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Serious insight for serious situations.

Serious insight for serious situations.

Among (Facebook) friends: Investigating personal social media posts as alleged workplace harassment

Social media can be a great way to connect with friends and family, especially those people we don’t often get to visit in person. Unfortunately, social media can also be a venue in which workers make demeaning, threatening, and insulting comments about colleagues and supervisors.

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Raising allegations of discrimination in the workplace: Is it what you say, or how you say it?

In October 2021, my colleague Dana Campbell-Stevens wrote a blog in which she addressed how the law views an individual’s gut feeling about being a victim of discrimination. A recent case from the Saskatchewan Court of Appeal, Thomas v. Saskatchewan Indian Gaming Authority Inc., raises issues respecting the potential implications of an individual voicing such a gut feeling.

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International Day for the Elimination of Violence Against Women: Considerations for your workplace

November 25, 2021, marks International Day for the Elimination of Violence Against Women. As workplace investigators, we know all too well that gender-based violence and harassment is a live issue, the impacts of which can be devastating on the survivor, their loved ones, and the workplace more broadly.

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Sexual assault – a serious form of workplace misconduct

In a recent Provincial Court of Alberta decision, Dupont v. Ag Growth International Inc. (AGI-Westeel), 2021 ABPC 118, the trial judge ruled that just cause termination was a disproportionate measure following a workplace investigation where the dismissed employee was found to have sexually harassed a female colleague. The employer subsequently appealed this decision to the Alberta Court of Queen’s Bench, who allowed the appeal.

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Revisiting workplace assessments under Bill C-65: What we know now

In August 2020, my colleague Veronica Howard and I published a blog on conducting workplace assessments under Bill C-65. At that time, Bill C-65 and the related Regulations set out the requirements that federally regulated employers were required to meet in order to satisfy their obligations under the Canada Labour Code (CLC)…

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See something, (don’t) say something: New research on witnessing workplace harassment

Time and again we see a familiar story play out in the media and in our work as workplace investigators: troubling behaviour on the part of one or more employees that many other employees witnessed, but never reported to anyone. This is one of the most vexing problems those of us who care about addressing and preventing workplace harassment and discrimination face: why do so many people see or hear about inappropriate behaviour in the workplace and remain silent? And how can we motivate these witnesses – who we refer to as bystanders – to speak up?

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