Case Study - Banter

ABC Construction employ 50 employees, with 20 based in the office and 30 working at various client sites undertaking the physical construction. The Health and Safety Manager Tim, who is office based, visited a site and was quite disturbed by his observations. Tim first witnessed one calling out to another ‘hello sick note, nice of you to turn up’. A short while later, Tim heard the same site worker refer to a female colleague in the office as ‘legs 11’. Tim approached the individual and commented on his observations, asking why he referred to them as ‘sick note’ and ‘legs 11’ when it clearly was not their name. The response was quite alarming when the individual said, it's just a bit of banter, ‘he’s always...

On this page

This case study looks at the use of banter in the work place and how this can be discrimination and/or harassment. It also looks at how to stop the use of banter.

Sign up to continue reading this content and gain access to our member content