Resolving EEO Issues

**A Telecast Originating**

**from the**

**BLM National Training Center in Phoenix, Arizona**

**June 19, 2003**

This transcript is from the closed-captioning file produced during the
telecast.

It may contain errors and omissions in transcription.

**Announcer:** Welcome to the NTC supervisory series. These courses are
designed to familiarize new supervisors with their role and to serve as
a review for experienced supervisors. Today\'s course, resolving EEO
issues. Now, your instructors.\
\
D. Chivers: Good morning. Thanks for joining us. Today we\'re going to
look at EEO from the point of view of you the supervisor. I\'m Debie
Chivers from the Office of Fire and Aviation at NIFC in Boise. I have
joining me today Enrico David from the Colorado State Office. Good
morning.\
\
E. David: Good morning.\
\
D. Chivers: And Angela Lara from the great Las Vegas Field Office. Good
morning.\
\
A. Lara: Good morning.\
\
D. Chivers: A few housekeeping items today before we start. The
instructions for the push-to-talk system on page 2 of your participant
workbook. Remember when you call us, polices state your name and
location, and I just want to give a little caution to participants, if
you talk about specific cases in your location that you don\'t use
names. Also, if two or more people are trying to talk at the same time,
that causes us great problems. We\'re going to give you a little
time-out sign, ask you to please talk at once and we\'ll call on you
individually. Before we begin, if you look at your Participant Guide on
page 4 we have a couple of questions we\'d like you to answer by
yourself. If you would just take a few seconds to do that. .\
\
D. Chivers: Thanks. Hopefully you had a chance to answer those
questions. Now we\'re going to talk about the objectives and
responsibilities of supervisors and I\'m going to turn that over to
Enrico.\
\
E. David: Thanks, Debie. I\'d like to begin this course by discussing
with you the objectives of this course and also the responsibilities of
supervisors. In a word, this course is designed to enable you as
supervisors to meet your responsibilities in EEO. Your responsibilities
include the following\... One, to foster a workplace free of
discrimination and to recognize the seven categories of prohibited
discrimination. Secondly, you have the responsibility to protect
employees from discrimination and illegal harassment by ensuring
employees are aware of their rights and responsibilities and by creating
an open and positive work environment. Finally, it is your
responsibility as supervisors to quickly and seriously respond to
complaints of discrimination, and you do this by addressing conflict at
your level, by addressing sexual harassment issues in a timely manner
and by acting to ensure that retaliation does not occur. This whole
course is focused on all this responsibilities that you have as a
supervisor. Now, as in all the supervisory top nicks this series,
managing the workplace to create an open and positive environment
doesn\'t just happen. It takes the application of many of the 27OPM
leadership qualities live to make this happen. These 27 leadership
qualities are listed on page 5 of your guidebook and please keep these
qualities in mind as you go about your duties as supervisors in the
workplace. Angie?

A. Lara: Well, every supervisor wants an open and conflict-free
workplace, but what does all of this have to do with EEO?\
\
E. David: We are here to find that out.\
\
D. Chivers: I think we can assume that everybody knows what the
abbreviation EEO stands for so let\'s start there briefly, and Enrico,
you can talk about what is EEO and what is EEO in the place to do.\
\
E. David: EEO is the acronym for equal employment opportunity. Equal
employment opportunity defined as the right of all employees to work and
to advance in the workplace based on their merit, ability and potential,
and also free from discrimination. Now, EEO is there in place to ensure
that employees are not subjected to discrimination. EEO is also there to
ensure that employees work in a non-hostile work environment. Now, the
question arises, who do you think EEO applies to? The reality is,
everyone falls under EEO protection in someway or another. Debie will be
expounding on this point when she discusses the protected groups in EEO.
There are many layers and facets of EEO, and today\'s course will
address the following topics. Number one, the rights and
responsibilities of employees and supervisors. Number two, mediation.
Thirdly, sexual harassment. And fourthly retaliation. Today\'s court
will not address reasonable accommodation, although reasonable
accommodation is a very complex topic, we decided that it merits a
separate training course by itself. Today\'s course also will not
address affirmative employment, will not address outreach and
recruitment, and also will not address hiring and other personnel
actions. Debie?\
\
D. Chivers: Thanks, Enrico. If you recall back to page 4, we asked that
you fill out some questions. We\'re going to go through those as we go
through the course today. Hopefully you had a chance to fill that out.
If you\'ll turn to page 6 of your Participant Guide, we\'ve left some
blanks for you to fill in there. Those deal with the categories of
protected groups under EEO. As an agency, the BLM is committed to
preventing discrimination based on race, any race, color, any color,
sex, either male or female, national origin, any national origin,
religion, either you have a religion or you don\'t, you\'re covered
either way, and then when I did my list, I left the three for the very
end you may or may not be covered under. The top five\' talked about
everybody is covered under. The first one I listed is disability. Either
physical or mental disability. Age, in the EEO system you have to be
over 40 to be covered. And then reprisal. You have to have been involved
in the EEO process in order to be covered under the EEO category for
reprisal. BLM\'s also committed to workplace free of sexual harassment.
Of course, the answer to this question you already filled out on page 4.
In this course we will look at what you need to know as a supervisor. We
will use scenarios, case studies and some role plays to help focus on
prevention. We figure a little prevention goes a long way. Then the
question always becomes, who are the players in the EEO arena? Enrico,
do you want to cover that?\
\
E. David: Sure. The players in this arena include the EEO staff, which
is composed of the EEO manager, the EEO specialist and the EEO
counselor. The EEO manager works on EEO policy guidance at the State
Office level. On the other hand, the EEO specialist assists the EEO
manager in implementing the EEO program. Lastly, the EEO counselor works
on individual cases as a fact finder in local offices. The EEO counselor
also attempts to resolve EEO complaints at the lowest possible level. It
is important to note here that the supervisors, you should establish an
ongoing working relationship with EEO. You should use EEO staff also for
consulting and assistance. Debie?\
\
D. Chivers: Enrico, I cannot emphasize enough that the EEO staff is
impartial throughout the process and that they really don\'t decide
anything. They fact find. That\'s really their job.\
\
E. David: Right.\
\
A. Lara: And although EEO is for all employees and supervisors are
employees, too, sometimes, though, we feel that EEO is only around when
there\'s a conflict. But we really can use them at other times.\
\
D. Chivers: So, Angie, you maybe give us ideas of how you\'ve used EEO
staff in your job as a manage center.\
\
A. Lara: I would be happy to do that. Some of the ways I\'ve used EEO
staff is for validating my decisions and thought processes, giving me
options and alternatives on how to move forward in some actions, maybe
some advice with those fuzzy gray areas, and sometimes just to listen to
me venting about my side of the story. So there\'s a multitude of uses
right there.\
\
D. Chivers: Thanks. I\'m very glad to hear you\'ve done a good job of us
using your EEO staff. I cannot stress enough the EEO staff is really
there to provide advice and consulting whether you have an issue pending
or not. Make them your friends. They can help you out. I want to turn to
the Participant Guide on page 7 and have you follow along as I talk
about some examples of how the EEO staff can offer you review and
critique services. They can review and critique interview questions for
you, recruitment strategies, disciplinary strategies, policies, they can
look at your policies and say is this policy necessary, is it open and
respectful of gender issues such as references to rating plans, they can
look at your procedures, they can ensure that you understand your rights
and responsibilities related to EEO, they can suggest strategies for
communicating policies, issues, rights and responsibilities with
employees.

Many issues develop due to poor communications. Open communications can
resolve issues and avoid false assumptions. They can help provide
training to employees. They can provide advice and guidance on the
issues of reasonable accommodation, sexual harassment and diversity. EEO
staff can suggest strategies for creating an open and respectful
workplace environment. They can provide guidance on how to address and
resolve conflicts informally at your level. They can offer information
and advice regarding the mediation or ADR process. EEO staff can provide
advice and guidance to help resolve issues that cannot be resolved
informally at the local level. EEO just provides a way to process issues
if they can\'t be resolved at your level. Now we\'re going to turn to
Enrico who is going to talk about employee rights.\
\
E. David: Thank you, Debie. In the workplace environment, employees and
supervisors have rights and responsibilities. Let\'s deal first with
employee rights. Every employee has the right to a workplace free of
discrimination. Know also that the employee has the right to report
workplace issues to a third party such as a higher level supervisor or
to an EEO officer. Also, every employee has the right to use the EEO
process. The EEO process provides a way to address issues if they are
not resolved at your level. Now, EEO is not just for all BLM employees.
It is also for contractors, volunteers, applicants for employment and
the general public. Remember, as a supervisor, you are an employee, and
as such, you also have these employee rights.\
\
A. Lara: So I know there\'s probably folks out there wondering, does an
employee have the right to sue me personally?\
\
E. David: The answer to that, Angie, is yes. Employees can sue
supervisors and as a supervisor, if you are sued, you will be defended
by the Solicitor\'s office and by the Assistant U.S. Attorney\'s office,
as long as your actions are within the realm and bounds of your
authority. Now, we come to a discussion of supervisor responsibilities.
Right up front we looked at the list of your supervisor responsibilities
regarding EEO. I should note here that many of these responsibilities
needed in the EEO arena are not any different from responsibilities you
have regarding conduct and performance of your employees. We\'re going
to be referring to the responsibilities listed on page 9 throughout this
session. Again, I would emphasize that this entire course is organized
around these responsibilities. You as supervisors need to recognize that
EEO complaints are against the agency. Generally, the supervisor, you,
act as the agent of the agency.\
\
A. Lara: Ok. Well, I know my name won\'t be on the cover of that
lawsuit, but I know that it\'s my decisions, it\'s my actions and in my
heart I know that\'s what\'s being questioned. So it\'s not the
Secretary\'s actions. She doesn\'t even know what happened. It\'s what
I\'ve done that\'s being questioned by the complainant. So you want to
talk about appear little bit, make me feel a little better?\
\
E. David: Ok. When an EEO complaint is filed, the EEO complaint is filed
not against you as a person, but it\'s filed against your actions as an
agent of the agency. So you have to bear this in mind so that you do not
take EEO complaints filed against you personally. Employees not only
have rights, they also have responsibilities. Employees need to treat
their peers and supervisors with respect. They need to adhere to
government and DOI policies regarding conduct, performance, ethics and
EEO. Employees also need to know the supervisor\'s expectations and the
possible consequences for not meeting the expectations. Employees need
to communicate with their supervisors, because after all, communication
is a two-way street. Another employee responsibility is to inform the
supervisor immediately when employment issues arise. Then, lastly,
employees have the responsibility to report incidents of harassment,
sexual harassment, to the supervisor immediately. Now, just as employees
have rights, supervisors have rights, too. These supervisor rights
include the following\... Number one, you have the right to have your
side of the story heard. Secondly, you also have the right to
representation of your choice during the EEO counseling and
investigation stages. Thirdly, you have a right to be represented by the
Solicitor at EEOC hearings in Federal District Court. Fourthly, you as
supervisors have the right to seek out advice and counseling from EEO
staff and higher level supervisors within the bounds of confidentiality.
Now, of course, just knowing the rights and responsibilities of
employees and supervisors in the workplace does not make that workplace
environment open and positive or more productive. So let\'s now look at
strategies you can take as supervisors to create this open, positive and
productive environment that everyone in the agency wants. Debie?\
\
D. Chivers: Thanks, Enrico. I want to talk a little bit about the open
and positive work environment. Being proactive may prevent many issues
from becoming EEO issues. So creating an open, positive workplace can be
approached in many ways. Each supervisor has their own style. The one
point to emphasize is the influence you as a supervisor have on the
attitudes of employees in the openness of your workplace. We want to
recommend and discuss in some detail strategies that will help create an
open and positive work environment. You can follow along with me on page
10 in your participant workbook. The first strategy is to communicate.
Strategy number two, be aware. Strategy three, street employees fairly.
Strategy four, be proactive. So we\'re going to look at each strategy in
detail. Let\'s start with strategy number one, communicate.

Communicate rights and responsibilities. Let employees know their
responsibilities and responsibilities and in turn you as a supervisor
should let your employees know what your responsibilities are as a
supervisor. Communicate up to date policies and information. Make sure
you let your employees know about EEO policy. Policy reminders are
usually issued on a pretty regular basis. So make sure that you post
those in locations in your office and that you get those to your
employees. Communicate your expectations. Let employees know what to
expect from you as a supervisor. Verbalize your intentions. Don\'t
assume employees know what you want them to do. Ask questions and follow
up to ensure they understand what you mean. Coach employees to ask you
for clarification. Then be open to their questions. Let employees know
your personal styles and preferences. Let them know how you react under
pressure, how you give work assignments, and how you like to receive
information. So my question is for Angie, so, Angie, what kind of things
have you told your employees about how you like to see things done?\
\
A. Lara: Well, I have tried to share some of those bits of information
with the folks that I work with, and some examples for me are that I
expect timely and meaningful EPPers from employees, I expect
inclusiveness in problem solving, most everyone knows I\'m not at my
best early in the morning and also I prefer talking face-to-face over
e-mail.\
\
D. Chivers: I know as an employee I would want to know that if I worked
for you. It would make it easier. One of the other items as a supervisor
you need to remember is to listen. A part of any good communication plan
is listening. As supervisors we often see our role as problem solvers.
We do that often, however, sometimes we resist the urge to solve every
problem or situation that walks into your office. Part of the effective
communication is listening. Understand why an employee is coming to you.
They may just want you to listen, listening is an important part of
creating an open and safe working environment.\
\
A. Lara: Debie, here what I would like to remind folks of is it\'s
important to use those active listening skills. A lot of have been to
communication classes and learned what some of those are. Those are
important to use. Also taking notes when it\'s appropriate.\
\
D. Chivers: Thank you very much. That\'s very helpful. Now we\'re going
to turn to Enrico. He\'s going to talk about communication
considerations.

E. David: I would like to offer some communication considerations to all
of you as supervisors. Remember, how you communicate is as important as
what you communicate. Communication is much more than what is written or
spoken. Our body language, the time and place we choose to communicate
and also the methods we use to communicate all have a lot to do with how
the message is received by the employees. As a supervisor, everything
you do communicates something. Be aware of that.\
\
A. Lara: And I had one thing I wanted to adhere, and that was when you
were talking about body language, I have a saying that, fonts are the
body language of writing. Just to keep that in writ mind as well.\
\
E. David: Good point. As supervisors you should avoid sending out mixed
or unintended signals to your employees. Be aware of how others read
your signals. Conflict often begins with the fact that different
employees have different perceptions about your actions as a supervisor.
Pay close attention to the perceptions that your employees have
regarding your behaviors.\
\
A. Lara: And again, as supervisors we tend to think of ourselves as just
regular folks, and forget sometimes about the perceptions that are
created just by virtue of the chair that we sit in. So that puts us in a
position of already being in a position to give conflicting messages. So
what we\'re going to do now is look at an example of mixed or unintended
messages and then we\'re going to ask you at your viewing sites to come
up with other examples and we\'ll find out there are many ways we can
give out unintended signals to employees. So go ahead look at page 11 of
your workbook. You will see a box in there that says discussion
exercise. .\
\
A. Lara: Let\'s go ahead and look at what that example, the first
example, was in the workbook, and just think about how you do spend your
lunch breaks. Do you always go to lunch with the same employees? How is
this perceived by others? Is there a perception that these employees may
get better assignments? And, might it be true? I also \-- excuse me \--
if you are participating with others, you might want to think of some
other examples that you have together. I did have one that I was going
to share to give you something else to think about, and that was I had
an employee who was relatively new working for me and I had to travel
quite frequently. I often called the office to see how she was doing,
make sure she had all the tools she needed to get her job done, find out
what was going on and so forth and so on. I came back from travel one
time and we talked about that, and I thought I was giving a message of
really showing how much I cared about her and wanted to make sure she
was taken care of. But the message she was getting was I didn\'t trust
her to run the shop when I was gone. So that\'s an example I have, and
we would like you to think of some of your own. Or maybe you already
have. Does anyone out there want to share an example with us? Come on,
you know you want to.\
\
Caller: This is Montana.\
\
A. Lara: Thank you!\
\
Caller: We decided here we don\'t do lunch in Montana. We just avoid the
situation altogether! No, the consensus here from the supervisors is if
you do go to lunch to make sure to include the other staff so you don\'t
show that preferential treatment.\
\
A. Lara: That\'s great. Thank you very much. Good point. Does anybody
else have one they want to share?\
\
Caller: This is New Mexico. Hello, Angie. How are you?\
\
A. Lara: Hi, Karsten. I\'m good. How are you?\
\
Caller: One of the examples we have here is at times there are
supervisors that perhaps go out and do recreational activities outside
the workplace such as golf on a regular basis with some of the same
employees and at times that can be perceived as developing a
relationship between the supervisor and the employee that perhaps could
be viewed as favoritism. We have heard that one in the past.

A. Lara: That\'s another good example. The two main points are
unintended and perception. So let\'s go on to page 12 in your guide and
we have a scenario exercise we\'d like to use now. As you read the short
scenario and consider the questions, put yourself in the role of Jay,
the employee, as an employee what messages might you be receiving from
Kevin the supervisor, and if you were coaching Kevin on his
communication with employees, what advice might you like to offer, and
we\'ll come back and get your answers. .\
\
A. Lara: Debie, do you want to check and see what our audience has for
us?\
\
D. Chivers: Hopefully you\'ve had a chance to take a look at that
scenario. I\'m going to send it out to you to see if you have put
yourself in the role of Jay the employee. As an employee what messages
might you be receiving from Kevin the supervisor?\
\
Gayle, I\'m really frustrated \--\
D. Chivers: How about if you were coaching Kevin \--\
\
This project you have had knee charge of, I come in, get a telephone
call from the OHV contact person asking me who the contact for this
project is and telling me they were told it\'s Jane. I don\'t understand
what\'s going on. You put me in charge of this project. I want to be in
charge of this project. Jane is completely inexperienced, she doesn\'t
know what she is doing, I\'ve started the project, put a lot of time and
effort into and it now I\'m not doing it, and I think it\'s a bunch of
crap and I\'m frustrated and want to know why she is in charge and I\'m
not and what am I doing now and how did this come about? I\'m just
really frustrated.\
\
D. Chivers: Thank you. I bet you were wondering why we saw that piece of
video, but we\'re going to go back to the Kevin and Jay scenario, so
what I\'m hoping is that you\'ve had a little extra time to take a look
at those questions. If you were coaching Kevin on his communication with
employees, what advice might you offer?\
\
Caller: This is Jan in New Mexico. How are you this morning?\
\
D. Chivers: I\'m fine, Jan.\
\
Caller: We had a group discussion here and thought about mixed messages
and perhaps the supervisor might be preoccupied or busy, but as a coach
you would need to remind that individual that they need to be aware of
everyone\'s feelings and to be careful about changing patterns of
behavior. The other thing I would suggest is that you set a climate
among your employees that if you as a supervisor change your behavior
the employees feel free to bring to your attention, hey, what\'s going
on here? You\'re not acting with the same patterns you have in the past.
Let the employees raise that to the supervisor as well.\
\
D. Chivers: Jan, that is perfect. I like your response. You\'re right.
If you do set up that atmosphere that people feel free to come to you,
they will do that, and that\'s so important. Thanks. That\'s a very good
point.\
\
E. David: Open communication is the key.\
\
D. Chivers: Absolutely. Thanks a lot. The next question is, what does
this have to do with EEO? Anybody have a response to that? Well, I\'m
sure at first blush you\'re saying now why do you think this is an EEO
issue? Well, sometimes you never know in your office. Just be aware of
that. That\'s that open and positive communication. Let me make a couple
points about this scenario. If you have a pattern of focusing on new
employees when they come in, and sometimes people do to that let them
get a feel for the office and make them feel very comfortable, that\'s
ok, but tell people that\'s your intentions, I\'m just going to be
focusing on you for the first couple weeks and then I will sort of let
you be on your own. That way you tell them what you are going to do. The
other one is always be aware as a supervisor anything you do that you
may have intentions people may see their perceptions may be different.
Just be aware of that. We\'re going to move now to another exercise.
I\'m going to turn that over to Angie. Angie?

A. Lara: We saw the brief OHV exercise. I don\'t know if we\'re going to
see that again. So what we\'re going to do now is watch the following
short role play. An employee has come to her supervisor. The employee is
upset about a change in work assignments. So after viewing this video,
consider the questions on page 13 of your guide. Again, if you have
groups, keep them small so that everyone can share in the short time
that we have. So let\'s take a look again at that video.\
\
You know, Gayle, I\'m really frustrated. I got to be honest with you.
This OHV project you\'ve had me in charge of, I come in this morning,
get a telephone call from the OHV contact person asking me hoot contact
for this project is and telling me they were told it\'s Jane. I don\'t
understand what\'s going on. You put me in charge of this project. I
want to be in charge of this project. Jane is completely inexperienced,
doesn\'t know what she is doing. I started the project, I\'ve put a lot
of time and effort into it and now I\'m not doing it and I think it\'s a
bunch of crap and I\'m really frustrated and I want to know why she is
in charge and I\'m not and what am I doing now and how did this come
about and I just \-- I\'m really frustrated!\
\
I understand how you feel, however, I\'m not going to get into a
discussion about Jane. How I treat Jane\...

A. Lara: Let\'s take a few moments to answer the questions that are on
page 13. The first question is: is this employee understandably upset?
Why or why not? Who would like to take a shot at that one?\
\
Caller: This is Melissa from Colorado.\
\
A. Lara: Hi, Melissa.\
\
Caller: Definitely understandably upset. If you are changing an
employee\'s assignment, you owe it to the employee if you plan to be
respectful to them to tell them before you tell anybody else what\'s
going on, and you need to give them the rationale as to why.\
\
A. Lara: I think that\'s a great answer. The next question is: what
possible reasons might the supervisor have for changing the employee\'s
work assignment? Who would like to take that one? Anyone on the panel?\
\
D. Chivers: I\'d like to take that one, Angie, thanks. A lot of times
supervisors change employee\'s work requirements simply because they
need people to do the work and the problem then becomes letting them
know they\'re going to change their work responsibilities and the
reasons why that\'s so important.\
\
A. Lara: I would also say that Melissa in her initial response kind of
answered the third question about what they could have done to improve
the situation when she said let them know early and up front and first.
That was an excellent answer, Melissa.\
\
E. David: This role play exercise highlights two very important items in
our relationship \-- or in your relationship with your employees. Number
one, you should communicate as soon as possible to the employee
concerned your reasons for your actions. Secondly, do not assume that
the employee will know your intent or your reasons for your actions. Now
let\'s take a look at the conclusion of this role play. .

I understand what you\'re saying, Ashley. I really do. I don\'t want to
talk about Jane right now. However, I do want you to know that I fully
recognize your expertise in OHV and trails inventory issues and that\'s
why I want you to be in charge of the trails inventory project for the
monument. As you know, we\'ve been just raked over the coals on the
whole monument issue, and therefore I need somebody with your type of
trails inventory expertise to be in charge of it. Not only that, the \--
if I had you in charge of the OHV project and the trails inventory
project in the monument, the monument people might be a little upset
since they\'re a little bit touchy about OHV issues anyway. So I needed
to keep some separation there. And in previous conversations when we\'ve
talked about what you wanted to do, you\'ve indicated that you wanted to
be involved with any project that involved the monument. So I thought
looking at all those factors you were the best person. You certainly
have more experience. You know everybody in the field. So you\'ll be
able to

contact them, you\'ll be able to get them all on the same page, you\'ll
be able to get the trails inventory project done in a way that meets
everybody\'s needs. So that was why I did what I did. My only concern is
that I should have brought you in earlier so you understood my thought
process, but believe me, you are\...\
\
E. David: Obviously we see here that if the supervisor had communicated
all her intentions and what she\'d done to the employee clearly up front
that employee may not have become upset and communication would have
been going back and forth between the supervisor and the employee.\
\
A. Lara: Again, we need to point out that situations like these do occur
so easily just because of constantly changing priorities and people who
are so busy, for example, in Montana where they don\'t even have time
for lunch. So it\'s real easy to just jump into getting the work done.
So, Debie?\
\
D. Chivers: Thanks. I\'m going to talk about communication that\'s
appropriate to the situation. If you would follow along, we have a list
of communication methods at the top of page 14 of your participant
workbook. Obviously not all methods of communication are going to be
effective in all situations. Let\'s spend just a few minutes. We\'ll
look at these communication methods and I\'ll kind of give you my idea
of what works if that you are looking for communication methods that
work, if you look at third party or word of mouth, sometimes that
doesn\'t work. That\'s certainly something we saw in the last scenario
about the OHV responsibilities. Employees really appreciate staff
meetings and face-to-face meetings. That way they feel like they\'re
getting the information specifically from you. And e-mail has become
certainly a BLM standard. We use e-mail a lot and sometimes it\'s not
the preferred method when there are issues out there. Just be aware of
that. We\'re going to move now to another exercise which is also on page
14. If you\'re participating with others, please work in small groups
and then consider the questions that follow in the guide. We\'ll be back
to talk about them.\
\
D. Chivers: Hopefully you\'ve had a chance to read that e-mail and
answer the questions. How might this e-mail impact Mr. Supervisor\'s
workplace environment?\
\
Caller: Hi, this is he will VIN in Phoenix.\
D. Chivers: How are you today?\
\
Caller: It\'s only going to be about 106 today.\
\
D. Chivers: I can understand that. How do you think this will affect the
workplace environment?\
\
Caller: I think you\'ve got a fragile situation here that has potential
to escalate. One being just a situation alone is talking about third
party impacts on other employees. Also is a workplace environment if
that you could communicate face-to-face to all employees and then ask
for suggestions on how to resolve the situation. The other issue that I
think we encounter with e-mail is that that can be forwarded to friends
and peers and co-workers and sometimes that also escalates a situation
when your intent was just to try to hold it down until you got back.\
\
D. Chivers: Those are some very good points. Absolutely. Your last point
about it being forwarded onto people, you\'re absolutely right. Thanks
for bringing that up. Anybody else want to take a stab at answering that
question?\
\
Caller: Debie, this Jan.\
\
Caller: This is Don in \-- the problem is people who don\'t in this case
joke about Jerry\'s promotion, they get lumped in together with
everybody else and it seems unfair. I understand the situation here, but
this happens all too often, that everybody gets picked on instead of the
individuals causing the problems.

D. Chivers: You are right, Don. You\'re right. When it\'s just a few
people in the office, as you said, dinging everybody, that\'s sometimes
not a good idea. Someone else also tried to get in at the same time. Do
you have a response you would like to share with us?\
\
Caller: Hi, this is Jan from New Mexico. We also thought that the
irritation of the supervisor is coming across in the e-mail, and that is
really inappropriate. You don\'t want either the supervisor or employees
to show frustration, anger or send an e-mail when they\'re upset about
something.\
\
D. Chivers: Very good. Thank you. How would you go about communicating
your concern to employees if you had this issue going on? We have a lot
of people \-- in Colorado, anybody want to take a chance at answering
that question?\
\
Caller: This is Beverly in Colorado. What I would do is probably call in
the people that are doing the pranks, talk to them, say that it\'s
inappropriate, and probably in a meeting that I would have with my
employees. He reemphasize it\'s not a good idea to pull pranks and do
things to people but not bring up the situation.\
\
D. Chivers: Very good point.\
\
Caller: This is Kim from Montana. Another way the supervisor could
handle it is obviously time is an issue, but right from the get-go
reemphasize to the employees in the branch Jerry\'s qualification and

that he expects everybody to fully support Jerry in his promotion and
kind of be more proactive about it.\
\
D. Chivers: Thank you. You folks have done a wonderful job.\
\
A. Lara: I have something by like to add and Jan kind of hit on it when
she said that the supervisors\' emotions were coming through in the
e-mail and I think the way some of that came through was the sentence
that\'s all capitalized and again the fonts are the body language of
righting. Just wanted to \-- writing. Just wanted to bring that back
pup.\
\
D. Chivers: I was going to mention that. I liked her statement, fonts
are the body writing of language. Be careful when you write messages to
your \-- when people send messages to me in all caps I think they\'re
remember yelling at me. Be professional when you send out e-mails. Make
sure the issues you are dealing with are appropriate for e-mails. You
also brought up the issue of blanket punishment. Make sure if you\'re
punishing people you\'re punishing the right ones and not everybody.\
\
E. David: I would like to add an additional comment. If the supervisor
feels that it is very urgent that the situation be addressed, the
supervisor can always ask the one taking his place, the one who is
detailed to his position or acting in his position to address the
problem with the employees.\
\
D. Chivers: That\'s a good point. Thank you very much. Now we\'re going
to move onto the second strategy for an open and positive workplace.
That\'s strategy number two, be aware. Be aware how people are treating
each other in the workplace. Recognize people don\'t have to like each
other but they do have to work together as professionals. Be sensitive
to changes in attitudes and behaviors. Remember the workplace can be
anywhere employees work. An office, the fire line, or the field site.
Sometimes employees mistakenly think that because they\'re in a remote
location or on an incident that they can behave in a manner that would
be acceptable in any other work setting. Make sure this is clear and
I\'m sure you are doing that. How aware are you of what\'s going on in
the workplace and how aware should you be? We will move on to another
role play which is on page 15. I want you to work again in small groups.
Take a few minutes to view and consider the following short role play.
In this role play two employees are complaining about a third employee.
They refer to their supervisor as Sheri. After viewing the role play, we
will discuss the questions in the guide.\
\
She\'s been real good to me, I\'ve enjoyed having her around. Wish I
could say the same thing about the queen. I tell you, that is really
irritating me. That is really gotten my goat right now.\
\
You\'re not alone.\
\
I think I\'m going to go pull my PD out and see if it says anything
about that my job description says that I need to bend to her every
whim.\
\
I heard that she\'s demanding a step increase, a quality step increase
and I also heard she\'s going to get it.\
\
You got to be kidding me.\
\
Just blew me away.\
\
If that happens, let me tell you, if that happens, I\'m going to file
complaints. I\'m going to make life miserable around here. Maybe
miserable for me but it\'s going to be miserable for her, too.\
\
Me too. I\'m just going to help her out in all the things she needs help
or feed her the job stuff.\
\
We don\'t get any support either, no support from upstairs. Sheri could
care less about what happens.\
\
The bottom shrine she is tuned into the queen right now and she doesn\'t
really \--\
\
It just \-- it just really has got my goat.\
\
It\'s going to hurt productivity.\
\
D. Chivers: Now, in your small groups, let\'s take a few minutes to look
at those questions and answer them for us. .\
\
D. Chivers: Ok. Let\'s take a look at question number 1. If workplace
productivity is not being adversely affected, why should the supervisor
really care what these employees think? I would like to hear from
somebody out in the field.\
\
Caller: This is Rita in New Mexico.\
\
D. Chivers: Good morning, Rita.\
\
Caller: What happens in an environment like this is the office, the team
environment, the morale goes down, number one. The supervisor would know
about the situation because oftentimes employees talk in the bathroom,
the coffee room, in the office, whatnot, and he or she would know the
work isn\'t being done. The other thing is we need to respect one
another or treat one another the way we would like to be treated and I
think if the supervisor has open communication and an open door policy,
whatever the case may be to vent if you will, to solve the situation,
then let the employees know there\'s a mediation process available for
them to have conflict resolved and oftentimes communication amongst each
other resolves the conflicts. Make sure they understand this process and
that it\'s a positive approach.\
\
D. Chivers: Thanks, Rita. That\'s a very, very good answer. Anybody else
have an answer to the first question?\
\
Caller: This is Jan in New Mexico. From a managerial standpoint I would
say that sometimes I\'m not aware when employees are grumbling about
each other or see it firsthand, but it does eventually come forward in
the workplace, and if you\'re not aware of the day-to-day undercurrent,
usually somebody\'s going to bring that to your attention and then it\'s
incumbent upon you to talk to those individuals that are doing this in a
confidential private setting and express your feelings about the issue
of morale and the fact that they are really not doing what you expect in
terms of respecting other employees. If they have legitimate concerns
about themselves, they need to talk to you about it, but to talk about
other people or whether \-- for

example, that person may be getting an award or some other kind of
recognition, it\'s really none of their business.

D. Chivers: Good. Thank you, Jan. Let\'s move onto the second question.
If feelings like these existed among employees you supervised, do you
think you would know? Why or why not? You kind of answered that, Jan,
but anybody have an answer out there from the field?\
\
Caller: This is Melissa. The thing we\'re kind of bouncing in our group
is you have to go between the normal human being gossipy stuff that goes
on and what was becoming somewhat poisonous in the dialogue between
Wayne and Doug. They were getting awfully carried away with themselves.
For us, particularly when you start getting to the poisonous point, at
least first-line supervisor I think are pretty well tapped into that
stuff. You can start to tell when you are group is polarizing around
certain issues versus the, you know, chitty-chatty gossipy stuff that
goes on.\
\
D. Chivers: Absolutely. Thank you, Melissa. The third question, as a
supervisor what do you routinely do to create a healthy, productive and
open workplace environment? Let\'s ask Angie as a manager how she would
deal with the situation, what she does to create an open environment in
her workplace.\
\
A. Lara: Well, I think Rita in New Mexico gave a couple good examples.
She kind of cited the golden rule and also mentioned the open door
policy. Some of the other things we\'ve already talked about, open early
on direct communication, those kinds of things. And to be friendly and
those are the main things that come to my mind right now. But what I was
thinking about in number 2 is while I might be aware of people in the
office talking about each other, I\'m sure I\'m not aware of what they
say about me when I\'m not around.\
\
D. Chivers: Aha. Very good. Very good. Thank you, Angie. Just \--\
\
Caller: This is Kim from Montana. Since we don\'t do lunch here in
Montana, the supervisors always bring bagels and cream cheese in the
morning to create that good working environment.\
\
D. Chivers: Good job.\
\
Caller: Really, from a supervisor\'s standpoint, taking an honest and
sincere interest in a person\'s job they, do that shows a good
characteristics of a supervisor and valuing their contributions to the
team.\
\
D. Chivers: Let me just summarize this discussion. As a supervisor you
need to be aware of how other people think that others are being treated
in your workplace and then keep an eye out for workplace productivity.
That\'s going to be an issue for you obviously as a supervisor. So you
also need to be mindful that situations outside the workplace can have
an impact on the workplace environment. Remember, your behavior or
employee\'s behavior outside the workplace can also cause problems
within the workplace. Examples, conversations, inappropriate jokes,
remarks about other employees or disrespectful comments about employees
or peers while playing golf, hunting, going out to dinner or any kind of
socializing can affect the work environment. Remember, the workplace
extends outside the office. We\'re going to move on now to strategy
number 3 in our open and positive work environment. That\'s treat
employees fairly. Treating employees fairly does not mean treating
employees identically. Realistically we don\'t supervise all employees
in the same way. Some may need more supervision, more positive
reinforcement or support. So strategy number 4. Be proactive. Timely
actions on your part can prevent many issues from becoming EEO issues.
Deal with issues and conflicts as soon as possible.\
\
A. Lara: Debie, another thing I would like to point out is that as
supervisors it seems like everything we do speaks about our personal
values. It\'s important to be a good role model and that helps people
understand our expectations of behaviors in the workplace.\
\
Thank you, Angie, for adding. Now we\'re going to go to a break. Thanks
so much for your participation in the first part of this show. When we
come back, we\'re going to spend the rest of the program on what we do

when conflicts do arise. Sexual harassment and preventing retaliation,
reprisals. Have a good break. We\'ll see you back in 10 minutes. .\
\
D. Chivers: Welcome back. Thanks for joining us for the second half of
resolving EEO issues. We\'re going to start talking about addressing
conflicts at your level. Creating an open and positive work environment
that reduces the likelihood of EEO issues from developing in the first
place is the desired way to go. When issues do arise, resolving issues
informally at the local level is always preferable. Deal with issues in
a timely manner as a supervisor. Enrico is going to talk with us about
the EEO counseling and mediation process.\
\
E. David: This juncture I would like to discuss the EEO counseling
process and mediation. Despite taking proactive steps, to resolve issues
up front, there will be times when your employees women seek out EEO
counselors. When in fact that happens, the yoke counselor will offer
mediation through the complainant as an alternative to mediation
counseling. Mediation is optional to the employee. Here comes the answer
to one of the questions we asked at the beginning, question number 2.
The answer to that question is: true. If the employee complaint is
directed at you, the supervisor, be aware that the departmental policy
is that you must participate in mediation if the employee elects to use
the ADR EEO option. Now is a good time for us to look at the mediation
process. Conflicts or dispute parties have a variety of tools available
to them to address and deal with their conflict. This \-- these measures
range from talking to each other in a congenial way to suing each other
and then ultimately slugging it out and using violence against each
other.

Now, short of litigation and short of violence we have this tool of
alternative dispute resolution or ADR available for dealing with
conflict. One of the tools is mediation. Let me briefly describe to you
what mediation involves. When parties are in conflict and they choose
mediation, what happens is that they sit down together face to face in
the presence of an external mediator who is a third party neutral. Now,
the parties to the conflict communicate with each other and address
their conflict face to face with a mediator giving them assurance that
they\'re doing this in a safe environment. Also, the mediator is not
there to make a decision on their particular dispute. The mediator is
simply there to facilitate communication between the parties to the
dispute. Who makes the decisions in mediation? It\'s not an external
third party like a judge or an arbitrator who makes the decisions in a
mediation process. Who makes that decision? It is the parties to the
conflict. In other words, the parties to the mediation have ownership of
their dispute and ownership of how to settle their disputes. Now, in the
BLM mediation can be used to resolve both informal and formal EEO
complaints. In addition, mediation can also be used to resolve conflicts
between employees.

At this point I\'d like to raise the question of why individuals or
parties of conflict elect mediation. The answer to that is that
mediation has several benefits in the workplace. First of all, it being
a speedy process, it promotes the early resolution of EEO disputes.
Secondly, mediation reduces the disruptions resulting from interpersonal
conflicts in the workplace. Thirdly, mediation promotes lasting
solutions and reduces the potential for future conflict. This is due to
the fact that the parties in the mediation actually decide how to settle
the complaints \-- or how to settle the employment dispute. It\'s not a
third party that makes the decisions for them; it is themselves who make
the decisions for their particular conflict. Now, another benefit of
mediation is that it fosters an environment where teamwork and
cooperation exists among employees, supervisors and managers. In
particular, especially for supervisors, participating in the mediation
process can be very beneficial. It is an opportunity for you as a
supervisor to meet face to face with your employee who you\'re having
employment conflict with and to make your perspective clear to that
employee and vice versa for you to hear the perspective of the employee.
I understand that a lot of people feel some uneasiness about
participating in mediation, so we have designed this discussion exercise
to address feelings about participation in mediation. I\'d like you to
turn to page 17 of your guidebook, and where possible, work with another
person. I would like to ask you to consider the following questions. The
first question is: Do you believe that the process of mediation between
a supervisor and a subordinate can undermine the authority of the
supervisor? Why or why not? Then the second question is: What experience
have you had in mediation, and did this help? . S.\
\
E. David: I hope all of you have had the chance to consider the answers
to these two earth shaking and profound questions. Anybody from the
field would like to volunteer their responses?\
\
Caller: This is Gary from New Mexico State Office.\
\
E. David: Hi, Gary.

Caller: In answer to the first question, in our discussion we agreed
that it is helpful for a supervisor and subordinate into enter into
mediation and it does not undermine the authority of the supervisor.
What it usually does is to open up channels of communication and let \--
sometimes let the employee have a better perspective of where the
supervisor is coming from. And in regard to the second question, Jan who
was I was with in New Mexico, she has had experience in formal
mediation. I have not had any formal mediation, but as a supervisor I
have participated in mediation with two employees who have a problem and
in most cases it is beneficial.\
\
E. David: Those are very good insights into mediation. Anybody else?\
\
Caller: This is Don in Eastern States. I would say in the first question
that there may be occasions that the answer would be, yes, the authority
might be undermined if an employee continually on many occasions keeps
going back to mediation rather than trying to resolve it with the
supervisor or just accept what the supervisors\' request might be of
their work \-- I\'m not explaining that well, but that\'s what I \--
I\'ll just leave it at that.\
\
E. David: Ok. Good point. How about Colorado?\
\
Caller: This is Mitch from Idaho. Mediation can \-- to dog pile on the
last comments, can undermine the authority of a supervisor, but only if
the supervisor allows it to happen. In other words, if the supervisor
doesn\'t understand their roles and responsibilities in the mediation
and then capitulates any responsibilities or capitulates their decision
making ability and then carries that on into the workplace after the
mediation. So if the supervisor understands their roles and
responsibilities during the mediation and understands it\'s a
communication forum, not a decision making forum, then it shouldn\'t be
a problem. But if they don\'t, then kit cause problems.\
\
E. David: That\'s a very good point also. Thank you. Debie?\
\
D. Chivers: I don\'t have anything to add. Thanks, Enrico.\
\
E. David: I do have something to add. Based on that experience, being
the EEO manager in Colorado, my experience has been that all the
mediations that have been held in Colorado, and we\'ve had ten so far
during this year, have all been successful. And the reason I attribute
to the success of the mediations that have been held in the Colorado
State Office is that because in mediations there are two very, very
powerful forces that operate in the mediation table, and one is
empowerment. During the mediation process the parties to the conflict
are empowered, are given the power to address their issues themselves
without the involvement of an outside party like a judge or an
arbitrator. The second very powerful force that occurs during mediations
is recognition. In mediation the supervisor recognizes and gets to
understand where the employee is coming from and vice versa, the
employee also gets to understand and to listen to where the supervisor
is coming from. Angie?\
\
A. Lara: I don\'t have anything to add right now. Thanks. You got it
all. What I\'d like to do now is for us to get the opportunity to speak
or see what the wise words of a trained mediator are and what happened
is recently I had a chance to meet with Deena Wilson. She is the
alternative dispute resolution program manager in Sacramento,
California, for BLM. I interviewed her and we\'ll go ahead and look at
that video clip. Deena, will you please tell us about the mediation
process, how it works from your position as a mediator?\
\
Mediation is a process. It\'s a process that allows parties to come to
the table and talk about issues that might be causing them great concern
or disputes and what we try to do is to help them come together and

talk about it in such a way they haven\'t in the past and possibly come
up with potential resolutions to have a resolution.\
\
A. Lara: This preprocess sounds like a pretty important part. Can you
tell me more about that?

It\'s a critical piece to the success of mediation. It\'s the
responsibility of whoever is responsible for the intake of a concern is
that they talk to each party about the confidentiality component of
mediation. It\'s important that each party understands that because it
really will \-- can sway the success of the mediation. I know managers
say, you know, I know so and so is not going to keep quiet and we
understand that. We really cannot control what other people may or may
not do, but it\'s your responsibility as a manager to make sure that
you\'re protecting the integrity of the process and not talk about it
outside the actual mediation session.\
\
A. Lara: Do you have any tips for managers who might be going into
mediation?\
\
Some of the tips I have for managers are, one, first of all, is to
recognize that the discussion that takes place in the mediation needs to
be different from previous discussions. Sometimes managers want to go in
talking the same old\' talk or talking the way they\'ve talked before.
Sometimes there are preconceived ideas about what will or will not
happen at mediation. We encourage managers to keep an open mind. Don\'t
take this stuff personally. I know that\'s easier said than done, but we
encourage managers to manage their emotions around this so they can hear
really what\'s going on behind the issue and that\'s why we say don\'t
take it personally. We want managers to focus on future working
relationships. That\'s critical when you\'re going into a mediation
session so that you \-- you\'re not spinning necessarily in the past but
you want to hear what\'s going on, what\'s brought you to the table and
then focus on how you\'re going to make that working relationship
different in the future.\
\
A. Lara: Are there situations where mediation isn\'t the appropriate
Avenue to take?\
\
What we encourage managers to do if they\'re unsure about if mediation
may or may not be the forum for handling the dispute is to talk with
their EEO representative or their EEO \-- the EEO staff in their
respective offices to help them make that determination.\
\
A. Lara: Are there any other parameters that occur during this process
that we should be \-- that we should know of?\
\
One of the parameters that I think managers need to be aware of is that
in a settlement that\'s reaching mediation, it stays in the mediation
session. You cannot take that settlement agreement into another venue.\
\
A. Lara: What happens if during the process the employee says they
don\'t want to finish?\
\
If an employee chooses not to go through with the mediation session,
they have a right to stop the process at that time. They\'re not
mandated to continue with the process.

A. Lara: Ok. Well, Deena made some really good points and I just want to
go over those quickly. One is being prepared is critical. Know your
parameters. There will be things you will and will not be able to
accomplish. You may go in with some ideas about possible resolutions to
the issue. And make sure you have the authority to resolve the issue.
There may be times when you need to go outside of your own authorities
to see if you can take care of that. Have your experts nearby, I don\'t
mean in the room with you, but let them know you may need to give them a
call. Then she said, don\'t take it personally. Actually we had quite a
discussion about that, because if you\'ve ever had a complaint filed
about your behaviors, you do take it personal, and it does hurt, and
it\'s kind of scary. So what we want you to do is manage your behavior,
manage your emotions. By the way, notice that the answer to the
true/false question on page 18 is false. Mediation is for more than
conflicts between employees and supervisors. Enrico?

E. David: That\'s correct. Mediation is not only a tool to resolve
issues between employees and supervisors. The mediation process can also
be used to resolve issues between employee to employee. Now, in
conclusion, resolving issues for you as a supervisor informally at the
lowest possible level should be your goal. The further into the formal
process the complaint goes, the less control you as a supervisor will
have over the outcome of the complaint. Now we go to the question of
what happens if the employee does not choose to use the mediation
process. If the employee refuses to participate in mediation, or if
mediation does not resolve the problem, the EEO counselor will generally
contact you, the supervisor, to get your side of the story on the
discrimination complaint. The counselor will interview you, the
supervisor, and get some information from you on the complaint. The kind
of inquiries that you should expect from the counselor can be summarized
in three requests for information. By the way, these three requests for
information are what you can expect at every stage of the EEO process
and not just at the informal counseling stage that we are discussing
right now.

These inquiries include, number one, explaining the events leading to
the incidents that generated the complaint. Number two, you will be
asked by the counselor also to articulate your business legitimate
nondiscriminatory reason for the actions you took. Number three, you
will be asked by the counselor to explain how you treated this employee
who is filing the complaint differently from other employees who are in
the same or similar situation as the employee. Now, after the counselor
interviews you and the complainant, that counselor will present the
complaint to the official with authority to resolve the issue. In some
cases, that official will be you. In other cases that official will be a
higher level supervisor. If the complaint is not resolved at the
counseling level, the complaint goes formal and then at that time the
counselor will prepare a report of the facts.

The term \"facts\" is underlined in your workbook because it\'s
important to remember that the counselor is not a decision maker. The
counselor is, in fact, a fact finder. This is where the informal process
of EEO counseling ends. At this point the employee may elect to pursue
the complaint through the formal process. Now I would like to offer to
you some pointers on what you should do as you go about the counseling
process. Throughout any informal complaint situation please consult with
the EEO staff. EEO staff have the experience to help guide you and also
to suggest strategies for you on how to deal with conflict. EEO staff
can also pass along strategies that have worked for other supervisors.
Avoid the tendency to go it alone. Seek EEO\'s help and advice. We\'re
there to help.

Secondly, address conflicts at your level. When a conflict occurs in the
workplace, explore ways to address and resolve the issue before any
formal process begins. Closer related to this, deal with issues and
conflicts A.S.A.P. Keep in mind that as a supervisor when confronted an
EEO issue you need to do the following things: Number 1, listen to the
employee\'s issues and concerns. Number 2, be open minded. Number 3, be
open to mediation. Then fourthly, meet with the EEO counselor when
requested to do so. The purpose of this meeting is to provide the
counselor with facts and to respond to the issues. In other words, when
you meet with the counselors, you present your side of the story on the
complaint. Finally, allow the employee and his representative, his or
her representative, a reasonable amount of time to prepare for the
complaint. Before we shift gears, I would like to entertain questions
from the audience regarding the EEO counseling process and mediation.
Any questions?\
\
Caller: This is Beverly in Colorado. I would like to get a take from all
three of you up there on what you feel like a reasonable amount of time
that an employee can spend on an issue talking to counselors.\
\
D. Chivers: I\'d like to see them answer that, too. Because I know
that\'s often the \-- a point of conflict that arises as you go through
that process, and there\'s some folks who seem to be pretty reasonable
and some folks who seem to abuse that reasonable time \--\
\
D. Chivers: The short answer of that is if you were to look in the
textbook and you would read the EEOC guidance, it says it is hours, not
days, not months. So what you need to tell your employees is, yes, they
certainly have a right to seek EEO counseling, but what they also have
to do is make sure their work remains at the level that it needs to be
to be successful. So sometimes that\'s a good guidance. Try that,
Beverly. Thanks for the question.\
\
E. David: And the reasonable amount of time also depends on the
case-to-case basis. You may have an employee who would need a lot of
time to vent out and to present her concerns or issues to the counselor,
and we should make exceptions to those. But the other answer to this
question is the question of what time is reasonable should be discussed
between the supervisor, the EEO officer and also the personnel office in
the State Office. We have reached a point where we are now ready to deal
with the issue and with the topic of sexual harassment. Debie?\
\
D. Chivers: I\'m going to address sexual harassment issues and talk
about your responsibilities as a supervisor. If you have questions
during this section, please make sure that you jump in and ask them. You
say, what is sexual harassment? Legally, it\'s a form of sex
discrimination prohibited by Title VII of the civil rights act of 1964.
EEOC has a definition for that. It says: it\'s unwelcome sexual
advances, requests for sexual favors and other verbal or physical
conduct of a sexual nature when submission to or rejection of this
conduct explicitly or implicitly affects an individual\'s employment,
unreasonably interferes with an individual\'s work performance or create
an intimidating, hostile or offensive work environment. Sexual
harassment can be in the form of verbal abuse such as insults,
suggestive comments and demands, Leering and subtle pressure for sexual
activity and physical aggression. So what I want you to do is turn to
page 19 in your participant workbook and work through those true/false
questions real quick. Then we\'ll discuss them. Hopefully you\'ve had a
chance to go through the questions. The first one, the victim as well as
the harasser may be a woman or man. The second one, the harasser can be
the victim\'s supervisor, an agent of the employ employer or supervisor
in another area a co-worker or non-employee. Both those are true. The
victim does not have to be the person harassed but could be anyone
affected by the offensive conduct.

Unlawful sexual harassment may occur without the victim suffering
economic injury or being fired. And then the harasser\'s conduct must be
unwelcome if that you know your facts, you found out all those are true.
All those that got those all true, give yourself a star. You did a good
job. Before getting into some scenarios, we want to define three types
of harassment. I have left a place for you to write this down on page 20
in the participant handbook. The first one is quid pro quo. That\'s a
Latin term for this for that. What that means is if you give me
something of a sexual nature, I\'ll give you back an employee benefit.
Then hostile work environment. That\'s conduct that is sexual in nature,
pervasive and persistent and unwanted. Then third party. That\'s where
an employee is affected by the sexual behaviors of others in the office.
By the way, the third party category relates to the question we asked
you up front, and that is, written BLM policy prohibits a supervisor
from dating or entering into a consensual relationship with a
subordinate. That\'s false. Only because there is no written BLM policy,
but it\'s just not a good idea to have relationships with employees that
are your subordinates. The perception will be that that person will get
the inside information on all the benefits and could that lead to third
party complaints. We\'re going to move to a role play exercise. If you
are participating with others, please work in small groups, take a
moment to view and consider each of the following short role plays
between an employee and a supervisor. We\'re going to show you two role
plays. Then you\'re going to type of sexual harassment is present.\
\
First of all, I would like to start off by saying I appreciate you
taking the time out to meet with me on this issue.\
\
It\'s nice having you come on in the office and it\'s good to see you
again. What\'s on your mind.\
\
I have been working for Gwynn for two years now, and I feel she has been
pretty fair up until she started dating Ted. It\'s common knowledge
they\'re seeing each other. They have been seen around the office
kissing and hugging and things like that. Last week, Ted received a star
award. No one else received one. I\'ve worked on several projects with
Ted. Gwynn has been involved in some projects. I feel like I have worked
just as hard as he has and I didn\'t receive a star award. Nor did
anyone else. I feel like the only reason he received this award is
because of his relationship with Gwynn.\
\
I see. Listen, I\'ll take this under advisement and get back with you as
soon as I can.\
\
D. Chivers: \--

That\'s why I wanted to talk to you about my IDP today. I just feel like
that if I can take these two courses and then the workshop and then
another two courses, it will be really a full course development and
better career path and that\'s why I wanted to talk to you and that\'s
why I brought up the workshop last week. So have you had a chance to
think about it?\
\
Well, you know \-- first, I want to say Rachel, your IDP, your goals are
really well done.\
\
Thank you.

As a matter of fact, I think they\'re probably better than anyone else
I\'ve seen at the office. You do such a good job here, and we all
appreciate all the things that you do for us.\
\
Thank you.\
\
You really make a big difference here. In terms of all these classes,
you know, that\'s a lot of classes and there\'s no doubt in my mind that
you deserve this as much as anyone. And \-- the problem is, there\'s a
lot of travel restrictions right now and all kind of limitations on what
we can do. I know there\'s lot of people that want to travel. I guess
I\'m just going to have to \-- we\'re going to have to work this out.
We\'re going to figure out if there is someway we can do this. I\'m not
sure what it is at this moment. I just know that today it\'s
ridiculously hot in here. You can feel it.\
\
I know. The air conditioning is out again. Well, I can come back another
time.\
\
We could just go out and get a couple beers and then go to the pool and
hang out and talk about this some more. I mean \-- anything would be
better than sitting in this sweltering heat.\
\
Yeah, I \--\
\
Because I want to work this out with you. I really want to get to a
point where you can do this.\
\
Right. Well, I\'m really busy. This afternoon I\'ve got a lot of work
I\'ve got deadlines \--\
\
That\'s ok. Just kind of an awful the wall comment.\
\
Sure. Sure. Absolutely.\
\
We will I think about it and get back together and talk about it some
more.\
\
Sure. Thanks.\
\
D. Chivers: What I want you to do is quickly move into your groups and
determine what type of sexual harassment is present in those two role
plays. .\
\
Hopefully you\'ve had a chance to take a look at those two role plays.
For the first one, who has a response whether it\'s hostile work
environment, quid pro quo or third party?\
\
Caller: This is Chris in New Mexico.\
\
D. Chivers: Hi, Chris.\
\
Caller: We went third party over here.\
\
D. Chivers: Good job. Good job, Chris. Thank you. How about \--\
\
Caller: You\'re very welcome.\
\
D. Chivers: How about role play number two, hostile work environment,
quid pro quo or third party? I know \--\
\
Caller: This is Diane in Montana.\
\
D. Chivers: Hi, Diane.\
\
Caller: We came one quid pro quo.\
\
D. Chivers: Very good. I thought someone was hesitating because no one
likes to say quid pro quo more than once in a day. Thank you very much.
Absolutely right. So obviously if we\'ve showed you role plays for both
quid pro quo and third party the third role play we\'re going to show
you is hostile work environment. Let\'s look at that video. .\
\
Lynne, how you doing today?\
\
Doing good. How about yourself?\
\
Not too bad except I have a couple concerns.\
\
Shoot. That\'s what I\'m here for. How can I help you?\
\
Well, I\'m not quite sure how to say this, and I don\'t know if you can
do anything, but two things. First of all, there are some individuals
around here in the office who have been kind of lately noticed making a
lot of jokes and other comments that I find inappropriate. Inappropriate
for the workplace. I\'m not here to say they can\'t tell these kind of
jokes but I think in the workplace they\'re inappropriate, makes me feel
uncomfortable and sometimes I feel like I want to walk around the corn
but I am trying to do my work. It\'s interfering.\
\
Have you told these people they\'re making you uncomfortable \--\
\
I haven\'t. That\'s why I came to you. I wasn\'t sure what to do or what
to say and I don\'t want to make a misstep. I just thought I would come
to you first.\
\
Ok.\
\
But \-- that\'s the first thing. Second thing, and again, I don\'t know
if you can do anything, but there\'s one individual who I\'ve noticed
has pictures, I think came from like a calendar or something, kind of
taped to the walls in his area, and I think they\'re also inappropriate
for the workplace.

Ok. How did you notice these pictures? Are they actually in his cube,
his \--\
\
Oh, yeah, you have to actually go into the cubicle and kind of like
around the corner, but then, they\'re on the wall. Kind of hard to miss.
There are several. Again, I don\'t know where the line is of personal
space and not, but, again, once you get in there you get an eye full.
Makes me feel uncomfortable.\
\
D. Chivers: Ok. Now, what we\'re going to want you to do is go to your
Participant Guide, page 21, and answer all the questions. We\'re going
to focus on the last one when we come back to talk about it. So in the
interest of time, please work in your small groups and we\'ll talk about
these in just a little bit. . Hopefully you\'ve had a chance to take a
look at those questions and have some good responses for me. I\'m
interested in what will you as a supervisor do next if this situation
comes to your attention? Do we have a response from anybody out there? .
Angie, as a supervisor, how would you handle this situation?

A. Lara: Well, I think what I would just start off with is I might go
\-- I know what I would do. One of the things I would do is take what
they said into consideration and probably I would go peek around and see
what is over there. The next thing I do is talk to the employee because
it is inappropriate to have those things in the workplace.\
\
D. Chivers: Good. Thank you very much. Anybody out there want to add
something to what Angie has said? How about \-- how would you know as a
supervisor when the situation is resolved?\
\
Caller: This is Vince in New Mexico.\
\
Caller: This is Don in Eastern States. Obviously in the second situation
the pictures are no longer on the wall. In the first situation, I guess
I would follow up with the original individual that complained and to
see if they have noticed an improvement in that situation.\
\
Thanks, Don. Vince, do you want to add something?\
\
Caller: No, we discussed real similar things here, getting back with the
employee and seeing how she felt about how things had changed in the
work environment.\
\
D. Chivers: Thanks, Vince. I appreciate your responses. As a supervisor,
just in summary f an employee comes to you with a sexual harassment
complaint, remember to deal with the complaint as soon as possible. Take
the complaint seriously. Maintain a professional tone and try to put the
employee at ease. Just the facts. Make sure that you understand what the
facts are. Keep detailed notes. Look into the charges. And follow up
with any necessary actions. So I guess I would pose to my fellow folks
up here, what is the appropriate disciplinary action for sexual
harassment?\
\
A. Lara: Well, I guess what you would do is go in and look at the
department\'s penalty guide and see what it has to say in there. I\'m
sure there\'s a wide range depending on the nature of the offense. And
another thing I wanted to add in is when you\'re a supervisor, employees
come to talk to you about sexual harassment issues, you better be
prepared to hear just about anything, and it\'s also a very emotional
issue. So sometimes employees feel comfortable with you to share things
in a common language, might be a way to put it. Sometimes they try to do
things for shock factor. So just keep that in mind. Then in answer to
Debie\'s question again, use the disciplinary action guide to help you
out and stay in touch with your EEO and HR folks.\
\
D. Chivers: Thanks, Angie. There is no right answer and there\'s no
wrong answer, and there are many answers in terms of disciplinary
action. So you do have to work with your HR folks and your EEO folks and
the departmental table of penalties. You also need to make it clear that
retaliation against anyone in the complaint is illegal. So when is it a
good time to get the EEO staff involved?\
\
E. David: My answer to that is A.S.A.P., as soon as possible.\
\
D. Chivers: Absolutely.\
\
A. Lara: I would just add if you have ever been involved in an EEO
complaint as a supervisor, you find out that it seems to be your
full-time job. So the earlier you can get it resolved, the better off
everyone is.\
\
D. Chivers: Thanks, Angie. Now, we\'ve talked about sexual harassment.
And definitions, you have some ideas about what supervisors should do.
So Angie is now going to lead us through some scenarios. Angie?\
\
A. Lara: So working in your groups again, read the scenario on page 23.
We\'ll ask you to decide two things. One is, does this employee\'s
complaint constitute sexual harassment. The second question is, what
will you do? So we\'ll go look at that now. .

D. Chivers: Now that you\'ve had a couple minutes to take a look at that
exercise on page 23, who out there would like to share the answers that
they came up with? Oh, everybody\'s talking at once. I can\'t hear \--
somebody out there? How about somebody on the panel? Anyone want to
answer that?\
\
D. Chivers: I guess the question becomes, for me, what will the
supervisor do with that situation? And what I would ask, if that issue
came to me as an EEO manager, what I would ask is that the supervisor
spend some time with the contractor and talk about what we expect in the
workplace. Now, some people say, sweet thing, is that really something
someone should be offended by? But the issue of sexual harassment is
always, it\'s in the eyes of the person who is receiving either the
words or the jokes or whatever. So if they feel offended by it, then
that\'s when you have to take action as a supervisor.\
\
A. Lara: Thanks, Debie.\
\
Caller: This is ma LIS nah Colorado.\
\
A. Lara: Please, go ahead.\
\
Caller: We had in our small group here kind of an interesting dialogue I
would like to have the panel respond to is that adult responsibility in
terms of telling the contractor how uncomfortable you are versus asking
your supervisor to do on it your own behalf. We had kind of a split
between the group interestingly enough, it was split women and men,
should the employee be asked or expected to as an adult to respond to
the contractor as opposed to having the supervisor do it on her behalf.\
\
E. David: In response to your question, Melissa, since sexual harassment
is an issue of power, there would be a lot of cases where the alleged
victim would feel very uncomfortable to inform the alleged harasser
about the unwelcomeness of that alleged harasser\'s remarks or
statements, and there are other nonverbal ways to communicate that the
action is not welcome. The employee can walk away from the situation. Or
the employee can go to the supervisor and have the supervisor inform the
alleged harasser about the situation and the unwelcomeness of those
alleged harasser\'s remarks.\
\
A. Lara: Great. Thank you. Smartly moving along now, we are just going
to look at exercise number 2 on page 24. So if you want to take a second
to look at that one and we\'ll get back with your responses. .\
\
A. Lara: Is there anyone out there who would like to respond to a
question as to whether or not this is sexual harassment? Tough
question.\
\
Caller: This is Vince in New Mexico.\
\
A. Lara: Hi, Vince. Thank you.\
\
Caller: We don\'t think it\'s a sexual harassment issue. We think it\'s
more of a performance issue that needs to be dealt with because her
actions are keeping him from being able to fully accomplish his job.\
\
A. Lara: What would you as a supervisor do to address this?\
\
Caller: I think I would go and talk to Lindy\'s supervisor and see what
that supervisor\'s perception is and how we could deal with the issue.\
\
A. Lara: Great answer. Thank you, New Mexico. Did you have anything \--\
\
D. Chivers: I have a question for you, Vince. If you didn\'t deal with
this, do you think it could become a sexual harassment issue?\
\
Caller: I suppose it could. I don\'t think it is now, but I suppose it
could become one down the road and you\'d have to do a little more
investigation to find out more facts.\
\
A. Lara: I have a question for you, too, now that I thought about it. I
agree, you would go talk with Lindy\'s supervisor, but what about the
other employee\'s request to keep it confidential? How would you handle
that?\
\
Caller: I think you could talk \-- I would certainly try to do that.
Could never guarantee confidentiality because people make assumptions
about who is involved in these things, but I think you could talk to the
other supervisor about concerns that you\'ve got with Lindy\'s
performance affecting my group.\
\
A. Lara: Great. Thank you. I\'m sure you\'ll take your own free time to
fill out the rest of the questions that we\'re not going to cover today.
So let\'s go back to Debie for a summary.

D. Chivers: Just to summarize what your responsibilities are as a
manager, make sure that you take issues seriously. You look into them
and follow up. And always keep in touch with your EEO staff. I can\'t
\-- I cannot emphasize that enough. They and your HR staff are just a
valuable resource when you have situations like this. Any last questions
before we shift gears? Ok. We\'re going to move onto Enrico. He is going
to speak with us about retaliation and reprisal.\
\
E. David: Thanks, Debie. The final and last responsibility of
supervisors in the EEO process is the responsibility to ensure that
retaliation does not occur in the workplace. EEO law extends protection
to employees who have participated in the EEO process either as a
complainant, witness or representative. Under EEO law, it shall be an
unlawful employment practice for an employer to discriminate against
employees or applicants for employment because they have made a charge,
testified, assisted, or participated in any manner in an investigation
proceeding or hearing under Title VII of the civil rights act of 1964.
Retaliation occurs when the agency subjects an employee to different
treatment or adverse action due to that employee\'s prior EEO activity.

Now, let\'s look at some examples of retaliation. I would like to
discuss with you two recent decisions of the EEOC that found retaliation
from the agency. In the first case, an employee of the department of the
army who had previously filed an EEO complaint received a poor
performance rating from his two supervisors. The two supervisors refused
to meet with the employee on the employee\'s EPPR and also, further,
they would not tell the employee the reasons for the low performance
rating. What did EEOC find in this case? EEOC found retaliation. In the
second case, the U.S. postal service changed the days off of a
supervisor who had the prior EEO activity. The manager who changed the
schedule did not offer a legitimate business reason for the change. The
complainant also had alleged in this capes the days off of other \-- in
case the days off of other fellow supervisor had not been changed. So
can you guess what EEOC found in this particular case? EEOC found
retaliation again. Angie, can you mention some other examples of
retaliatory activity?\
\
A. Lara: Well, I have a personal story to share about that. On a far
away planet a long time ago when I didn\'t work for BLM, I was a wage
grade painter, upward mobility trainee. I was assigned a lead person a
team lead a journey person I need to do work with, and I had told him
one time that I didn\'t think I wanted to be doing that work anymore
when I was old, like 50, and anyway I decided \-- I told him about that,
and he didn\'t appreciate my answer about that. He then started treating
me differently, and it was kind of a subtle treatment initially, but
what ended up happening is some little things I\'d kind of seen before
became much grander, and one of the things he started to do was to
undress in the paint shop where at the end of the day people would clean
up, put all of our tools away and everything and he started undressing.
He also started to bring out his posters, his calendars, his books and
other inappropriate sexual items, and for me I was sitting there not
really knowing what to do.

The employees would look at me, and I knew if I didn\'t do something
they wouldn\'t respect me. If I did do something, I was afraid nobody
would talk to me anymore because I was the only woman in the shop, and I
just really was uncertain about where to turn. I did end up seeking EEO
counseling, and we did end up early on getting that situation fixed. But
my talking to him, the way his actions accelerated, it was clear to me
that it was reprisal at the time. Another thing I wanted to say is,
later on in my career I had the opportunity to learn by being alleged to
have discriminated, and that was a pretty terrifying experience as well,
actually. I was really hurt because I\'d been accused of something which
to me is just really terrible, and I just wasn\'t really sure how to be
around that employee anymore. So that leads us to some of the things
you\'re going to be talking about with dos and don'ts of retaliation.\
\
Thank you, Angie. Page 26 contains a list of dos and don\'ts on
reprisal. Rather than me going over each and every one of these items, I
would just want to summarize what this list is telling you. As
supervisor, you should first of all reassure your employees that the
charge that they have made against you will not affect their working
relationship with you. Secondly, explain to the employees that they
should continue to feel free to come to you and work problems out
regardless or in spite of their EEO activity. Thirdly, stress to them
that the complaint will not in any way affect their employment status or
the terms and conditions of their employment. Then fourthly, do not take
adverse action on the employee such as termination, discipline, bad
performance review or assignment of unfavorable duties. Just because
they filed a charge against you. If you do have to take these actions,
please make sure you have a business related reason for your actions.
Also, do not refuse to communicate with the employee. And do not
encourage other employees to avoid this particular employee. Finally, do
not suddenly enforce work rules previously not enforced or loose which
you have loosely enforced in the past. I would like to add one more
thing to the list, and this is guard against taking the EEO complaint
personally. Remind yourself that the complainant has filed the EEO
complaint not on your person, but against your actions as an agent of
the agency. Remember also that you have some options that you need to
take \-- or could take in seeking assistance in dealing with the issue.
You have the employee assistance program. You have human resources. And,
of course, you ever the old stand by, the EEO staff to help you. Of
course, you also have your supervisor. Because unlike in conduct issues
in which discussing the merits of a case with a supervisor may not be
appropriate in EEO situations your supervisor can also give you guidance
and advice on issues in the workplace. Angie?\
\
A. Lara: Let\'s go ahead and turn to page 28 in your Participant Guide
and look at exercises 1 and 2. I\'m going to go through these for you
and then we\'ll do some together. Everybody\'s there? Scenario 1 is
Janice, your employee has filed a complaint. The formal process for
resolving the complaint is moving forward. Since the complaint was filed
Janice has talked to many other employees about that complaint.
Therefore, the complaint is common knowledge. You have heard that
another employee, Pam, is refusing to talk to Janice unless it\'s
absolutely necessary to get the work done. Number 2 is actually kind of
a variation on the same theme. It says, rob, your employee, has a
complaint filed. The formal process for resolving the complaint is
moving forward. John works for another supervisor in the office. John
was called to give testimony over the phone on Rob's complaint. But
since the testimony was completed, rob has avoided meetings where John
is present. Now, while these two cases may not meet the strict
interpretation of the EEOC definition we heard earlier, the point to
remember is our responsibilities as supervisors to maintain a productive
work environment, and regardless, if the employee believes its reprisal
and seeks EEO counseling, they are going to get EEO counseling. In fact,
it will go through the whole process before any decisions are made
because that happens way later in the process. So, again, it does
behoove you to try to resolve those issues. In RICO?\
\
Thanks, Angie. Let\'s turn to the three remaining scenarios for this
section of the training. If you are participating with others, please
work in small groups and consider the following situations. For each
situation, decide if retaliation is occurring or not. Then ask the
question why or why not.\
\
E. David: I hope all of you had the chance to consider these three
situations and have responses to each of these three situations. Now, in
the interest of time, rather than dealing with each situation
individually, what I would like to do is ask the participants what
common elements in these situations they found to pertain to retaliation
or retaliatory activity? Anybody from the field? What do the situations
have in common?\
\
Caller: This is Jan in New Mexico.\
\
E. David: Hi, Jan.

Caller: Everybody decided that I would be the spokesperson, although we
came up with the same thing. That is, a change or perception in the work
pattern or something that has taken place that\'s changed that wasn\'t
the regular routine before.\
\
E. David: Very good point. Anybody else?\
\
D. Chivers: Maybe somebody at the national business center or my friend
at NIFC, do you have a response to that? We haven\'t heard from you
today.\
\
A. Lara: I have one thing, and I would say those changes that Jan
mentioned sure weren\'t viewed as positive.\
\
E. David: Right. And if there\'s a situation, the source of the change,
where was this change coming from?\
\
Caller: The other issue, this is Jan again, was the change communicated
to the employee in advance? Did the supervisor explain the legitimate
business reasons for why he was perhaps now looking at time cards,
changing work schedules, et cetera? There doesn\'t seem to that that
kind of information in the examples to show that the supervisor took the
time to show the legitimate business reason for the change.\
\
E. David: Right. How about knowledge by the supervisor of EEO activity?
Especially in scenario 5 where the employee Greg applied for a job at
SSA and was not selected for the job. Do we have any indication here
that management or agency officials in the BLM knew about this EEO
activity?\
\
Caller: No, there\'s nothing to say that the supervisor knew about that
activity.\
\
E. David: Right. Anybody else in the field have any response?\
\
Caller: This is Kim from Montana. Just some of the conversations we\'ve
been having here, I think again it boils down to perception and I think
keeping the EEO process open is an important one, and some of these
scenarios might make really good examples for mediation, and again that
goes back to the supervisor maybe explaining the rationale, for example,
like the reorganization, maybe everybody had to change their work
schedules, so this might be really ripe for that, but again I think
everybody\'s got that right to seek counseling if they feel or that\'s
their perception they have been retaliated against.\
\
E. David: Right. Very good observation. Now, who determines whether the
business reasons articulated by the agency for its actions are good or
bad? Is it the supervisor? Is it the employee? Or is it the equal
employment opportunity commission that determines that?\
\
Caller: The final determination rests with EEOC.\
\
E. David: Is that you, Jan, again?\
\
Caller: Yes, it is.\
\
E. David: That\'s correct. It is EEOC who ultimately determines whether
the agency has articulate add good business reason \-- articulated a
good business reason for its actions. Now, these three situations point
to the elements of retaliatory activity from agencies. Number one, a
basic element is prior EEO activity of the complainant. Secondly,
another element is the knowledge by the official accused of retaliation
about the activity. Thirdly, we all see here that there has been
different treatment or adverse action for one reason or another towards
this employee. Fourthly, another element is, of course, the business
non-retaliatory reason for the action of the agency, which ultimately is
decided on by the equal employment opportunity commission. Are there any
more questions before I leave this topic of retaliation? Good. I\'ll
turn it over to Debie.

D. Chivers: Thanks, Enrico. We\'re about to wrap up. So are there any
questions we can certainly answer for you out there in the field before
we wrap this up? Or comments. If you have comments, we would like to
hear those, too.\
\
Caller: Debie, this is Jan in New Mexico. We want to thank you for a
good job. I want to suggest in Montana that Diane take you all out to
lunch.\
\
I think that\'s an excellent idea.\
\
Caller: This is Kim from Montana. She left for lunch and didn\'t take
any of us.\
\
D. Chivers: Thank her for us. Well, I just want to ask my panel members
here if they have any closing thoughts they want to share. Angie,
anything you want to share?\
\
A. Lara: Well, this has certainly been an enlightening experience, and I
really appreciate yours and Enrico\'s expertise and don\'t forget to
your EEO staff because they really do want to help you out.\
\
D. Chivers: It\'s been a pleasure. Enrico, anything you want to add?\
\
E. David: I have a message for all the supervisors out there in the
field. As you go about your job of creating and fostering a workplace
environment free of discrimination and with very minimal conflict,
please remember that you need to keep in touch with the EEO staff. You
need to consult and communicate with EEO staff often. We\'re there to
help you. That\'s it.\
\
D. Chivers: It\'s been great being with you this morning also. I just
want to remind you that we have as a point of final left a little
reminder what your responsibility is as supervisors on the last page of
the workbook. Make sure you review those. Also, keep an eye out for the
next course in the supervisory series that will be coming up pretty
soon. Also, we\'ve talked a lot today about your EEO managers, and if
you don\'t know who those are, a list of those will be accompanied by
the evaluation that\'s going to be coming out to you for this course. As
for me, thank you. This has been a wonderful morning. I appreciate your
participation and we hope to see you soon. Thanks.\
\
E. David: Thank you.\
\
A. Lara: Thanks.