A lot of sexual harassment lawsuits focus on toxic workplace culture. That’s because Florida workplaces and employers are required to offer their employees a workplace that is free of offensive, sexualized banter and sexual harassment.
Every employee has the right to feel comfortable in their workplace. This includes employers taking care of basic things such as hiring an Office Cleaning business to regularly keep the place sanitized and hygienic, providing basic health and first aid needs, fostering a productive and communicative environment, and so on.
Workplaces today are not the sweatshops of old. Providing the minimum standard of care is mandatory for employers. Whilst this constitutes comfortable furniture from a place like Office Monster, it also means mental wellbeing within the office should be diligently monitored by employers. In some situations, workplace culture serves to promote this bad behavior. Employers have a legal duty to squelch this kind of culture as soon as it rears its ugly head.
Here’s what to look for to determine if you believe that your workplace culture is “toxic”:
- Women don’t receive promotions while men always seem to get opportunities and raises.
- Maternity and paternity leave policies are outdated, and employees feel like they’re being discouraged from taking time off for the birth of a baby, even though it’s their legal right to do so.
- Flirty comments are frequent and make you feel uncomfortable. If you complain, you hear someone say “That’s just how things are at this office.” or “Come on, it was just a joke.”
- Women are constantly being commented on regarding their clothing and appearance rather than a job well done and good work ethic.
- After work events tend to be boy’s club events. It tends to just be the men who come, and the banter tends to be about women, with lots of raunchy jokes.
- Male salaries outpace female salaries notably..
- Go-getter female employees are referred to as aggressive and moody, while the male employees are referred to as motivated and passionate.
- Female complaints don’t receive action, while male complaints are listened to and taken seriously.
- Female job applicants only get the job to meet quotas to build the appearance of a diverse workplace, but in reality, they are not respected once they get the job.
Are you being subjected to toxic work environment? If those conditions have lead to discrimination, being sexually harassed or if you just have a feeling that they are “not right,” a Florida employment law attorney can review the facts of your case to determine what can be done.
Source: Entrepreneur, “10 Signs You’ve Got a Toxic Workplace Culture, Bro,” Amol Sarva and Jenny Fielding, accessed Sep. 20, 2017
