes 5 different scenarios. Each mission will introduce learners to a different point of view to better understand what harassment is and will give them, through a number of small activities, concrete elements to act in such situations, by taking on the roles of manager, colleague, internal investigator, defendant or victim. They will experience five real-life adventures in which they will be the protagonists.

Are you ready? Now it's up to you!

For the ones who want to know more about our courses and test the demo, please click here.