Question

As a researcher, what major consideration you had while developing your proposal for the class? How did you apply the knowledge and understanding of reading material in research design, methodology and analysis in the research project? Highlight the major findings of your project.

Answer 1

As a researcher, the major considerations one has while developing a proposal for class is to come with research topics which are burning issues in the workplace and society and create awareness about the same. Given below is an excerpt from research proposal for the burning issue of Sexual Harassment and workplace violence at the workplace.

Of late, the workplace is witnessing various cases of employee exploitation and harassment. Employees are getting exploited for various reasons like sexual favors, discrimination, etc. Harassment can be quite detrimental for the overall wellness of any individual. Harassment of any kind of the employees is not justified and it is the duty of the employer to take stringent actions against the accused.

Any kind of harassment practices are considered illegal under this government. It is the duty of the HR to make sexual harassment policy more stringent and stricter for the company. There are various factors because of which workplace violence and harassment cases do not become public. This is a major finding of the case. Reasons why this issue has not been resolved fully:

• Various employees still hesitate to talk about harassment which they may had experienced
• Companies try to save their reputation and so they try to compromise the situation and keep it under wraps somehow
• Employees are ignorant about the harassment which they might be experiencing

Title VII of Civil Rights of 1964 highlights the impact of any kind of sexual harassment malpractices at the work place. Harassment of any kind of the employees is not justified and it is the duty of the employer to take stringent actions against the accused. Title VII of Civil Rights Act, 1964 plays a very important role in the workplace harassment or discrimination cases. Any kind of discrimination from employer on any kind of bias like sex, race, religion, sect, etc. is strictly prohibited under this Title. This serves as the basis for providing equal employment opportunities to all.

It is the role of HR Manager to ensure that the workplace is protected for all employees and any kind of harassment incident is not encouraged. A dedicated employee grievance cell must be maintained in the structure of the company, where victim employees can freely report such incidents. The HR Manager must ensure that the cell must have members of diverse groups, to ensure that victim employee can approach anyone, whoever he or she finds comfortable, and can report the incident without any kind of hesitation.. A woman employee can be more comfortable talking about the incident to another woman employee and vice versa is the case for men employees.

Any kind of workplace retaliation must not be performed by the company’s management. All harassment cases must be treated with the same standards. The investigating committee needs to delve in detail about the incident and corroborate the facts. If the harassment is proved, stringent punitive measures must be taken to punish the accused and give justice to the victim. Usually if the harassment gets proved, the company asks the accused to leave his job without any kind of severances or benefits.

The HR Manager must also make the employees aware about the policy against sexual harassment, being practiced at the workplace. Awareness trainings can be conducted so that the employees are aware about the aspects which can be considered as a harassment and the procedure to be followed to report a case. This way, the workplace can be made a safer place for all employees.

The research question is “What methods are effective in building employee awareness of policies on workplace violence and harassment?”

The research objectives for this proposal will be:

• To enhance the overall awareness of employees regarding policies of workplace violence and harassment
• To make workplace violence and harassment reporting, more prominent

The long term project outcomes of this proposal are as follows:

• To enhance the overall effectiveness against workplace violence and harassment
• To reduce the number of incidents regarding workplace violence and harassment