Chapter 1

1.0 INTRODUCTION

EEOC (Equal Employment Opportunity Commission) define sexual harassment as

unlawful to harass a person (an applicant or employee) because of that persons sex.

Harassment can include sexual harassment or unwelcome sexual advances, requests for

sexual favors, and other verbal or physical harassment of a sexual nature. Harassment does

not have to be of a sexual nature, however it can include offensive remarks about a persons

sex. For example, it is illegal to harass a woman by making offensive comments about

women in general. Business Dictionary define performance as The accomplishment of a

given task measured against preset known standards of accuracy, completeness, cost, and

speed. In a contract, performance is deemed to be the fulfillment of an obligation, in a

manner that releases the performer from all liabilities under the contract.

Of all the forms that violence against women can assume, sexual harassment is the most

ubiquitous and insidious, all the more so because it is deemed normal behavior and not

an assault on the female entity. It affects women in all settings whether public or private

and has psychological, medical, social, political, legal and economic implications. Instances

of sexual harassment should not be viewed as isolated incidents rather they should be

construed as a gendered aggression against the rights and dignity of women. The fact the

extremely harmful effects of Sexual Harassment are visible globally discounts any effort

to view it with less gravity than it deserves.

Below are a few examples activities that could be considered sexual harassment if

unwelcome. The list is meant only to give an idea of what can be considered sexual

harassment:
 Direct or indirect threats or bribes for unwanted sexual activity

Sexual innuendos and comments

Intrusive sexually explicit questions

Sexually suggestive sounds or gestures such as sucking noises, winks, or pelvic

thrusts

Repeatedly asking a person out for dates

Touching, patting, punching, stroking, squeezing, tickling, or brushing against a

person

A neck/shoulder massage

Rating a person's sexuality

Ogling or leering, staring at a woman's breast or a man's derriere

Spreading rumours about a person's sexuality

Name-calling, such as bitch, whore, or slut

Sexual Ridicule
 Frequent jokes about sex or males/females

Letters, notes, telephone calls, or material of a sexual nature

Pervasive displays of pictures, calendars, cartoons, or other materials with sexually

explicit or graphic content

Stalking a person

Attempted or actual sexual assault

1.1 BACKGROUND OF STUDY

This study is to find out how sexual harassment can effect employees performance in WRP

Asia Pasific Sdn.Bhd.In addition, this study was conducted for female staff only. WRP Asia

Pacific Sdn Bhdis one of the world's leading manufacturers of premium quality private brand

glove products. The company has come through close collaboration with branded partners

whose strength in sales and marketing bring their products to a variety of customers and

markets on a global scale. The company has total 573 workers. There are 177 of female

worker and the balance is male worker.Today, the problem of sexual harassment in

workplaces is acknowledged as a serious issue as an occupational hazard and a violation of

human rights especially women. The ILO (International Labour Organizational) has called it

a violation of the fundamental rights of workers, a safety and health hazard, a problem of

discrimination, an unacceptable working condition, and a form of violence, usually against

women workers and affects their work performance.Although both men and women can be

subjected to sexual harassment, most of the research shows that women are much more likely

to be victims and men perpetrators in societies globally. It same goes to the WRP Asia Pasific

company most of women that working there having a problem regarding sexual harassment

and effect their work performance.Sexual harassment deeply affects an employees

psychological and physical well-being (Earnshaw&Davidson, 1994) There are quite adverse

effects of sexual harassment like in some cases it might lead to illness, lack of commitment
and performance at job, increased absenteeism and even sometimes resignation (Chartered

Institute of Personnel and Development, 2005) while (Sczesny and Stahlberg's study, 2000)

of call centres found that job satisfaction and job performance are extremely affected by

telephone based sexual harassment. One of the studies in finding the effects of sexual

harassment has shown that men and women both feel humiliated, loss of self-confidence,

depressed, low self-esteem and decreased jobs satisfaction (Gutek, Barbara A, 1985)

1.2 RESEARCH PROBLEM

Sexual harassment is a problem that is normally faced by workers all over the world. In this

context, the researcher seeking to the sexual harassment on feminine staff in the WRP

company and how it effect on their job performance. Nowadays sexual harassment is a hazard

encountered in workplaces across the world that reduces the quality of working life,

jeopardizes the well-being of women and undermines gender equality and imposes costs on

firms and organizations, it mostly cause negative impacts only. Some companies in fact had

to pay out damages in addition to incurring indirect costs such as high job turnover, increase

absenteeism, low morale as well as low productivity and excessive medical claims. Besides,

women who reported sexual harassment suffered lower levels job satisfaction compared to

women who have not been harassed. They tend to be absent from work using sick leave as an

excuse. For the individual, it could bring adverse effects on the victim's emotional state.

Emotional distress may be manifested in symptoms including anxiety, depression, irritability,

anger and insomnia. All these could in turn affect motivation and effectiveness at work as

well as family relations at home.

1.3 RESEARCH OBJECTIVE

Objective is one of the most important keys for the researchers in order to complete the

research efficiently and successfully. This is because it will give some guideline to the

researchers and help to solve problems that arise in the topic. The purpose of the research is

to identify the relationship between the sexual harassment on feminine staff and the

employees job performance. More specifically, the objectives of the research are;

I To identify the risk factors of sexual harassment in WRP company.

II To identify the effect of sexual harassment on the female staff towards their job

performance.
III To identify the prevention of sexual harassment among all female staff.

1.4 RESEARCH QUESTION

Considering the background of the problems in WRP company and briefly summarised in

the problem statement, several research questions need to be addressed. They are :

I. What are the types of sexual harassment in the WPR Company?

II. How the female staff of WRP Company affected by the sexual harassment

problem regarding their work performance?

III. How the female staff can overcome their problem from sexual harassment in the

workplace based on their job performance?

1.5 SIGNIFICANCE OF STUDY

The significance of the study can be observed from the following

I. It helps WRP Asia Pacific Sdn Bhd to understand the effect of sexual harassment on

feminine staff towards their job performance.

II. It helps the company to find the risk factors of sexual harassment in that company.
III. It acts as a measure whether the company has been responsible for the safety and

welfare of the feminine employees against sexual harassment in workplace.

IV. The result of the study will help to assist the company about how to improve own

policy against sexual harassment that they have formulated, how to protect the

feminine staff from the harassment.

1.6 LIMITATION OF STUDY

This study is basically confined to one company that having being stated asWRP Asia Pasific

Sdn Bhd and the feminine employees of the company. Male employees of the company are

not included in the study.In order to complete this research a number of limitations would be

faced by the researchers such as:

I. Lack of information and cooperation from respondents.

Another problem is related to the respondents because women themselves are sometimes

reluctant to label their own experiences as sexual harassment. This is because such acts are
defined in terms of seriousness, and some women may not think their own experiences are

serious enough.

II. Logistics problems

We were also facing a lot of difficulties as we were living far from each others.

Transportation problems also put a limitation to us as we were heavily relying on public

transport.

III. Time Constraint

The period to complete this study is only about 4 months and at the same time the researcher

has to attend the class. As a student, researcher need to do a lot of assignment and it is hard

for us to focus and to spend more time on this research.

 1.7 DEFINITION OF TERMS

Sexual harassment

Sexual harassment at work: National and international responses (Deirdre McCann,

2005)Sexual harassment is a hazard encountered in workplaces across the world that reduces

the quality of working life, jeopardizes the well-being of women and men, undermines

gender equality and imposes costs on firms and organizations. According Sabitha.M

(2008)sexual harassment at work is an unwelcome or uninvited behaviour of sexual natures,

which is offensive, embarrassing, intimidating or humiliating and may affect an employees

work performance, health, career or livelihood.

Feminine

http://ardictionary.com/Feminine/1571 Having the qualities of a woman; becoming or approp

riate to the female sex; as, in a good sense, modest,graceful, affectionate, confiding; or, in a b

ad sense, weak, nerveless, timid, pleasure-loving, effeminate.

Harasser

Based on the source of http://www.merriam-webster.com/thesaurus/harasser: a person who

causes repeated emotional pain, distress, or annoyance to another <the firm takes the issue of

sexual harassment very seriously, and harassers are harshly disciplined.

 Hostile environment

Regarding the web page of http://www.ehow.com/about_6753496_meaning-hostile-

environment_.html A hostile work environment is one in which an employee is unable to do

his work effectively due to the harassment or interference of management or co-workers. For

women, hostility in the work environment often takes the form of unwanted sexual advances

or other forms of sexual harassment. A hostile work environment can also involve

insensitivity or harassment based on race or sexual orientation, or unkindness based on

personal incompatibility.

Job performance

http://www.consultingcafe.com/articles/job-performance-definedJob performance has been

defined as the overall expected value from employees behaviours carried out over the course

of a set period of time (Motowidlo, Borman, & Schmidt, 1997). This definition, although

fairly technical, includes specific ideas that are worth breaking down. Performance is a

property of behaviour, or, plainly stated, what people do at work. An employees behaviour

adds expected value to the organization that is, an employees behaviours may be

distinguished as helping or hindering an organization, but the outcomes of employee

behaviours are rarely measured so their value is merely expected

 Workplace

(AWARE, 2008)This study expands the concept of the workplace from just the physical space

or location of the corporation/enterprise where work takes place. It includes work-related

venues and interactions that employees may be involved in, so long as these are related to

their employment. Harassers therefore need not only be employers or colleagues, but can also

include clients and customers. For example, an incident where an employee receives

harassing SMS (Short message service) from another colleague or client is considered

workplace harassment, even though those SMS may not be sent at the physical workplace, or

during working hours. Similarly, sexual harassment that occurs on a persons way to and from

work, or during a client interaction or work-related dinner or function is also considered

workplace sexual harassment.

1.8 ORGANIZATION OF THE PROJECT PAPER

This project paper consists of five chapters that will explain the whole process of the

research.This study is structured as follows. Chapter 1 introduces the topic of the study

including the background, the problem statement, the research questions and research

objectives as well as the significance of the study which explain about the contribution of the

study. This chapter also includes with the limitation of study which explained about the

problem the researcher faced when doing this research. Then, this chapter also explained

about the definition of terms used throughout this study

Chapter two described the literature review on sexual harassment in workplace that effect the

feminine staff job performance in WRP company.This chapter also highlights other

researchers points of view on this subject. Articles, journals and book are used as materials

for the literature review.

After that, it is follows by the research methodology in Chapter 3, which covers the research

design, variables in the study, the populations, questionnaire data, collection of data and

techniques use to analyze the data.

Chapter Four basically is about data analysis and findings. Table and graphs are usually

presented in this chapter as illustrations and it will help explain in the details of the results of

analysis. The statistical package SPSS is used for data analysis.

The conclusion and recommendation of the study will be discussed in Chapter 5, based on

findings.Therecommendations are expected to be adopted by the company for further

improvement in their policies regarding to the sexual harassment on feminine staff in the

workplace.