Meat+Poultry - February 2019 - 80

LABOR

Picking off pr*f@n!ty
Virtually every workplace will have one,
two or perhaps even several employees
who routinely use crude, obscene or
profane language. This may include
supervisors. Many workplaces will also
have employees who find such language
deeply offensive. Balancing those
competing concerns, while staying in
compliance with all relevant laws can be
a tricky task. Employers must actively
address the issue before significant
problems arise. Ignoring obscene or
crude language can harm customer
relations, cause the business to appear
unprofessional, and even worse, put
employers at risk of claims of allowing a
hostile work environment. In one recent
case, the National Labor Relations
Board overturned an employee's
termination for profanity where it found
the company "had a general laxity
toward profanity in the workplace."
One challenge with managing
potentially offensive language in the
workplace is its subjectivity. What one
person may find shocking or profane
may not be a problem for someone
else. While profanity and obscenities
have different degrees of offensiveness,
certain words or phrases are clearly
improper and cannot be tolerated in
the workplace. For example, ignoring
slurs about race, gender, ethnicity,
disability, or sexual orientation as well

as sexual innuendos, can form the basis
for claims of unlawful harassment and
hostile work environment.
In certain circumstances, profanity
can even form the basis for claims of
workplace violence. According to the
US Dept. of Labor's (DOL) "Workplace
Violence Program" approximately 2
million persons are victims of non-fatal
workplace violence every year. The
DOL considers "verbal abuse including
offensive, profane and vulgar language"
to be included in the forms of violence
among co-workers. Such conduct, if
tolerated, would be strong evidence of a
hostile working environment.
ESTABLISHING EXPECTATIONS
There are no hard and fast rules,
except for possibly banning the use of
racial, ethnic, gender-based, disabilitybased and religious slurs. Otherwise,
employers should consider how their
organization operates on a day-to-day
basis; what is considered normal and
acceptable for their industry; and how
much contact employees have with
customers. Because this is such a
subjective area of employee relations,
employers should develop policies
to quickly escalate issues up the
management chain whenever issues,
including workplace profanity, arise.
Some guidelines include:
Put policies in
writing. Workplace
profanity policies should

be as specific as possible and clearly
stated in the employee handbook.
The policies should be addressed in
employee orientation as well as in
periodic training. They should also
set forth the disciplinary measures for
violation of the rules.
Today, employees who are called
to account for violating company
profanity rules sometimes try to
claim First Amendment protections
of freedom of speech. However, the
First Amendment does not apply in the
workplaces of private employers.
Train managers and supervisors.
Managers and supervisors should
receive training about how to respond
to profanity in the workplace.
An isolated outburst should be
distinguished from a pattern or
routine use of profanity. In addition
to learning how to properly respond
to employee concerns, they should
clearly understand that use of profane
language by them in front of employees
is totally unacceptable. They must lead
by example.
Like jokes and other idle banter,
profane or obscene language can be
a non-issue to some, while seriously
offending others. Employers need
to carefully consider what will
be acceptable in their particular
workplace. What may be tolerated
in one, could lead to legal claims
in another.
RICHARD ALANIZ | meatpoultry@sosland.com

80

MEAT+ POULTRY | 02.19 | www.meatpoultry.com

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What one person may find
shocking or profane may not
be a problem for someone else.
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Meat+Poultry - February 2019

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