Mapping And Measuring Gender Harassment In Organizations: An Essay.

Discuss About The Mapping And Measuring Gender Harassment In Organisations.

Research objective and hypothesis

Sexual harassment is one of the complex issue which negatively affect the organization, individual and the entire society. The issue of the sexual harassment is not the new phenomenon and there has been a long history of discrimination and harassment, especially against the women. Even though many laws and the sexual harassment prohibition laws has been introduced by international and national organization, women are still harassed in both the unorganized and the organized sectors in different ways(ILO, 2016; Pereira & Rodrigues, 2014).

There has been extensive research on the issue of the sexual harassment by many scholars from different parts of the world at different time periods. One of the study by  (MacKinnon, 1979; McLaughlin, Uggen, & Blackstone, 2012) defines it as “ the unwanted imposition of sexual requirements in the context of a relationship of unequal power”. Furthermore the International labor Organisation (ILO) has defined sexual harassment as “ a continuum of unacceptable behaviors and practices that are likely to results physical, psychological or sexual harm or suffering”(ILO, 2016).  Another study by (Uggen & Blackstone, 2008) in some cases the caste and level of the individuals in the society. In addition research by (Leskinen & Cortin, 2013)make the distinction between the sex based harassment and the sexual harassment. Authors argued that sexual harassment may not necessarily only refer to the sexual desire only about the sexuality, it can be the power of one particular sex over the other(Hejase, 2015; Pereira & Rodrigues, 2014; Sharma, 2017). For example the assert power of maleness of the femaleness. In another research by (Centre for Transforming India, 2010; McLaughlin et al., 2012) authors argued that in most cases the sexual harassment is used as equalizer against the women who are in power, and not as the sexual desire which is often instigated.

A research by (Pereira & Rodrigues, 2014) examined the women harassment cases and issues in  India. For the analysis purpose the authors have taken a sample from India and conducted the descriptive statistics. Results from the analysis shows that most of the women in India are not aware about the sexual harassment and the number of reporting of such cases are very low. On the basis of the results authors concluded that the awareness program has to be implemented properly.

Another research by the (Sahgal & Sahgal, 2017) conducted the exploratory reach to examine the dynamics and the occurrence of the sexual harassment. For the analysis purpose both the qualitative and the quantitative research has been conducted. The sample included both the respondents from both the private and public organizations. Results from the analysis shows that the even though the women are educated and they still dependent on the male member to support them.

Method sampling and the approach

In case of UBER also there has been various allegations from employees and the riders. Due to the sexual harassment issues the CEO of the company had to resign and there are other allegations against him also(Recod, 2017). Furthermore UBER also fires other employees in the organization in the sexual harassment investigation(the guardian, 2017).

The current research is aimed to examine the sexual harassment at UBER. The major objective of the research are as follows:

• To examine whether the male and female have difference in terms of anger towards sexual harassment at UBER.
• To examine if the anger towards sexual harassment at UBER for people in different income groups.
• To examine if the relationship between Word of mouth about UBER and its brand value.

On the basis of the research objectives following hypothesis has been proposed.

Null hypothesis: There is no significant difference between genders on anger towards sexual harassment at UBER (ASP3).

Alternative hypothesis: There is significant difference between genders on anger towards sexual harassment at UBER (ASP3).

Null hypothesis: There is no significant difference between income levels on the anger towards sexual harassment at UBER (ASP3).

Alternative hypothesis: There is significant difference between income levels on the anger towards sexual harassment at UBER (ASP3).

Null hypothesis: There is no positive correlation between the Word of mouth (WOM3) and brand popularity of Uber (BP4).

Alternative hypothesis: There is positive correlation between the Word of mouth (WOM3) and brand popularity of Uber (BP4).

Research methodology is one of the most important part of every research. The methodology explains all the research methods and techniques used in the study including the data collection procedure. There are two types of research methods which can be used for any research. The first method is the qualitative research which is used when the researcher wants to explore the research topic and get in-depth knowledge about. The second method is the quantitative method where the collected data is used to get useful and hidden information using different different statistical tools and techniques.

The data is also majorly two types, namely the primary and the secondary data. The primary data is the data collected for the first time by the researcher whereas the secondary data is already collected by someone else.

The current research is aimed to study about the sexual harassment at UBER. For the analysis purpose the primary data was collected among 201 respondents. The data was collected through Mturk, which is a online data collection tool. This has been used by many previous studies also for similar topic. In terms of the data analysis techniques, for the current study the independent sample t –test, ANOVA test and the correlation analysis has been used. The results from these test has been used to test the proposed hypothesis.

Demographic profile of the respondents

On the basis of the results it can be concluded that 35 % of the respondents are graduate and 26 % undergraduate. The proportion of the respondents with less than high school is very less.

Furthermore, as the results shows the number of people living in the household is 3 for 41 % of the respondents whereas for 36 % of the respondents the number is

Results from the data analysis are shown in the current section. In the first section the findings from the independent sample t test has been shown followed by the findings from the ANOVA and the correlation respectively.

The results from the t –test shows that for male the mean value is 4.58 and the more the value more furious the respondents are for sexual harassment. The mean for the female is 5.32. So, the women are more furious about the sexual harassment at UBER as compared to the male.

Furthermore the Levene’s Test shows that the value of 12.553 is statistically significant as the significance value is less than 5 %. So, it can be concluded that there is significant difference between the genders for ASP3 at UBER. In terms of hypothesis, the null hypothesis can be rejected and the alternative hypothesis can be accepted. This results was expected because most of the sexual harassment cases at UBER are against the women. So, it was expected that female are more concerned about such cases as compared to the male.

The second test in the current research is the ANOVA test and it has been conducted to test the second hypothesis proposed in the previous section of the paper. The t test and the ANOVA test are used in the similar cases. The only difference is that the t test can handle only two groups and if there are more than 2 categories in the variable ANOVA test has to be conducted.

Results for the ANOVA test is shown above. The results shows that the F value is 1.581. Similarly the sum of squares between the groups is 11.66 whereas that within the group is 361.473. However it should be noted that the significance value for the F statistics is 0.181. This shows that the F value is not statistically significant as the 95 % confidence interval has been taken into consideration for the current research. Since the F value is insignificant, it can be concluded that there is no difference among the different income group about the anger towards the sexual harassment at UBER. This is because the sexual harassment is not restricted to any particular income group. The women both in the higher or the lower income are the victims of the sexual harassment. However, it has been argued by some of the previous research that the sexual harassment is higher for the women in the lower income bracket, but the percentage of the case reported are very less they cannot afford to fight the case and they have some other threats which restrict them to come forward. In case of the higher class, they can afford to fight for their rights and are also aware of their rights. Based on the results the null hypothesis cannot be rejected.

The last test for the current research is the correlation analysis which is used to investigate the relationship between the two variables. The range for the correlation coefficient is [-1, +1]. The coefficient of less than 0 indicates negative association whereas the coefficient of more than 0 indicates positive association between the two variables.

For the current case the correlation has been used to examine the relationship between the word of mouth and the brand popularity of the UBER. As the table shows that correlation coefficient is 0.103 which indicates that the word of mouth and the brand popularity are positively correlated. However the relationship is not statistically significant. It was expected that the with negative word of mouth the brand popularity of the UBER will decrease. In other words the negative correlation was expected. From the previous research it has been shown the word of mouth is one of the most important factor for any brand and negative word of mouth have negative impact on the brand. In this case even though the coefficient is positive the p value is more than 0.05, so the null hypotheis cannot be rejected.

Conclusion

The current research is aimed to study about the sexual harassment at UBER as there has been increasing incidents about the sexual harassment at UBER both at the higher management level to the drivel level. For the current research the primary data was collected among 210 respondents using the online data collection portal Mturk. The collected data was analyzed in SPSS using different statistical tools. This includes the t- test, ANOVA test and the correlation analysis. The results from the research have various managerial implication which has been discussed in the following section.

The results from the t-test shows that the female are angrier about the sexual harassment at UBER as compared to the male. This is may be because the more sexual harassment cases are faced by women and there are very rare cases where the male are harassed. So, the UBER management needs to take quick decision so that the women can feel safe not only while riding the UBER but also at the UBER workplace. The sexual harassment case of the UBER CEO is well known so the management should focus on building the culture that the women are safe and also provide the proper platform so that they can come forward in such cases.

Similarly the results from the data analysis shows that there is no difference in the anger towards the sexual harassment for respondents in different income level. This clearly indicates that irrespective of the income and the status people and especially the women are sexually harassed at UBER. So the management have an important role to play in such cases. It can also be argued that if the sexual harassment cases are high among the high income group, such cases for lower income group is much higher, as most of the women in the lower income are threated to not speak about those incidents. So, the focus should be on preventing the harassment at all levels and the strict rules and regulations need to be introduced and implemented. This will send a message to the people to thinks before harassing someone. Also the awareness program should be conducted to aware people about such issues. This is because some people think that this is normal and there is such laws which they can use to protect themselves, especially in the lower income level.

In addition the results from the correlation shows positive but insignificant relationship between the word of mouth and the brand popularity of the UBER. The negative word of mouth have adverse impact on the brand value, so UBER should focus on improving the brand value by solving the concerns of the people. A proper grievance redressal system should be implemented so that people start having positive brand image.  To improve the word of mouth UBER can also conducte its own survey among the riders and employees and identify the major problems faced by the people including the sexual harassment. One of the issue for people coming forward about the sexual harassment is of the social pressure. In such cases the privacy becomes an important issues. UBER should ensure that if someone wants to complain without revealing the identity, the proper mechanism should be there.

Some of the major limitation of the research includes the sample size and the research methodology used in the analysis. In the current research all the analysis has been done only using the quantitative research method and there is no qualitative method used. A sensitive issue like the sexual harassment should have been done using the qualitative research also which could have provide more details about the issue. Another limitation is related to the sample size of the study. UBER is now a global brand and it has its presence in many countries. However the sample for the current study has been collected only from the United States. So, a larger sample size can be collected from different countries so that the results can be generalized.

References

Centre for Transforming India. (2010). India’s First Workplace Sexual Harassment Survey Reveals Startling Revelations,. New Delhi.

the guardian. (2017, June 6). Uber fires more than 20 employees after sexual harassment investigation. The Guardian. Retrieved from https://www.theguardian.com/technology/2017/jun/06/uber-fires-employees-sexual-harassment-investigation

Hejase, H. J. (2015). Sexual Harassment in the Workplace: An Exploratory Study from Lebanon. Journal of Management Research, 7(107-121).

ILO. (2016). Sexual Harassment at Work. Geneva.

Leskinen, E., & Cortin, L. M. (2013). Dimensions of Disrespect: Mapping and Measuring Gender Harassment in Organisations. Psychology of Women Quarterly, 38, 107–123.

MacKinnon, C. (1979). Sexual Harassment of Working Women: A Case of Sex Discrimination. New Haven: Yale University Press.

McLaughlin, H., Uggen, C., & Blackstone, A. (2012). Sexual Harassment, Workplace Authority and the Paradox of Power. American Sociological Review, 77, 625–648.

Pereira, M. P. J., & Rodrigues, E. J. (2014). Sexual Harassment at Workplace in India Medico-Legal Aspects. J Indian Acad Forensic Med, 36(4), 421–424.

Recod. (2017, June 21). Uber CEO Travis Kalanick has resigned due to investor pressure, and a search for a new leader is on. VOx Media. Retrieved from https://www.recode.net/2017/6/21/15844848/uber-ceo-travis-kalanick-resigned-board-pressure

Sahgal, P., & Sahgal, P. (2017). Sexual Harassment at Workplace Experiences of Women Managers and Organisations. Economic & Political Weekly, LII, 49–57.

Sharma, K. (2017). Sexual Harassment of Women at workplace in India: an Ubiquitous Hazard. IOSR Journal Of Humanities And Social Science, 22(9), 36–46.

Uggen, C., & Blackstone, A. (2008). “Sexual Harassment as Gendered Expression of Power,.” American Sociological Review, 69, 64–92.