When someone starts a business, there are so many things on their plate that they might not have ‘preventing workspace discrimination at the top of their priority list.
However, there are laws that clearly state that workplace discrimination is against the law. If a business is found guilty, severe legal charges will be placed in the business.
While you are creating pillars for your business, you must ensure that your business is built on anti-discrimination culture. This will help your business in the long run and establish your business to sustain the extreme tides of time.
With the right system and protocol in place, you will find that you can prevent discrimination from happening and cultivate a strong company culture that will become a bottom line for other organizations.
But first…
Understanding Discrimination
Before we talk about preventing workplace discrimination, you need first to understand workplace discrimination.
Workplace discrimination occurs when an employee is treated less favorably than others because of protected characteristics.
Now, these protected characteristics may include:
- Disability.
- Gender Reassignment.
- Age.
- Sex.
- Sexual Orientation.
- Race & Religion.
In addition, the act of discrimination encompasses a variety of offenses. The offenses might include:
- Direct Discrimination: Direct discrimination is all about the employers favoring Employee A over Employee B.
- Indirect Discrimination: Indirect discrimination is related to an act or decision affecting a person or group. The act or decision puts a person or a group of people in an advantageous position and other groups at a disadvantageous position.
- Victimization: This is when a person claims that they have been treated ill just because of elements like sex, age, gender, color, or any other factor.
- Harassment: When a person engages in unwanted conduct that violates another person’s dignity or creates a hostile or offensive environment for that person.
When running a business, you must prioritize these things. To mitigate such issues, hire a law firm in DIFC and talk about the things your business can do to prevent them.
Steps To Minimize Discrimination In Workspace
Now that you know what kind of discrimination your employees can face in a workspace, you must take the right steps to prevent them.
Below are the steps you can follow to mitigate the risk of discrimination in the workplace.
1. Document And Treat Every Employee The Same
Documentation is important when you are hiring and firing any employees. Maybe you have fired an employee who has been filed charges for business and not for discrimination. But the employee can use discrimination as a tactic to get back at your business.
2. Educate Management & Staff
Staff training is one of the important aspects of every organization. Every organization should conduct staff training to ensure processes are concrete in the organization.
It doesn’t matter what method you choose to train your staff; the ultimate goal is to educate the management about the business and how their involvement affects it.
3. Investigate Employee Complaints
How you take care of the employee complaints reflects your policy documents and the procedure your company follows.
If you show any lax in taking care of your employees’ complaints, they might feel isolated and left alone.
4. Record Everything Related To Employee
When there is a risk of litigation, record everything that is related to the employee. Whether we are talking about a small message, work assignments, results, reports, metrics, and even on what grounds they have been fired.
These documents act like evidence if any problem arises.
5. Maintain Transparency
Remember, even a small change in the working environment can make a big difference for the employees. Employees might feel uncomfortable with the sudden change, and some might not even like it.
But the scenario might have been different if the change had been made after letting the employees know.
Consistency Is Necessary!
Running a business means everyone working for you is like a family. Therefore, you must ensure that everyone is treated equally and fairly.
While you treat everyone fairly and evaluate them based on their performance, you are also protecting yourself from any legal risks.
Hence, consistency is the key!