Sexual Harassment in Hospitality Industry

  • Posted on December 5, 2024
Sexual Harassment Hospitality Industry

By Anuradha Gandhi and Rachita Thakur

Introduction

A young intern joins a hotel in an unknown city her schedule involves being placed in the kitchen. During her days in the kitchen, she finds the kitchen atmosphere inappropriate with a high percentage of male chefs working under high pressure and heat to deliver the ordered meal in record time. The expletives used, the terms of endearment and the exclusion of the intern experiences is not ideal but uncomfortable and offensive. The girl files a complaint of sexual harassment with the Internal Committee of the hotel. What do you think would be the outcome in this scenario? Can the chefs be held accountable for sexually harassing the intern?

Working conditions in hospitality industry differ greatly from other industries which has a visible impact on the working conditions of women in hospitality.

The global market share of hospitality industry has witnessed a significant growth over the years. Encompassing other industries including the largest accommodation and food and drink services, in 2023, the global hospitality market reached 4.7 trillion U.S. Dollars which is further expected to grow around 5.5 trillion U.S. Dollars in 2024.

Market size of hospitality in India is anticipated to reach US $31.01 billion by 2029 within an annual compound growth rate of 4.73% for the forecast period of 2024-2029. [1]

Women in Hospitality

Hospitality, known for being male dominated industry but has also seen increased participation of women over time. Hospitality today stands as one of the leading employer of women within Travel and tourism sector. According to the 2023 Women in Hospitality report form AHLA Foundation and Pennsylvania State University, 58% of the hospitality workforce was female in 2022. However, when it came to leadership positions, women comprised only 19% of C-suite roles.[2]  This shows how the sector is still traditionally male dominated and the reasons for which  can be attributed to workplace barriers such as insufficient number of qualified women further down the career ladder, discriminatory stereotyping of leadership attributes as male attributes, incompatibility between job structures and demands of a raising family.

Undoubtedly, hospitality sector has changed over years with better job benefits, more conducive environment and improved industry standards. From being majorly male dominating industry to witnessing women take up leadership roles, a change has been brought up.

However, women are still being underpaid and underrepresented. The International Labour Organization highlighted the challenges faced by women in the Hotels, catering and tourism industry by noting divergence between qualifications and workplace reality.

Sexual harassment in Hospitality – A narrative of safety and security

In 2024, two complaints against a senior director at a well-known hospitality organisation in the United States uncovered the questionable conduct of the perpetrator for a decade of employment with the organisation. Victims and witnessed confirmed the conduct of the perpetrator which included hugging, heavy touching, extended shoulder rubs and cheek kisses since 2014.[3]

In 2017, a survey of 500 workers conducted by Unite Here Local 1 found that 58 percent of women who work in Hotels and casinos reported experiencing at least one incident of sexual harassment by guests. 49% of participants (from housekeeping) surveyed said that the guests expose themselves, flash them or answer the doors naked. While 65% of the casino cocktail servers surveyed said that the guests would grope, pinch or grab them or try to touch them in unwelcome way. [4] In response to the same, the Unite Here in Chicago started a campaign called “Hands off, pants on” to advocate stopping sexual harassment perpetrated against women who serve drinks at casinos and clean hotel rooms. This led to passing of a legislation in 2017 which required the hotel employers to provide housekeeping staff with panic buttons. In addition, the legislation also protects hotel workers from retaliation when they report sexual violence by guests and further require hotels to implement anti-sexual harassment policies.[5]

Reasons why women in hospitality are subjected to sexual harassment?

Women in hotel industry become more vulnerable because this sector places high value on customer satisfaction which can put employees under pressure to tolerate unethical behavior.

  1. Employing young women as frontline workers- Women, particularly minority women, are often placed in jobs with lower status and are more likely to be hired for lower-paying segments like quick-serve as compared to higher-paying segments like fine dining. This difference in power creates an environment where sexual harassment is tolerated, ignored, or normalized, because employees have less bargaining power to report inappropriate behavior.
  2. Close interaction with co-workers and customers – Workers in hospitality are encouraged to draw on feminity to create pleasurable consumption experience. Thus, appearing bubbly, light-hearted and joyful are considered as valuable dispositions and described as skills. For women this means performing feminine receptivity towards male customers. Studies have shown that managing unwanted sexual attention and harassment is typically normalized as ‘part of the job’ particularly in bar work, where monitoring and ‘calling out’ problematic male customers was a critical and routine part of their work. [6]
  3. Environment where alcohol is served is more likely to have intoxicated customers who can be abusive to staff or other customers
  4. Where workers are in close contact with customers such as hotel spas experience more incidents of sexual harassment. Low skilled employees face discrimination.
  5. Many women working in hospitality industry are immigrants which makes them more vulnerable to experience sexual harassment because of their innate fear of retaliation or even worse, losing their visas.
  6. The vulnerable position with guests versus employees. Where either can feel like a victim of sexual harassment.
  7. The issue of contractual labour employed by the hotels.

Perpetrators of harassment in hospitality

Source – Research paper “Customer abuse and harassment in the hospitality industry: the immersion of an everyday workplace crime”[7]

Legal landscape by countries

  1. The U.S. Equal Employment Opportunity Commission (EEOC)

The EEOC announced four lawsuits against local restaurants in the Las Vegas and Southern Nevada including allegations of rape, sexual assault, sexual solicitations, sexual comments, inappropriate touching, stalking and other inappropriate behaviors towards employees by owners, supervisors, management, co-workers, and/or customers. Taking note of the lawsuits, the Regional Attorney for the EEOCs Los Angeles District remarked, “Harassment remains a persistent problem in the workplace when employers fail to properly address reports of harassment. The allegations are particularly concerning when directed at the most powerless in the workforce”. [8]

The lawsuits were filed by the EEOC before the U.S. District Court for Nevada seeking compensatory and punitive damages for the class of aggrieved individuals.

In 2018, the owner of a restaurant group in the New York City was directed to pay $2.3 million to five ex-employees who had experienced sexual harassment and retaliation. The employees had reported incidents of sexual harassment by a supervisor, and after reporting the harassment, they were subjected to retaliation and were eventually fired. The verdict also included $1.3 million in punitive damages.[9]

The United Kingdom

In 2019, a female employee of a hotel chain in the United Kingdom reported sexual harassment by a male colleague. The hotel chain was fined £100,000 (approximately $136,000) after it was found to have failed to take appropriate action to address the harassment, which continued for several months.[10]

California

In a case where an employee as fired, in retaliation, for reporting a case of sexual harassment to the management. The Luxury hotel in California agreed to pay $2.5 million to settle a lawsuit filed by the said employee. [11]

India

The Prevention of Sexual Harassment of Women at Workplace (Prevention, Prohibition and Redressal) Act, 2013 is the current legislation that mandates all organisations to comply with its provisions in order to create safe workplaces. The POSH Act obligates organisations and employers to constitute an Internal Committee to deal and redress complaints of sexual harassment, have in place a POSH Policy, organize and conduct sensitization sessions for employees and capacity building programs for the members of the IC.

State specific Shops and Establishments Act also govern the working hours and conditions for women in working in shops and other commercial establishments. These include considerations on rest intervals, suitable working conditions, health and other safety safeguards for women employees.

Solutions- Initiatives taken by some of the global players in Hospitality

Leading hospitality organisations have started to recognize the potential of diverse and strong female workforce and have started to introduce initiatives to boost women’s participation in travel and tourism employment.

A renowned hotel chain, in their commitment to foster a safe and inclusive environment for women travelers and employees, have started an empowerment campaign which covers their in-house development training program for their employees and program that celebrates Indian women chefs and workforce. [12]

In May 2022, another hospitality company, launched a framework of women-centric initiatives for all stakeholders including guests, employees, partners and community. The said company has also announced its goal to raise women participation in its workforce to 25% by 2025 and support women led businesses and partners.[13]

An international hotel brand had opened its first all women property managed by women in Hyderabad. While in a similar move another hotel chain, in 2022, had launched a campaign ‘It’s Ok’ to promote flexibility in its culture. A famous luxury hotel brand in New Delhi is known for its stringent policies and detailed standards addressing safety concerns of female employees and travelers. From flexible work arrangements to zero tolerance policy for harassment and prejudice for female travelers and employees, this hotel has defined strict policies and procedures pertaining to sexual harassment, discrimination and workplace safety for female employees.[14]

[1] https://www.ibef.org/research/case-study/growth-of-hotel-industry-in-india#:~:text=The%20market%20size%20of%20the,forecast%20period%20of%202024%2D29.

[2] https://www.ahla.com/sites/default/files/2023-05/Women-In-Hotel-Leadership-2023-FINAL.pdf

[3] https://yaledailynews.com/blog/2024/10/25/former-hospitality-director-found-to-have-committed-severe-sexual-misconduct-remained-employee-for-months/

[4] https://www.handsoffpantson.org/

[5] https://endvawnow.org/en/articles/1962-women-in-the-hospitality-and-tourism-sector.html

[6] https://nova.newcastle.edu.au/vital/access/services/Download/uon:51108/ATTACHMENT02?view=true

[7] https://strathprints.strath.ac.uk/88712/7/Hadjisolomou-etal-CIT-2024-Customer-abuse-and-harassment-in-the-hospitality.pdf

[8] https://www.eeoc.gov/newsroom/eeoc-announces-several-sexual-harassment-lawsuits-filed-against-las-vegas-hospitality

[9] https://www.mahoneygroup.com/sexual-harassment-hospitality/

[10] https://www.mahoneygroup.com/sexual-harassment-hospitality/

[11] https://www.mahoneygroup.com/sexual-harassment-hospitality/

[12] https://bottindia.com/hospitality-chains-in-india-undertaking-several-initiatives-for-women-safety-empowerment/

[13] Ibid.

[14] Ibid.