Survey shows 44% of women have been sexually harassed at work, companies not doing enough to support victims

Just days after retail giant David Jones was hit with a $37 million sexual harassment claim, a new survey suggests 44% of Australian women have been harassed at work, with 62% saying they believed companies do not do enough to support those who make a harassment allegation.

The survey of 505 women, taken by cosmetics company Heat Group, also suggest that many of David Jones’ female customers don’t believe the company on a key part of its defence against the harassment claim, with 77% of respondents saying the believed that management were aware of the unacceptable behaviour of former CEO Mark McInnes but failed to take action.

The survey results come after a weekend of developments in the case against David Jones, which was launched last week by former publicist Kristy Fraser-Kirk.

While reports emerged yesterday that David Jones had offered to settle the case, Fraser-Kirk was forced to go on the attack over what she described as a “smear” campaign from Sydney’s Sunday Telegraph newspaper.

Fraser-Kirk and her team preempted The Sunday Telegraph newspaper article by saying the paper had “asked several questions of our client, which by their very nature, are designed to smear her by snidely implying that she is a serial complainer.”

Fraser-Kirk admitted she had made a complaint against a superior while working at NSW Police but said the matter was “was totally resolved during [an] informal meeting”.

Heat Group founder Gillian Franklin says that while the size of Fraser-Kirk’s claim was “excessive”, it would help to shine a light on the issue of sexual harassment for Australian business.

“I would be surprised if this is not on the agenda of every board meeting around Australia right now,” she says.

Franklin said the most disappointing result from the survey was the fact that women don’t feel their employers support people who make a sexual harassment claim.

Franklin, whose company recently won a four-year discrimination and harassment case, says having a clear and well-understood process in place to deal with complaints was essential.

Under the Heat model, a number of employees from different parts of the company, different managerial levels and of different genders have been nominated to receive complaints from staff to ensure workers can find someone they are comfortable talking to.

The company also holds performance reviews every six months, where staff are given the chance to review the performance of their boss and write down any emerging issues.

However, while Franklin says these processes and procedures helped Heat win its recent case, a better result is not having complaints made at all.

“There needs to be a culture that everybody understands. If you have a culture that says ‘this is not appropriate’ behaviour, then women will feel more comfortable making a complaint.”

As well as having clear policies on the issue of harassment, Franklin says managers should educate staff with clear, real-life examples of what women consider to be acceptable and what is not, to ensure all workers know where the line is.

“There needs to be a culture that everybody understands. If you have a culture that says “this is not appropriate” behaviour, then women will feel more comfortable making a complaint.”