AN EXAMPLE OF CONTEXTUAL
LEARNING DESIGN
The HR department of PQ Inc. had
organised a session on Workplace Harassment and all the employees had gathered
in the hall to attend the session. Once everyone was seated, Kumar, the H.R.
Manager walked on to the stage with an elderly lady, draped in a gray coloured
cotton sari and introduced her as Dr. Chaturdashi, a veteran psychotherapist,
who would conduct today’s session.
Dr. Chaturdashi greeted the
gathering and asked them to relax and watch a film she was going to show them.
She switched on the projector and the lights in the hall dimmed while the screen
on the stage came to life. Pornographic
scenes flashed on the screen making quite a few women in the audience jump up
from their seat. Dr. Chaturdashi paused the screening of the film and addressed
the rather disturbed gathering, “Please remain calm. This is not a pornographic
film, but a narrative of an employee like you. The session is based on the
narrative.” Once the gathering had settled down, she resumed the film show.
In the film, pornographic scene zooms out to show a young woman
at her workstation watching the pornographic scene streamed on her screen
through Facebook Messenger. The scene changes and the audience see the woman
walking into the office. On her way inside the building she meets a young man,
who is a sales staff of the organisation, on his way out of the office. They
greet each other and he informs the woman that he is way to make field visits
and sales calls. The woman walks to her workstation and places her bag at her
work desk. When she switches on the computer, an intranet message flashes on
the screen that It’s free internet access time and staff can login to their
Facebook account too. Since, she has reached the office an hour earlier than
the scheduled work hours. She logs in to her Facebook account. Immediately a
Facebook Messenger Chatbox pops up and a lady, who has befriended this woman as
a staff of Facebook, congratulates the woman and informs her that she has won a
lottery of seventy five thousand dollars. She continues chatting with the woman
on how she can claim her cash prize. At that moment yet another Messenger Chat
Box pops up with a greeting from a man residing in UK. He suddenly starts
sending obscene messages to the woman. The woman tries to chat with both the lady
and the man. The Lady posing to be the Facebook employee asked her to deposit
three thousand and five hundred dollars in the account number she had messaged
her and asked her for the identification documents. The woman messaged her
reply that she could not pay the amount and did not want the prize money.
Meanwhile, the man had messaged few obscene photographs and streamed a
pornographic video of a woman who looked and was dressed quite like her
colleague she had met on her way into the office. She tried to message in
defense of the integrity of the people of her nationality. She was so engrossed
in doing so that she forced herself to ignore the obscene messages and pictures
the man continuously messaged her. Suddenly the computer hanged and the woman heaved
a sigh of relief and restarted the computer. After this incidence, many of her
colleagues began making obscene gestures to her and whenever she would log in
to any of the social networking sites like Facebook and WhatsApp. She was not spared even on the social networking site like LinkedIn. She often would receive unsolicited messages asking her for a date or sexual favours. The screen blanked out and a text message
flashed on it informing the viewers that after a few weeks the woman was
diagnosed to be suffering from depression and she resigned from her employment.
Dr. Chaturdashi switched of the
projector and discussed the narrative with the audience and encouraged them to
share their experience too. Then she announced another round of film show and
switched on the projector. Now most of the audience saw themselves on the
screen. Most of them were screened reading the email from the HR Department they
had received through LMS announcing today’s session on Workplace Harassment and
fidget with an obscure link at the end of the email. Many closed the email as
soon as they had finished reading it, while most of the male employees fidgeted
with the link that opened a pornographic site. They spent a long time at the
site and then closed it to resume work. Dr. Chaturdashi switched off the
projector and resumed the discussion. She smiled and informed the audience that
the objective of the second film was not to spy on the employees of PQ Inc. or
to embarrass them. The objective was to study the work pattern and how many
would be curious to access an unknown link and view the site linked to it. She
asked the audience to share their views and comments on the film to facilitate
the discussion. One of the men commented that most of the people enjoy doing on
the sly such activities that are a taboo. He thought that most of the people
get into such habit from their childhood days, when they stole pickle and
mangoes or pinched tidbits from the refrigerator that their parents had asked
them to stay away from.
Dr. Chaturdashi replied, we are
always curious about the objects, activities and information that we are
deliberately kept away from. We then get into habit of it. We also learn to use
this as peoples’ weakness and use it to manipulate them. While doing so, we
forget that if we exploit anyone, we too are invariably being exploited.
Behaviours like voyeurism, making
derogatory remarks or comments, playing derogatory practical jokes, black
humour, making false accusation, any vengeful act are signs of a negative mind
that only hurts the owner of such a mind, but also the people he or she
interacts with, especially those who differ from him on beliefs. This causes a
lot of stress and friction at the workplace. That is why, the Handbook on
Corporate Ethics and Workplace Harassment was enclosed with the session
announcement email.
Dr. Chaturdashi then divided the
audience into activity groups and asked them to make a list of reasons that
prevent them from reporting any workplace harassment to the HR of the
organisation or feel defeated in tackling with issues like workplace harassment.
This results in both physical and mental
stress and it takes its toll on our health. Through the subsequent discussion
she tried to explain why we should be courageous enough to manage workplace
harassment; when necessary, report any such abuse for the good of not only ourselves
but also of the abuser.
Doctor Chaturdashi then shared
the following information at with the audience grouped into activity groups and
facilitated further discussion on Mental and Sexual Harassment of Women and Men
at the workplace and how they should tackle and when necessary, report such
abuse. She also made it quite clear to the audience that no one should misuse
the legal protection by filing a false report to harass any female or male
colleague.
Workplace
Harassment and What Action Can Be Taken:
Right to Dignity/Respect at
Workplace
Lawyers
Forum for Free Legal Advice
Sexual Harassment of Men
Prevention of Sexual Harassment
of Women at the Workplace in India (Department of Women and Child Welfare,
Government of India)
wcd.nic.in/act/handbook-sexual-harassment-women-workplace
Post the discussion on the information she had shared with the audience, Dr. Chaturdashi, to finally
debrief the participants on the objective of the session asked the audience,
how they could avoid sexual harassment at their workplace.
One of the men replied that the best way to avoid sexual
harassment is to have very clear and honest communication with the colleagues
and always have the organisation’s Employee Handbook on corporate Ethics and
Workplace Harassment Prevention and Reporting Guidelines and use them to both
avoid and prevent harassment.
Dr. Chaturdashi finally asked the audience what was most
important thing one can really do to not fall into the trap of such harassment.
Then one of the women from the audience replied that we should not appear
timid, helpless and gullible that anyone with negative intentions can take
advantage of us. We have to make ourselves both physically and mentally strong.
Dr. Chaturdashi applauded the answer by clapping her hands and the she
distributed a programme sheet in the audience that announced subsequent
training sessions on Self Development and Methods to Avoid and Manage Sexual
Harassment at the workplace.
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