While the term sexual harassment has been in widespread use since the 1970s, some experts say employers still fail to adequately train employees on what constitutes improper behavior and it’s putting businesses at risk. 

Incidents occur despite ever-increasing regulations on mandatory workplace training, they say. 

“What’s happened is it has become a check-the-box exercise for the employers; it’s just another training that these employees all have to have,” said Renee Noy, co-owner of Calabasas, California-based WorkWise Law P.C., which provides training.

Companies often underestimate the risk of sexual harassment, mainly because they have a policy in place, she said. 

“Nobody ever believes that this stuff happens because it’s insane that it does happen,” Ms. Noy said. “You would think with all these new rules and the zero tolerance policies that so many companies now have to have, or internally decide to have, that it would start to diminish a little bit, but it really hasn’t. It’s just gotten really, really bad.” 

Government statistics show sexual harassment cases fell slightly in 2020 and 2021, but experts attribute that to the drop in attendance at offices and other workplaces during the pandemic (see chart). 

In a recent workplace sexual harassment case, the 9th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals in San Francisco in June overturned an earlier ruling and found that loud “sexually graphic, violently misogynistic” music blared throughout the workplace can be considered sexual harassment. 

In Stephanie Sharp et al. v. S&S Activewear LLC, eight former employees — seven women and one man working at a Reno, Nevada, location — sued apparel manufacturer S&S Activewear after they repeatedly complained of blasted music that denigrated women, glorified prostitution and described extreme violence. The sounds from commercial-strength speakers placed throughout S&S’ 700,000-square-foot warehouse were considered “motivational” music for workers, according to court papers. 

Mark Mausert, a Reno-based lawyer who represented the plaintiffs in the case, said most companies have an anti-sexual harassment policy, but “usually what the companies have is a policy on a page in the personnel manual and it’s not enforced.” 

“When you think about some rap music, it’s the implicit message that negates any training or any policy or any instructions that you’ve given,” he said, adding that the lyrics sometimes include details of graphic acts of violence toward women. The warehouse workers, in their complaint, said the music prompted male workers to imitate sexual acts. 

S&S did not return requests for comment. It does, however, tout employee-friendly policies on its website. 

Richard Chapman, a Chicago-based employment litigation attorney with Clark Hill PLC who conducts sexual harassment training as a managing member of the training company Chapman Associates, said companies with no follow-through or disconnected sexual harassment training will see it manifested in the organization’s culture. 

“If it’s just, ‘Here, sign a form, check in the box,’ then that’s what employees see,” he said. “Because they see it’s not important to the firm, and I think that’s a pervasive feeling that people have.” 

Camille Oakes, Atlanta-based president and CEO of Better Safety LLC, which provides safety training, said that despite more and more training being mandated in many states and municipalities, “it feels like there’s been no change.” 

Of training, she said, “there’s a concept in safety called work as prescribed versus work as done. There’s the stuff that we say we’re going to do on paper and then there’s the stuff that we actually do.” 

Often, training materials don’t relate to job sites where they are used, said Kathleen Dobson, Detroit-based safety director at Alberici Constructors Inc. 

Citing the example of videos that show harassment in an office setting, she said, “People on our job sites don’t act that way. They don’t respond that way. They don’t interact that way. And, so, that just becomes 20 minutes where people can just snooze off because it’s not relevant to them.” 

Ms. Dobson continued: “They need real people talking about real situations, bringing up the dirty little secrets that all construction companies have, where they can say, ‘Hey, on this occasion 15 years ago we had a problem with sexual harassment and here’s what happened, here’s how we dealt with it and we’ve learned from it.’” she said. 

Lance Ewing, vice president of enterprise risk management and operations for the San Manuel Band of Mission Indians in Highland, California and a longtime risk professional, said companies should audit themselves on compliance and follow through. 

“There’s the spirit of the law and then there’s the actual letter of the law, and we think in this case, you’ve got to be in the spirit of the law and make sure that it gets down to the hundreds of thousands of employees,” he said. “Do you need to reach all of them? Yes. And ask yourself, ‘Is this a concrete block in our defense wall if something would happen?’” 

Updating policies to stay ahead is also vital, said Michael Schmidt, a New York-based labor and employment attorney with Cozen O’Connor P.C. 

“We are seeing ever-changing standards on dealing with sexual harassment and other types of harassment,” he said. “Companies not only need to look at their actual policies, but they need to look at the training that they’re giving to make sure that they’re doing what needs to be done and keeping up with changes in the law in their jurisdictions.” 

And training, Ms. Oakes said, is only one piece of the puzzle; firing offensive workers is something companies are reluctant to do but should, she said. 

“You can’t change a person by sending them through a computer-based training that tells them, ‘Don’t be racist, don’t be homophobic, don’t be sexist,’ because it’s already in them,” she said. “So, sometimes, if we really want to change culture we have to get rid of the people that are doing it.”