To think this is predatory behaviour?

[hotelheartbreak]

I run a team in a very male dominated environment, one of my youngest female team members was being chatted up at a bar at the weekend by an older man (20 + her senior). Conversation turned to work and discovered he is the GM for one of our active clients, in his intoxicated state he suggested he would like to offer her a job, but only so he wouldn’t be able to keep his hands off her and would be ‘F**king her’ in the office. She felt embarrassed and didn’t know what to say as she didn’t want to do anything that implicated her in a situation she was uncomfortable with. She was polite, declined his job offer and left for another bar. She told me this on Monday morning, she was clearly rattled and worried this might look bad on her as she accepted a drink from him in an expensive bar.
He has since emailed and messaged her on LinkedIn in the space of a few hours, asking her for coffee / lunch this week.
AIBU to think this guy is a total creep, is being predatory and should be reported to his own HR department? I don’t really care if we lose work, just think that’s appalling. I’ve told her to block him, while I calm down and work out what to do!

Then the OP had better start looking for a new job at the same time.
"I don't care if we do lose work" is a career wrecker.

Conversely if he is found to be the next big sexual predator and she knew this and didn't warn their HR she might have some consequences too.

He is the one with the bad behaviour here and it would be highly unlikely his HR hadn't heard of him doing this, or similar, before. Often they want a reason to get rid of these dinosaurs who are on inflated salaries with few up to date skills, who make people in the office feel uncomfortable.

@vitalityvix I clarified the context as to many it had seemed a workplace event.

I agree with you and stated that the follow up communications are an issue and should be reported if they persist.

This man behaved terribly.

From a legal standpoint, if he repeated the transactional job offer verbally or in writing then it would likely meet the threshold for quid pro quo harassment.

In my view, the initial follow up lunch invitation would be unlikely to meet the legal threshold of harassment. However, further invitations may meet the threshold. The case is strengthened if she rejects him but this is not essential for a strong claim.

Agreed that the employer has duty of care to protect the employee in question from the toxicity and potentially initimidatory behaviour of this man bleeding over from the social setting into the professional setting.

Everyone knew about Jeffrey Epstein and still looked the other way and I can't believe that some mnetters are still advocating looking the other way. Shame on you.

This is 3rd party sexual harassment which needs to be reported to your own HR department. If they know what they are doing they will then take it up with the man's employer.

I think that at the moment what you can do is limited.

He's not in your company so there is no disciplinary process to access, and I think going so far as to contact his higher ups is not (yet) indicated.

Once they realised their work connection he was inappropriate to say what he did. If he had left it there you could chalk it up to stupid drunkenness, but the fact that he's followed it up the next day (when he should be at home feeling mortified) turns it into real creep territory.

However, I think the real first step is for her to respond and say something like, "Sorry, I don't date people who I have a professional connection to," and see if he then leaves it alone. If so I'd leave it there, although you should make sure you have an email or something where she has told you what happened and keep it on file.

If he pushes her, I'd send it upward in your own organisation for someone to deal with, closer to his own level. I don't think it really matters how they do this as long at it is effective, but again, make sure you have written receipts.

Op you have a duty to report this to your own employer as 3rd party sexual harassment of someone you manage.

Any other advice is, with respect, irrelevant although im sure its all helpful to you personally in some way.

Make sure you report it in a way thats documented to cover your arse.

It's obvious and blatant sexual harassment and you should absolutely report it to your own HR department if you have one.

Employers have a duty of care towards employees and if they are being exposed to harassment or abuse by a third party as a result of their work, the employer needs to protect from that. The days of 'Well, Debbie just needs to put up with sexual harassment (or racist comments or homophobia or whatever else) because he's a client and we can't rock the boat' are long gone, thankfully.

Except it’s not ‘because of her work’, but because of a coincidental meeting in a bar, out of work time and not at a work-related event, during which the woman permitted the man to buy her a drink.
If the man uses his position as a client of the firm she works for to pressurise or harass the woman, it is an HR matter, but surely not otherwise. The OP’s employee sounds pretty naive.

The man is a client of the company the employee works for, and he knew this when he offered her a job so he could fuck her.

Whether the employee accepted a drink is completely irrelevant.

Therefore, this is 100% 3rd party sexual harassment and op has a duty to report it to her employer.

He's awful. I tend to think if he'd said these things to her and then, when she declined and left, he'd left it alone, your duty of care to her would simply be to ensure she was not working on his business and definitely not engaging with him professionally in any way.

the cat that he's now contacting her on LinedIn and inviting her out inappropriately means that you do have to do something.

I had a similar situation with a young female employee a few years ago. My boss and I were both very happy to take it further and agreed that either he would go to the man's boss or I would go directly to the man (who was at my sort of level). The team member said she did not want us to do that in the first instance, but we all agreed that she would never be expected to deal with him in any way again. That worked for her as he did NOT try to contact her again at any point. My manager and I had also told her that we would respet her preference here but only as long as he did not attempt anything further, which she agreed with.

I would be inclined to do similar here. If you can, remove her from any need to engage with his business, or if not, figure out if you need guardrails. But, as he IS contacting her, you need to go to him or to his manager and say that the beavuour is inappropriate and unprofessional and it must stop. YOu will have a better idea than I do on where and how to do this.

I might want to have a chat with someone in HR about this and then email afterwards to confirm what they said.

If it was just a random sleazy guy that would obviously not be necessary but he’s senior in a client organisation and he’s taking it further - which makes it more significant and also more delicate.

Anyway I’d say “consult” HR rather than “report” to HR - you would be seeking views on how best to handle this as her manager. Nothing wrong with that, I seek input from HR on staffing issues regularly.