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Robert Wood is Professor of Management at the Melbourne Business School and Director of the Centre for Ethical Leadership (CEL) the information provided below is courtesy of the CEL.

Harassment hurts, and everyday sexism really hurts
Frequent sexist wisecracks, comments and office cultures where women are commonly undervalued and ignored are just as damaging to women as single instances of sexual coercion and unwanted sexual attention, according to a new study from the Centre for Ethical Leadership, published in Psychology of Women Quarterly.
“Norms, leadership, or policies, that reduce intense harmful experiences may lead managers to believe that they have solved the problem of maltreatment of women in the workplace,” wrote the study authors, Dr. Victor E. Sojo (Centre for Ethical Leadership [CEL], Melbourne School of Business [MBS] and the Melbourne School of Psychological Sciences), Professor Robert E. Wood (CEL & MBS) and PhD Candidate Anna E. Genat (CEL & MBS). “However, the more frequent, less intense, and often unchallenged gender harassment, sexist discrimination, sexist organizational climate and organizational tolerance for sexual harassment appeared at least as detrimental for women’s wellbeing. They should not be considered lesser forms of sexism.”
An analysis of eighty-eight independent studies which included a combined 73,877 working women, the researchers found that:
• Sexism and gender harassment were just as harmful to working women’s individual health and work attitudes as common job stressors such as work overload and poor working conditions.
• When women are the targets of sexism and harassment in the workplace, they are more dissatisfied with supervisors and co-workers than with their work tasks.
• There was a trend of a more negative effect of sexism and harassment in male-dominated workplaces, such as the armed forces and financial and legal services firms. However, the authors suggested this required further research.
The results of the study led the authors to recommend that “organizations should have zero tolerance for low intensity sexism, the same way they do for overt harassment. This will require teaching workers about the harmful nature of low intensity sexist events, not only for women, but also for the overall organizational climate. Supervisors are specially compelled to champion any effort in this area, given their position of power and responsibility to set the standards of appropriate behaviour at work.”
Find out more by reading the full article “Harmful Workplace Experiences and Women’s Occupational Wellbeing: A Meta-Analysis” here.
The Centre for Ethical Leadership (CEL) brings evidence of the potency of ethics to the business world. Its dedicated research agenda is a demonstrable force in enlightening leaders to both the moral and commercial advantages of embracing fairness in decision making. The CEL is dedicated to developing leaders with the capacity to thrive in an increasingly disruptive world.
The CEL undertakes cutting edge research to provide insights, tools and programs for creating inclusive, culturally aware, diverse and dynamic workplaces. We combine our market leading diagnostic tools with a collaborative approach to create high impact individual programs.
Our programs include Unconscious Bias training, Diversity & Inclusion Leadership training, and Cognicity Academy, our e-learning platform.

Centre for Ethical Leadership
Ormond College
University of Melbourne
info@cel.edu.au
+61 3 9344 1403
cel.edu.au

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