Sexual harassment allegations and sex of investigator

[SophieHMS]

If you lodged a complaint at work against a man, of sexual harassment, would the sex of the investigator matter to you?

If one believes a man is less likely to perceive sexual harassment, to minimise it, it to victim-blame, then one would want a woman investigator.

But that choice is itself discriminatory, surely?

Not all women are as alive to sex inequalities as others and there may well be an "enlightened"/aware man who would be fairer than a woman investigator who for example might think the woman's own behaviour was "asking for trouble".

Would you open up more to a woman, if you were the complainant? But the man responding to the allegations might feel a woman investigator came in to the investigation already biased, and might then behave more defensively in response.

Please help me think this through!

I made a complaint about harassment once to a male manager and he was great. The HR rep who got involved was female. Both were empathetic and kind. I think it matters more about the kind of person you're talking to and your relationship with them rather than their sex.

Personally I maybe would feel better talking about my complaint to a woman, but the most important thing is their training and professionalism in the subject. I’d rather have a man who has completed training on responding and investigating complaints of that nature than a woman who hasn’t.

So, broad strokes I’d probably prefer a woman but their skills are most important- and if the man dismisses or disputes simply because the investigator is a woman then that’s just plain sexism.

I would not care about the sex of the investigator.

I wouldn't care.

I think it doesn't matter. A good investigator likes fact following and getting an answer. The charge presumably will be against an individual (rather than men in general)so the male investigator won't take it personally.

To be honest it might depend on the type of workplace too. If it was somewhere where the male staff were buddies outside work, golfing buddies, school/uni buddies etc then I'd want to report it to a female because I'd be less confident of there not being a link between the guys that would work against me - not that they'd not follow protocol exactly, more that the manner in which it was followed and depth of investigation might be prejudiced.

Generally though, I would feel better if it was a woman..however so many women dismiss events because it happened to them and wasn't a big deal for them or worse happened to them.

What I would want, in an ideal world, is someone who had been trained by the likes of Dr Jess Taylor from victim focus. If I knew that they had, then the sex would be less relevant/irrelevant.

If it was sexual assault rather than harassment, or actual rape, then biological sex would be imperative and I'd want a woman (ideally also trained by Victim Focus-like training!).

If you are a woman lodging a complaint of sexual harassment, it is not discriminatory to want to talk to a woman.
I would want to know that they had some sort of training to manage that type of complaint.

I think there is enough variation among individuals on this that the sex of the investigator isn't likely to be the main issue to worry about.

I think it's probably more important to have plenty of women in the room when policies on sexual harassment are being formed and training sessions conducted.

Men and women as classes do seem to perceive sexual harassment differently. And there will, on average, be less recognition from men. But, as a previous poster said, there is so much variation on this and also so many other factors that mean you don't have a random person in HR departments anyway, that sex is not going to be the biggest factor most of the time. So most of the time it won't matter.

But I do think, with more serious harassment and assaults, that there will be a significant contingent of women who would be put off more if they have to go into detail with a man rather than a woman.

I genuinely don’t think a man is automatically a shit investigator for these offences based on his gender, so I wouldn’t mind

Flip side. A male collegaue had sexual allegations made against him. He worked in admin in a college.

What actually happened was he was carrying a number of box files through reception towards his office and a group of girls was spread across the corridor. He asked them if they could move over, 2 moved and one then stepped back into him and srated to shriek.

She made an allegation that as he passed he had grabbed her bum and as she turned felt her breasts.

Not true... ask me how I know and I will tell you that I was walking about 6 feet behind him and saw his hands at all times, still clutching his box files. The only contact made was one girl stepping back into him and doing a twirl in the middle of the corridor.

I was asked if I was sure I wasn't just protecting a collegaue, told it would look very bad if it came out that I was.

I couldn't discuss it nore could he. The girls plastered it all across social media, names etc.

He took gardening leave and eventually early retirement - still with the allegations hanging over him. He ended up with a large payout when the girl's social media was found to include a conversation about how they were scared that it had gone too far, didn't know how to stop it especially as the HT wouldn't believe them when they told her they had made it up!

She's got made a Dame about 3 years later.

He died of a heart attack at 61.

Sometimes the sex of an individual is just not important, their honesty, their morals are!

If I had to disclose intimate details of an assault or graphic conversations then on balance I’d prefer a woman.

If your question is about bias and preferring a woman because they’d be more willing to accept an offence had been committed I suspect statistically you’re far better off with a woman, although my impression is based on the NAMALT-ing I see on Twitter and not real data.

I'd be more interested in whether they'd had specialist training in handling sex harassment investigations. Don't be afraid to ask.

@CuriousaboutSamphire

Flip side. A male collegaue had sexual allegations made against him. He worked in admin in a college.

What actually happened was he was carrying a number of box files through reception towards his office and a group of girls was spread across the corridor. He asked them if they could move over, 2 moved and one then stepped back into him and srated to shriek.

She made an allegation that as he passed he had grabbed her bum and as she turned felt her breasts.

Not true... ask me how I know and I will tell you that I was walking about 6 feet behind him and saw his hands at all times, still clutching his box files. The only contact made was one girl stepping back into him and doing a twirl in the middle of the corridor.

I was asked if I was sure I wasn't just protecting a collegaue, told it would look very bad if it came out that I was.

I couldn't discuss it nore could he. The girls plastered it all across social media, names etc.

He took gardening leave and eventually early retirement - still with the allegations hanging over him. He ended up with a large payout when the girl's social media was found to include a conversation about how they were scared that it had gone too far, didn't know how to stop it especially as the HT wouldn't believe them when they told her they had made it up!

She's got made a Dame about 3 years later.

He died of a heart attack at 61.

Sometimes the sex of an individual is just not important, their honesty, their morals are!

This has absolutely nothing to do with the OP.

Distraction and minimization of the harassment women do face and the potential difficulty in reporting it by highlighting one occasion when someone lied is just playing into the whole rape myth quagmire.

Distraction and minimization of the harassment women do face and the potential difficulty in reporting it by highlighting one occasion when someone lied is just playing into the whole rape myth quagmire.

Except, if you read right to the end, I was pointing out that the sex of the investigator isn't as important as their integrity.

If we cannot acknowledge the truth, all possible sides of an issue, then we won't get the right approach to effective investigation, punishments, training etc. The situation I described could have been closed within 5 minutes. Should have been. The only reason it did not was that the woman leading the investigation chose to continue, even when it became clear that the girls involved had fully recognised their error immediately - they had a moment of stupid but they too were punished, badly served, by the intransigent, "eye on the headline" stance of the person in charge.

I work in HR and have handled several serious sexual harassment cases, including sexual assaults.

When choosing the two people who would handle the investigation it was pretty standard to use the best investigator manager available with HR and if possible have one male and one female in that team.

It wasn’t always possible, but we tried whenever we could to do that. What was more important was that the people had the skills to manage a complex investigation that also linked to a criminal investigation by the police, and were able to deal with assessing legal issues and procedures involved such as safeguarding etc.

Sorry I have realised I didn’t answer your question really.

It would technically be discriminatory in most work contexts to insist on a female investigator, however in reality it would get justified using the argument that it benefited the investigation that the colleague was talking to someone who they felt comfortable with and was able to provide the best information as a result.

I’ve not come across any colleague who raised a concern and refused to speak to a male investigator. The overwhelming response has been relief that they were taken seriously.

If it was me complaining I would want the best investigator as they would be able to take action that’s appropriate, and that is justifiable based on the factual findings. Therefore any disciplinary actions would be on firm ground and less likely to be overturned on appeal etc.

@CuriousaboutSamphire

Distraction and minimization of the harassment women do face and the potential difficulty in reporting it by highlighting one occasion when someone lied is just playing into the whole rape myth quagmire.

Except, if you read right to the end, I was pointing out that the sex of the investigator isn't as important as their integrity.

If we cannot acknowledge the truth, all possible sides of an issue, then we won't get the right approach to effective investigation, punishments, training etc. The situation I described could have been closed within 5 minutes. Should have been. The only reason it did not was that the woman leading the investigation chose to continue, even when it became clear that the girls involved had fully recognised their error immediately - they had a moment of stupid but they too were punished, badly served, by the intransigent, "eye on the headline" stance of the person in charge.

Your story had nothing to do with the sex of the investigator - it was simply pushing the idea that women lie.

You can read it that way of you will. It isn't what I intended when I typed it, nor what I think, in general. That's the problem with absolutism!