Sexual harassment, or any form of harassment, in the workplace is not laughing matter.  Most organizations have done a great job of developing and instituting sexual harassment policies in the office and often send their employees to sexual harassment prevention training seminars.

And though the days of womanizing and chasing secretaries around the desk are more or less gone, subtle forms of unwanted harassment still occur in the workplace. A recent article on MSNBC, “Where ‘omg, u look gr8’ can land you in court”, details the subtler forms of sexual harassment which “include everything from flirtation at a company party to a complimentary text message or an unwelcome invitation to discuss the latest project over dinner or drinks.” As Jay Zweig, an employment lawyer with Bryan Cave, notes in article, “There’s been a new generation of confusion in this area.”

A few month’s ago we posted on another one of our blogs, DailyHRTips.com,an article that detailed 3 ways in which to combat sexual harassment in the workplace. They are:

• Create a zero tolerance sexual harassment policy that is fully supported by upper management and employees alike. Make sure this policy is communicated often (at least annually) throughout the organization.
  
• Provide training (ideally to all employees but certainly to supervisors) on recognizing and understanding the potential harm to themselves and the organization in sexual harassment. Additional training on the best practices of responding to or reporting allegations of sexual harassment may be needed (check if you state requires mandatory sexual harassment training).
• Encourage people who are victims of sexual harassment, both male and female, to come forward and report the incident – the only way to make it stop is to take action.

I want to focus on the two sentences in bold. These are two important elements necessary in the fight against sexual harassment and it is important for employers to provide the appropriate tools for employees to learn about and combat unwanted, inappropriate workplace behavior. Such a tool is Learning @… With Learning @… it is easy to communicate the organization’s policies with regards to harassment of any type (even subtle sexual harassment) as well as provide online training modules to all employees on how to prevent and report it if necessary.

If sexual harassment is a problem within an organization it can make many quality employees feel degraded and they may consider moving on to greener pastures. In addition, the associated legal costs, not to mention the negative publicity, could severely damage a company’s bottom line and public image. For all parties involved, using an online employee learning tool such as Learning @… is a smart investment in combating sexual harassment in the workplace.

According to a recent article on MSNBC, more than half of the employers polled in a recent survey said that they will be hiring employees within the next year. This is no doubt great news for those who have been struggling to find a job during the recession. It will however present some “growing pains” for the hiring organizations. For months now, many companies have cut deep into the proverbial bone of their workforce and may not immediately be in the right mind set for onboarding an influx of “fresh blood”.

This is where having a tool like Learning @… Professional in place can really give organizations a helping hand in integrating new employees to the organization. With Learning @… Professional a company can easily provide to all incoming employees important organizational information ranging from the company vision, mission, and goals to the Code of Conduct Policy. Additionally, instead of holding numerous orientation sessions for the new arrivals, the human resources department, or who ever manages the hiring for the company, can host a virtual online orientation module.

The upcoming months will be prove to be interesting times for many organizations—in order to hold their competitive edge at the upturn of the economy and to have their new workforce hit the ground running, it is in a company’s best interest to have an application that can provide the necessary communication and learning tools. That application is Learning @… Professional

So far I have posted a bunch of information on this crazy sounding thing called Learning @… I’ve posted all this info about the product that states that it is a “a customizable, cost-effective online employee learning tool designed to fit your company’s learning and development needs…” and a cost effective alternative to “expensive Learning Management Systems (LMS) and Learning Content Management Systems (LCMS)”.

But what’s with the name? What does Learning @… mean?

The answer is simple. Think of it this way: An employee, Jane Q. Learner, walks into work one day at an organization called The XYZ Company. She sits down at her computer and logs-on to her company’s online learning portal provided by the best organization development consulting firm around (biased opinion? Maybe a little). Jane begins her day by checking the Learning Seminars Calendar to see if there are any training events she needs to attend for the week and after finding the Business Acumen course she has signed up for she quickly and easily scrolls over to the Online Learning Module section to go through the conflict resolution training module the HR department has asked you to complete. Finally, before she has even completed her morning cup of coffee, Jane looks up The XYZ Company’s Paid Time Off policy in the Policies and Procedures section of the online learning portal so that she can begin planning her next vacation at lunch time.

So what is Jane Q. Learner doing while cruising through the online application? She is:

Learning @ The XYZ Company!!!

Get it?

Ok, this is last screen shot for now. I will get some more up soon. It’s a shot of the Learning Events feature of the Learning @…Professional online employee learning portal. I think this is one of the coolest features of the product, which allows the company administrator the ability to post learning seminar information.

On the Society for Human Resources Management (SHrM) homepage, there is currently a great article, written by an affiliate from India—Rekha Bajaj—that details the importance of “upskilling”, otherwise known as self-improvement, in times of economic turmoil. Bajaj notes, “Upskilling is the basis for evolution and if the workforce does not evolve with the demands of the market [come companies] could be the next dinosaurs.”

This insightful point is all the more poignant during times of economic recession when competition for the scant few jobs remaining on the market is at it’s highest.

But how do organizations promote upskilling among their workforce? After all, employees can’t be expected to intrinsically know that they should improve their skills in order for their employer to survive a tough economic climate; many employees are set in their ways and may feel that the best way to prove their worth to the organization is to do what they to best. As Bajaj points out, open communication is the answer.

There are numerous ways to promote open communication within an organization including:

• Stating and adhering to an open door policy in the employee handbook
• Holding regular meetings where employees can speak openly (at least in a professional manner)
• Leveraging technology to communicate company policies, procedures, expectations, vision, etc.

It’s on this last point i’m going to expand because this is where I will segue to Learning @…, the subject of this blog. Learning @… is the perfect tool for organizations to build the open communication necessary for managers to express and detail the vision and mission of the organization, which may have drastically altered in the face of a new economic reality, and then provide the online training for them to “upskill” and work towards achieving that vision and mission.

I really encourage you to read the article on SHrM (unfortuneately you need a SHrM membership in order to read. Ironic given the subject of this post. If you have a membership, the article’s title is Upgrading for an Upturn: Training Encouraged for Greater Mobility.) When you are finished reading, take a look at the features of the Learning @…Professional and let me know if you agree with my assessment—I hope you see the connections that I do.