I'm in Colorado.
I've been the victim of ongoing sexual harassment from late December to February 12; during this time, a coworker would walk behind me several times a day and run his hand along my back. I informally notified my supervisor mid-January, but declined to put in a formal complaint with HR, as my supervisor and I both wanted to try a less confrontational approach. He was eager to hold a floor meeting with the whole department and go over the employee handbook together, specifically spending time going over what sexual harassment was and setting a tone of zero tolerance.
When he held the meeting, he addressed a lot of unrelated issues, and spent thirty seconds or so on sexual harassment, saying something to the effect of, "As a reminder, sexual harassment is not permitted, please see your handbooks for details." After the meeting, he pulled me aside and said that the floor manager (his supervisor) had told him he couldn't have a meeting going into detail about sexual harassment, and to just refer employees to the handbook. He felt bad about not being able to do more, and asked me to let him know if anything else happened.
The harassment continued, and during this time, my supervisor had me actively training with and working around my harasser. So I filed a formal report with my supervisor to be submitted to his manager and HR on February 14.
The touching stopped after this, though it took over a week for HR to move the coworker to a different work station, though we both remained in the same room and the nature of his work meant that he was auditing some of my work. The day after I made my report, my supervisor asked me to work at the station sandwiched between this coworker and another man who we all understand to be my harasser's sidekick.
Though my harasser did not touch me again after February 14, he made a point of being in my work area several times a day, chatting and greeting other coworkers by name while altogether ignoring me. Though everyone involved in this work occasionally has a reason to be in my work area (to grab parts or confer with coworkers), this individual was in the area almost twice as often as anyone else on his team.
Starting last week, (3/21) he began physically intimidating me by standing near my work station and watching me work while we were alone in the area. He also blocked the entrance to my work station (a few feet away from me) and stood with his arms crossed, staring at me while I talked with a coworker. He did not move until the coworker needed to exit the area.
I attempted to report this new physically intimidating behavior to HR, but the HR representative told me she was too busy and had me make my report to the floor manager (my supervisor's boss) instead. This was on 3/26.
The next day (3/27), I met with both HR and the floor manager, and I was informed that I would be moved to a new department effective immediately. This new department is actually in the process of moving to an entirely new building -- this new building is more than twice as far away from my home as my current place of work, and puts a huge burden on me in terms of getting to work every day.
During this meeting, the HR representative told me that the man I was accusing of harassment/intimidation was a conscientious, exemplary worker who had been with the company over 4 years, and was a family man, and that she believed him -- his side of the story is that he is intimidated by me, and so they are moving me to a new department and will be "monitoring" the situation. The HR representative further told me that I was a temporary worker and this was their attempt to keep me around.
I began keeping a log of specific dates and times of the unwanted touch on February 12, and began logging each time he came into my work area and standing around chatting to coworkers. I have also been writing down reports of the meetings with my supervisor and HR.
Today I began the EEOC filing process, but am stuck in limbo until they have an opening to do an interview with me as a final step before submitting the claim.
My question is, what else should I be doing? Or, what else can I do? Am I being unreasonable? I feel so incredibly frustrated and victimized, not just by my harasser, but by the HR representative and the floor manager.
Written By: Mediocre_Nebula
Source: https://ift.tt/2OwOA5H
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