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Every employer has a duty of care which they must fulfill towards their employees. This includes in particular the safeguarding of the employee’s personality rights in accordance with Art. 328 Para. 1 CO. The duty of care is also laid down in the Labor Code in Art. 6 Para. 1.
Employers, in order to fulfill their duty of care, should create a work environment in which all employees feel respected and valued. There should be specialized management training on the duty of care and, in particular, on what constitutes a violation of personal integrity. Managers should be given competencies and skills to deal with such incidents. Despite these safeguarding measures, violations of personality or personal integrity can still occur. Violation of personal integrity is understood as any attack on one’s personhood. Measures should be taken to support those affected and clear regulations should be in place on how to proceed in the event of an incident affecting someone’s personal integrity. All employees should know what support services are available and how they can obtain help the person in the situation.
Typical cases of violations of personal integrity in working life are sexual harassment and bullying. However, they can also occur in completely different ways, which is why this list cannot be considered exhaustive. If you are affected by a possible violation of personal integrity, it is advisable to contact a lawyer for employment law in Switzerland.
Sexual harassment is defined as any behavior with a sexual connotation that is unwanted by one party. Central to the assessment of whether sexual harassment has occurred is not the intention of the person who is harassing the other, but the way in which the behavior is perceived by that other person. If the other person perceives the behavior as sexual harassment, it constitutes sexual harassment. Sexual harassment can take the form of actions, words or mere gestures. The harassment can come from other employees as well as supervisors, customers or members of partner companies.
Typically, sexual harassment includes advances that are associated with the promise of advantages, the threat of disadvantages, unwanted physical contact, unwanted invitations with a clear intention, remarks and jokes about sexual orientation or other sexual characteristics. Our team of lawyers in employment or criminal law in Frauenfeld, St. Gallen or Zurich can advise you in specific individual cases.
In the company, both repressive and preventive measures should be taken to counteract sexual harassment in the workplace. In particular, management should take a clear stance that incidents of this nature are not tolerated. Information should be provided and a first contact person should be available. The person responsible in the company must react without hesitation and initiate investigations if such incidents are suspected or are reported. It is particularly important that informal reports are taken seriously.
Victims of sexual harassment in the workplace should, as a first step, request the harasser to refrain from such acts in writing. If necessary, it is sensible to send this message by registered mail to demonstrate its receipt. It can be helpful to keep a diary of the harassment from the beginning, so that the incidents can be retrospectively represented. In addition, the responsible department or manager in the company should be informed about the incidents. If the aforementioned measures do not have any effect or if further action is necessary, the cantonal arbitration board can be involved or other legal steps can be taken. A lawyer for employment law in St. Gallen, Frauenfeld or Zurich or our criminal lawyers in Zurich, St. Gallen or Frauenfeld will be happy to assist you.
Bullying is defined as systematic actions by a person or a group against a targeted person in order to exclude them from the employment relationship. Bullying behavior can take the form of ignoring and excluding people, not letting them speak out, withholding information from them or ridiculing them, insults, refusing to communicate, assigning demeaning work or assault and threats of physical violence. Sexual harassment may also constitute as a form of bullying. The attorneys for employment law in Zurich, St. Gallen and Frauenfeld can provide you with detailed information on your individual case. As in the case of sexual harassment, the subjective feeling of the person affected is also decisive in cases of mobbing. Central is whether the affected person perceives the actions as hostile. Another important criterion is that of time. In the case of bullying, the behavior and events occur persistently over a long time. If individual acts are viewed in isolation, they may not appear to be bullying, but in their respective context, they may constitute bullying. The recognition of bullying behavior can also come retrospectively, with the accumulation of events.