Ask HN: How do I deal with the first sexual harassment complaint at my startup?

Just hired a new biz dev person. Over the weekend, he sent some messages that were inappropriate to one of my existing employees.

He asked to take the conversation off Slack (moved to Whatsapp) and asked if they could hang out (she said, "sure as friends in work context"), referred to her as a milf (ugh...), and asked if he could tell her a secret (she refused)

My employee handled it well and didn't let it get out of hand. I've seen the evidence of the texts in question.

The employee came to me in confidence (I'm one of the founders) and told me she really doesn't want to cause problems with the team. I'm really upset by this guy's behaviour and I want to fire him immediately. If I do, she'll know and it will be a violation of the trust she placed in me.

So what do I do HN? Do I fire him? Kick his ass? Get them in a room with a HR rep and talk it out? Hold a "how to recognize sexual harassment seminar"?

The employee in question has made it clear that it's not a big deal and she knows how to deal with it, but fact is she shouldn't have to deal with it and I want to make it clear that these things aren't acceptable in the company we're building.

Lawyer lawyer lawyer LAWYER lawyer LAWYER.

I think the consensus in the grown-up business world is "fire immediately for cause." I would bet substantial money that when you lawyer lawyer lawyer they will advise you to do that and document the heck out of it. The calculus is really, really simple: if you don't, then you will with probability approaching one get this incident or a similar incident cited during a threatened employment practices lawsuit, and your lawyers will sigh and say "OK, settle for $250,000. You can choose to fight it but the odds are not in your favor."

I get that you feel this may cause problems for your innocent employee. If it helps you contextualize this, maybe think of it less in terms of "Our departing employee has transgressed against our innocent employee, who let me into her confidence about that" and more in terms of "Our departing employee demonstrated judgement flagrantly incompatible with professional employment."

Would you be worried about this if he had been embezzling? "I'm just telling you on an FYI basis boss but I don't want to cause social issues." That's not really how we deal with embezzlement, right. You embezzle, you get fired. Immediately. The embezzlement is not a crime against the person who discovers the embezzlement. They're welcome to an opinion on what the best course of action is, but regardless of what that opinion is, the course of action will be a swift firing.

As to messaging to the rest of the company, again lawyer lawyer lawyer, but "X made comments of a sexual nature to another employee. As a consequence, we fired him. If you have questions or concerns, speak to me later. Moving on."

Have you a sexual harassment policy? Did they agree to it when they took the job?

Fire that person immediately, it's a clear breach. You need to show your employees that you will support them when something like this happens.

This may not be the first time this has happened, might only be the first time that you have heard about it. You need to be proactive in creating a safe work environment and as the founder that is your responsibility.

One thing to remember if you keep him on and he continues this behavior you might not find out about it for a while. People won't always speak out and tell you. What happens when he starts harassing your new hires? If he is new to the company and already this bold what happens in a year or two?

1. Talk to your attorney, yes.

2. Probably: fire this guy. This isnt someone you want at your company. When you fire him, you wont announce to the rest of the company why. And you can have a conversation with the victim employee to let them know why you did it: you don't want abusive people on the team, and that you value every employee and also have to look out for everyone and the entire business. The employee will respect you more for taking action, trust me.