Continued
from page two
Your
business must comply with your state’s requirements
To start with, many states
have specific sexual
harassment laws and requirements that
a business owner is required to adhere to. Make
sure that your business is in compliance with those laws
that
you are
required to follow.
These laws could involve training
of supervisors, posting
of mandated posters, creation
of a formal complaint
policy for sexual harassment and/or any of a number of
procedures.
In California for example, recent passage
of Assembly Bill 1825, and Government Code Section 12950.1,
changes
the
requirements of the employer in regards to sexual
harassment training
and prevention.
By January 1, 2006, employers with 50
or more employees must provide ALL of their supervisory employees
who are
employed
as of July 1, 2005, and all new supervisory employees
within six months of their assuming the position, with
at least
two hours of sexual harassment prevention training.
In
addition, the training must be repeated no less than once
every two years, with each and every supervisory
employee.
For the
purposes of Section 12950.1, "employer" means
any person regularly employing 50 or more persons or
regularly receiving the services of 50 or more persons
providing
services pursuant to a contract, or any person acting
as an agent of
an employer, directly or indirectly, the state, or any
political or civil subdivision of the state, and cities.
Now,
many construction business owners will undoubtedly convince
themselves that they don’t need this sexual
harassment training for their employees because they
have less than 50 employees, or they’re
not located in California, or everyone in the field is
of the same sex, or any of a number of reasons.
Don’t
be one of those contractors. No matter how many employees
you have, or which state your business
is located
in, or if all of your employees are the same sex or whatever
reason imaginable, you must take steps to protect
yourself and your business from sexual harassment lawsuits, and
the sooner you do this the better.
Next
page: Institute a training and education program
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