3 Example Scenarios of a Hostile Work Environment

Описание: 22% of Americans say that they experience a hostile work environment.

This statistic is 1 in 5 Americans. Hypothetically, this means that someone you work with may believe that they are in a hostile work environment.

While employees have the right to enter into a comfortable working environment, we know that realistically the workplace is not always butterflies and rainbows. This means that the chances of an argument happening or an insensitive comment being made is very likely. While examples like these may not be deemed as ethical or kind, they don’t exactly constitute a hostile work environment according to state laws.

James J. McDonald Jr. says “A hostile working environment has a narrow legal definition, and what most employees think is a hostile working environment is usually not.". (SHRM-SCP) You may be wondering now what is considered a hostile work environment then? It’s when unwelcome conduct is so severe that it affects one’s ability to perform their job responsibilities comfortably.

Each state has certain qualifications that need to exist in order to determine a hostile work environment. For example, in some states a single offensive remark can rise to the level of a hostile environment.

So let’s talk about some common indicators that signify a hostile work environment is present:

Discriminatory behavior, Continuous unwelcome conduct, A victim or victims must endure this behavior in order to keep their job, The harassment is “severe or pervasive enough” that an average person would consider it intimidating and/or abusive, The conduct that continuously happens targets a particular protected group

A protected group is a group of people that are legally protected from facing harassment or harm. Examples of protected groups include gender, race, age, religion, and disability status.

Now that we have an understanding of what a hostile environment is and can legally constitute when it might occur, let’s put our knowledge to the test. I’m going to take us through scenarios where a hostile work environment may or may not be present.

SCENARIO 1
Say that you’re a leading sales representative at your company. Today you have a pretty important meeting with a potential client that’s looking to do business. It’s a pretty big opportunity so you have a few other people from your company joining in on this meeting. You decide with the interested client to meet at a local coffee shop to discuss interests. On your way to the meeting, traffic is a bit stuffy due to a fender bender. For this reason, you’re about 10 minutes late to the meeting. When you arrive, your supervisor gives you quite a dirty look as you apologize to the client for your tardiness. The meeting goes well but afterwards, your boss pulls you aside and calls you an “idiot”. The rest of the day he’s short with you.

Is this a hostile work environment?

The answer is no. Why? Name-calling that falls short of extreme behavior does not qualify as a hostile work environment indication. Because the name-calling was a one-time occurrence as well it would not be enough to report a hostile work environment.

SCENARIO 2
Imagine that you’re an intern in your early 20’s and you received your first real job offer out of college. You’re pretty excited about the opportunity until you meet your supervisor. As your internship continues they continuously make derogatory comments concerning your age toward you. You find these jokes belittling. You feel that your supervisor isn’t taking any of your inputs seriously and brushes them off due to your age.
Is this a hostile work environment?

Did you think Yes? You’re correct! This example is an instance of a hostile work environment for multiple reasons. The key word here is “continuously”. The hostility is continuously happening. The jokes that your supervisor is making are also targeting a protected group: age.


SCENARIO 3
Let’s say that you’re working at a company that recently hired a new manager to oversee your department. In comparison to your previous manager, you can say that this person’s quite the micromanager. This new manager isn’t afraid to critique the work that you send over to him or question your work ethic. You begin to feel frustrated as you feel that your manager is monitoring everything you do and has pretty strict regulations regarding working from home and meeting organizational standards. Is this a hostile environment?

Micromanagement may not be ideal for most, but it does not alone fall under the scope of qualifying as a hostile work environment.

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