Instructions

1. Analyze the following interview.  After each helper statement label the listening skill used, indicate what the helper was trying to do, and evaluate her effectiveness. If the helper could have said something different or better, make a recommendation for change.

2. Develop a table of response kinds and describe and evaluate the overall use of communications skills.  Make recommendations for change, if appropriate.

3. Describe and evaluate the strategy that was used. Comment on the use of transition from one step to the next.  Make recommendations for change if appropriate. Use statement numbers to identify transition and steps in your analysis.

Background Information

In this interview one friend is talking to another friend.  The helper friend’s name is Joyce. The client friend is Rita. After getting comfortable in their physical environment, the conversation flowed rather easily. Rita decided to discuss a problem she is having at work with a male co-worker, Bob. She has worked with this person for over ten years. This man is married and has children. Their relationship is professional but borderlines dalliance. Rita was handling this until recently. Rita now works in Human Resources and the policy regarding sexual harassment was recently redone. The policy regarding sexual harassment is very clear and very strict. Rita knowing now what she knows and working in Human Resources feels this man has crossed the line.

The following is approximately a ten-minute excerpt from their conversation. Odd numbers refer to Rita. Even numbers are the comments of the helper, Joyce.

INTERVIEW

1. “In an ordinary working day... everybody jokes around with each other in a very, maybe a little bit in a sexually orientated fashion. Not anything that’s of any... there’s no touching there’s no whatever. I consider it to be very mellow. I certainly wouldn’t consider it to be sexual harassment.”
2. “Okay so you tell dirty jokes or... that kind of stuff.”
 
 

3. “No. They do funny things. How do I say... Let’s say a... oh I don’t know... somebody might say nice dress... you know and you go ‘thanks’ you know? It’s not sexually whatever but it’s just kind of joking a bit. How do I explain it? it’s a... there’s no overt sexual harassment meant in anything that’s ever said in a normal working day. Okay and I never feel it and I would never pick it out. Every once in a while this person will do something that I would consider extremely sexually harassing. I just let it roll off my shoulders. If anybody sees it or hears it in my work it would be considered sexual harassment.”
4. “Okay. Give me an example of something this man will do or say.”
 
 

5. “I’m on the phone. He comes up to me. I have a shirt on. He’ll take my hand, unbuttons the cuff, rolls up my sleeve and kisses my arm.”
6. Rita has my attention. She knows it because I am looking at her with my jaw dropped. I am thinking ‘the nerve of this man’ and at the same time ‘is she for real?’ There is a five-second silence.
 
 

7. “What?” At this point Rita is grinning and lets out a laugh.
8. “I’d agree that is definitely sexual harassment.”
 
 

9. “It’s going past the point. Right? I believe it is.”
10. “Your two examples that you gave me. First ‘nice dress.’ That’s a compliment. I could tell you that.”
 
 

11. “Right. That’s appropriate.”
12. “Second example, rolls up your sleeve and kisses your arm. That is sexual harassment. Are both these examples using the same man? Are you aware of him doing this with anyone else?”
 
 

13. “Yes, the same man. I don’t follow him around. So no I don’t know. I only know what he does to me.”
14. “This is private and not in front of anyone else.”
 
 

15. “Well I’m in an open area. I’m in a cubicle. Anyone walking by would see that. Right.”
16. “But nobody has.”
 
 

17. “Well I don’t think anybody has. Well maybe someone has seen some of the things that he has done. I mean this is only one example. Right.”
18. “This man has done things like that to you several times.”
 
 

19. “Oh for sure!”
20. “In the last ten years. Five years.”
 
 

21. “No. Probably the last year. Before that I don’t think I could tell you of any example of anything that has ever been said or been done. I’m saying I can’t think of anything up to that time that I would consider sexually harassing. In the past year he has become physically... it’s physical now. Right. It’s touching.”
22. “You feel uncomfortable now because it has become physical. It’s touching and you feel sexually harassed.”
 
 

23. “Well... yeah, it’s a work environment. He’s married. He shouldn’t be doing these things to me. I’m Human Resources. Like ‘HELLO.’ Why don’t you do it to the President? Like how far up do you want to go before you get your butt kicked here. Right.
24. “Okay Rita, you’ve given me some details about your concerns at work. You feel this is definitely sexual harassment. You are no longer comfortable with the situation and can no longer let it roll off your shoulders. Tell me, what are you going to do about this?”
 
 

25. “How do I deal with this in the correct fashion? Do I address him with this and say ‘Bob back off’. I mean up till now I’ve blown him off, but this arm thing happened last week! I know at the time I should have said ‘excuse me’ and popped him in the face, but I didn’t” Rita is laughing. “I’m HR now. I cannot in any shape or form, even if it’s not a big deal to me. I cannot put up with this anymore. I have to deal with this. I have to deal with this. I have to address him so he will not do these things anymore and recognize this is not acceptable to me. Right. I’m not exactly sure how I’m going to do this.”
26. “You feel torn between what is acceptable to you personally and what is acceptable according to Human Resources Policy because up to now you’ve blown things off. But the rules have changed with your title and in your very job description this behavior is not acceptable. Is that it?”
 
 

27. “Yes, yes, yes! I cannot blow it off anymore. I have to deal with this now. We are launching the new Human Resources Manual soon and I know the Policy on sexual harassment will jump right out at him.
28. “So Rita your problem is well defined.  What can you do?  What are your options? What does your Human Resources Manual say you should do?
 
 

29. That I am to go to my manager and express my concerns and they would deal with it.  I would be taken right out of the picture. If management can’t solve the issue then it goes to HR.”
30. “You are HR. Can I assume your manager is HR also?”
 
 

31. “That’s right ‘So duh, Bob come to me with your problems and I’ll help you work them out.”’ Rita gives a big laugh.
32. “So what are your options?”
 
 

33. “My thought was I could address him first or I could take it to management. I don’t want him to get in trouble.”
34. “What would you say to him?”
 
 

35. “ Tell him about the manual and that he’s going to have to stop this behavior at work. I’d tell him he has to be real careful about what he says and does, especially to me. Right.”
36.  “Yes. Go on.”
 
 

37. “I don’t care if you’ve known me for ten years... and we’re... you know... it’s just us. This kind of behavior is inappropriate at work. He’s married. He probably thinks it’s funny.”
38. “You feel he won’t take you serious because you’ve been putting up with his harassment and blowing it off.”
 
 

39. “Maybe. I could just go to management.”
40. “You have limited options. Two options actually. You can talk to him yourself.”
 
 

41. “Right.”
42. “Or you can go to your manager and complain to them and let them deal with him.”
 
 
 
 

43. “Right I’m just not sure which is the best way. Either them or me.”
44. “You feel worried about him being reprimanded or losing his job because of you. Is that it?”
 
 

45. “That’s not what would happen. They’d just tell him not to behave that way.”
46. “He wouldn’t be let go.”
 
 

47. “Oh no. That would never happen but I guess the real problem is I don’t want someone to give him shit and he ends up thinking bad of me.”
48. “Okay. Go on.”
 
 
 

49. “That’s the whole piece. Right I think he’s the kind of person that would say to me ‘Why didn’t you just come to me? Why didn’t you tell me sooner? Why did you let things go so far?”’
50. “Why didn’t you tell me to stop?”
 
 

51. “Yeah right I think my best bet is to pull him aside and say ‘look I’m not going to tell anybody anything unless you keep doing this’. A verbal warning.”
52. “A verbal warning. I like that.
 
 

53. “We’ve worked together ten years and I’ve let things slide but I’m not going to any more.
54. “Right. Sounds good. You’ re making a plan.”
 
 

55. “I’ll pull him aside and talk to him. If I don’t get what I want out of that… if he doesn’t watch his P’s and Q’s, then I’ll go to management.”
56. “You’ll tell him that.”
 
 

57. “Oh yeah. He will know that if things don’t change immediately I will go to management.”
58. “Sounds good.”
 
 

59. “Thanks, I’ll get right on that”

60. “You go girl!”