Sexual Harassment Prevention Training
California AB 1825 & SB 1343 for Supervisors and Employees
This course is intended for employers who need harassment training in California (Gov. Code 12950.1)
Sexual harassment is a form of discrimination based on sex and can occur in many forms and under many different circumstances. The federal government and the State of California have passed laws that prohibit sexual harassment in the workplace. We understand these laws and have designed our training to meet all California sexual harassment training requirements 2023.
In the last five years, many new laws, statutes, and regulations have come into effect. Compliance Training Group offers the following Supervisor and Employee versions of sexual harassment training in California:
CA Sexual Harassment Awareness for Supervisors
- Content: Sexual Harassment Awareness (CA compliant)
- Version: Supervisor
- Course Length: 2 Hours
- Languages Available: English & Spanish
- Price: $19.99 (single user e-learning enrollment)
What makes our sexual harassment online training California-compliant?
Our online two-hour supervisor course for individual learning provides content that is relevant to today’s issues and challenges. Updated California harassment training content and features include:
- Real workplace scenarios
- Harassment prevention training that addresses current issues in the workplace
- Increased flexibility allowing the users to move through the course at their own pace, while ensuring users still fulfill the two-hour training requirement
- Quizzes & final test
- Our Two-hour California Compliant Supervisor Training is available in English and Spanish.
Learning Objectives - CA Supervisor
- Explain Federal and California sexual harassment laws
- Define sexual harassment
- Explain the types and forms of sexual harassment
- Identify who the law protects from sexual harassment
- Describe employer’s duties under Federal law
- Identify who is liable for sexual harassment
- Explain how to exercise legal rights
- Describe the remedies for a sexual harassment complaint
- Describe the elements of an anti-harassment policy
- Explain best practices for avoiding sexual harassment situations
Other Objectives
- The definition of unlawful sexual harassment under the FEHA and Title VII of the Civil Rights Act of 1964
- FEHA and Title VII provisions regarding the prohibition and prevention of unlawful sexual harassment.
- Types of conduct that constitute harassment.
CA Sexual Harassment Awareness for Employees
- Content: Sexual Harassment Awareness (CA compliant)
- Version: Employee
- Course Length: 1 Hour
- Languages Available: English & Spanish
- Price: $19.99 (single user e-learning enrollment)
California Senate Bill 1343 explicitly covers training for employees. This law now requires employers with 5 or more employees to train all non-supervisor employees every two years. Due to the rise in sexual harassment claims across the U.S. over the past twenty years, Compliance Training Group saw that clients would often request general training for non-supervisor employees to ensure their entire workforce was educated on sexual harassment and their rights and responsibilities in the workplace, not just supervisors. As a result, we created supplementary harassment training for California. In turn, California SB 1343 now makes that training mandatory.
Our Internet-based, one-hour course for non-supervisors guides employees through key federal discrimination and sexual-harassment laws, relates these laws to everyday workplace behavior, and provides the legal definitions of discrimination and harassment.
Employees will learn about sexual harassment, discriminatory behavior, and types of conduct that create a hostile workplace. The California sexual harassment course engages employees and confirms their understanding of the course material via the following interactive features:
- Video scenarios demonstrating forms of harassment
- Quizzes & final test
- Our One-hour California Compliant Employee Training is available in English and Spanish.
Learning Objectives - CA Employee
- Explain Federal and California sexual harassment laws
- Define sexual harassment
- Explain the types and forms of sexual harassment
- Identify the perpetrators of sexual harassment
- Identify who the law protects from sexual harassment
- Identify who is liable for sexual harassment
- Describe the effects of sexual harassment
- Explain how to exercise legal rights
- Describe the remedies for a sexual harassment complaint
- Explain best practices for avoiding sexual harassment situations
Assembly Bill 1825 & Senate Bill 1343
Assembly Bill 1825 (AB 1825) and Government Code section 12950.1 are the first laws to actually outline the requirements for effective compliance training, setting the standard not only for California, but for the rest of the country as well. In practical terms, AB 1825 requires California businesses with 50 or more employees to train their supervisors on sexual harassment, every two years.
Passed August 24, 2004, Assembly Bill 1825 requires employers to meet certain standards relating to sexual harassment training and education in the workplace. AB 1825 applies only to employers with fifty or more employees or contractors. This includes employees that are full time, part time, and temporary employees. Even employers that have less than fifty employees in California may need to comply with AB 1825. This is because AB 1825 defines “employer” as “any person engaged in any business or enterprise in California, who employs 50 or more employees to perform services for a wage or salary or contractors or any person acting as an agent of an employer, directly or indirectly.” If your business has employees in other states, which bring your total employee count to fifty or above, training would be required. (“There is no requirement that the 50 employees or contractors work at the same location or all reside in California.”)
Effective January, 2019 Gov. Code 12950.1 (Amended by SB 1343) now requires that all employers of 5 or more employees provide 1 hour of sexual harassment and abusive conduct prevention training to non-managerial employees and 2 hours of sexual harassment and abusive conduct prevention training to managerial employees once every two years. The training and education required by this section shall include information and practical guidance regarding the federal and state statutory provisions concerning the prohibition against and the prevention and correction of sexual harassment and the remedies available to victims of sexual harassment in employment. Existing law also requires the trainings to include practical examples aimed at instructing supervisors in the prevention of harassment, discrimination, retaliation, and harassment based on gender identity, gender expression, and sexual orientation and to be provided by trainers or educators with knowledge and expertise in those areas. There is no requirement that the 5 employees or contractors work at the same location or that all work or reside in California. Under the DFEH’s regulations, the definition of “employee” includes full-time, part-time, and temporary employees. Both managerial and non-managerial employees must receive training by January 1, 2020. After January 1, 2020, employees must be retrained once every two years. That means that all employees statewide must be retrained by January 1, 2022.
This course reflects recent California legislation which clarifies the definition of sexual harassment (sexually harassing conduct does not need to be motivated by sexual desire). We offer California harassment training online or in a variety of other deliverables.
AB1825 (Sexual Harassment Training California Compliant)
If you wish to learn more about harassment training requirements in California:
Assembly Bill 1825 also stipulates that the training must include:
- Practical examples of harassment in the workplace
- The complaint process and its limited confidentiality
- Victim resources
- The obligation of the employer to conduct an investigation for all harassment complaints
Employers are required to maintain compliance with AB 1825 by keeping detailed records of Harassment Prevention training. The records must be kept for a minimum of two years.
AB 1825 stipulates that trainers “must have knowledge and expertise in the prevention of harassment, discrimination, and retaliation.” Live training sessions must be led by a “Qualified Trainer.” A person can be considered a Qualified Trainer if they have had formal education and/or training as well as experience lead a training session. Another person considered a Qualified Trainer is a Subject Matter Expert, which has received legal education on the topics of harassment, discrimination and the prevention of retaliation.
Assembly Bill 2053
Assembly Bill 2053 mandates that certain California employees provide workforce anti -bullying training, in addition to already-required sexual harassment training. California employers were required to expand their AB 1825 training program to address abusive conduct beginning on January 1, 2015.
“Abusive conduct,” otherwise known as “bullying” is defined as conduct “with malice, which a reasonable person would find hostile, offensive, and unrelated to an employer’s legitimate business interests.” Examples of what constitutes abusive conduct include repeated use of insults, derogatory remarks, and epithets; threatening, intimidating or humiliating verbal or physical conduct; and the gratuitous sabotage of a person’s work performance. The AB 2053 training excludes a single act in its definition of abusive conduct unless it is especially severe and egregious.
AB 2053 does not contain any new requirements for record keeping or the length of training. As a result, Compliance Training Group has incorporated appropriate content into its Harassment Prevention training which will satisfy AB 1825 as well as AB 2053.
Senate Bill 292
Senate Bill 292 was signed into law in 2013 and amended the definition of sexual harassment in the Fair Employment & Housing Act to clarify:
“Sexually harassing conduct need not be motivated by sexual desire.” This is meant to inform that trainee that Male-on-male, Female-on-female, Male-on-female, and Female-on-male sexual harassment can occur without the accused having any “sexual desire” for the victim.
SB 292 does not contain any new requirements for record keeping or the length of training. As a result, Compliance Training Group has incorporated appropriate content into its Harassment Prevention training which will satisfy AB 1825 as well as AB 2053 and SB 292.
Senate Bill 292 does not have any new requirement for who delivers the content, the length of the content or any specific stipulations regarding trainer periods and record keeping. At Compliance Training Group, our best practice recommendation is to incorporate the same baseline regulations provided in Assembly Bill 1925. To ensure employers’ have no problems maintaining compliance with all these laws, we have incorporated SB 292 into our AB 1825 training, making compliance simple.
California Department of Fair Employment and Housing 2016 New Regulations (Record Keeping, Transgender Status)
Updates by the California Department of Fair Employment to the Fair Employment and Housing Act (FEHA), state that beginning in 2016, California employers with five or more employees are required to take “reasonable” steps to prevent and correct discrimination and harassment.
Under the new regulations:
- Employers must create detailed written policies for preventing harassment, discrimination, and retaliation.
- Employers must distribute its prevention policies to all current and future employees. If 10 percent or more of the workers in a given location speak a language other than English, an employer must also translate its policies into those alternative languages. (§ 11023.)
The main additions include new definitions of Transsexuals and record-keeping requirements. Examples include:
- “Gender expression” means a person’s gender-related appearance or behavior, whether or not stereotypically associated with the person’s sex at birth. (§ 11030(a).)
- “Gender identity” means a person’s identification as male, female, a gender different from the person’s sex at birth, or transgender. (Id. at (b).)
- “Sex Stereotype” means an assumption about a person’s appearance or behavior, or about an individual’s ability or inability to perform certain kinds of work based on a myth.
Senate Bill 396
SB 396 was signed into law in 2017 as part of the Fair Employment & Housing Act (FEHA) to provide gender identity training and goes into effect January 1, 2018.
Senate Bill 396 requires California employers with 50 or more employees to provide harassment training that must now also include harassment based on gender identity, gender expression, and sexual orientation. The training must be a minimum of two hours long, must be taken by all supervisory employees within six months of their hire date, and must be repeated every two years.
SB 396 requires California employers to train all supervisory employees on definitions related to transgender employees. This includes gender identity, gender expression, and sexual orientation. In addition, Supervisory employees must receive training on practical examples of transgender harassment. SB 396 also requires California employers to post an amended harassment DFEH-approved training poster in a common work area that contains practical examples of harassment involving gender identity, gender expression, and sexual orientation.
To ensure our clients maintain compliance with Senate Bill 396, Compliance Training Group has incorporated Senate Bill 396 into our signature AB 1825 training module.
To read Senate Bill 396 in its entirety, click here.
Senate Bill 1087 (California Law for Farm Workers)
Enacted in 2015, Senate Bill 1087 seeks to make farms a safer place for women by creating training requirements and guidelines and imposing penalties on Farm Labor Contractor (FLC) who fail to comply. SB 1087 amends section 1685 of the California Labor Code to prohibit the California Labor Commissioner from issuing new or renewal farm labor contractor license to anyone who has been found by a court or an administrative agency to have committed sexual harassment of an employee within the past three years.
SB 1087 requirements include:
- Requires applicants for a new or renewal Farm Labor Contractor (FLC) license to attest that their supervisorial employees received two hours of annual sexual harassment prevention training (as compared to bi-annual supervisor training required for supervisors of employers with at least 50 employees in other industries);
- Requires applicants for an FLC license or license renewal to attest that agricultural workers hired by the FLC were trained on sexual harassment prevention at the time of hire and at least every two years thereafter;
- Forbids issuance of an FLC license to any person who has committed sexual harassment within the last three years, or any person applying for an FLC license who employs a supervisor who has committed sexual harassment within the last three years; the law also provides a “safe harbor” allowing applicants to receive a license by attesting they have not committed sexual harassment, or that supervisors in their employ have not committed sexual harassment, within the last three years;
- Adds knowledge of prevention and identification of sexual harassment to the examination taken to obtain an FLC license;
- Increases the required annual continuing education training for FLCs from 8 hours to 9 hours, one hour of which must pertain to sexual harassment;
Frequently Asked Questions About California Sexual Harassment Training
Yes, sexual harassment training is required by law in California. Employers with five or more employees must provide harassment prevention training to supervisory and non-supervisory employees.
AB 1825 mandates that employers with 50 or more employees provide at least 2 hours of classroom or other effective interactive training on sexual harassment to supervisory employees every two years. The training must cover state and federal laws, ways to prevent harassment, remedies available to victims, and practical examples.
California requires various employee trainings depending on the nature of the job and the industry. Some mandatory trainings include sexual harassment prevention, injury and illness prevention, emergency action plans, and heat illness prevention, among others.
SB 1343 expanded the requirements for sexual harassment training in California. As of January 1, 2020, employers with five or more employees must provide 1 hour of sexual harassment prevention training to non-supervisory employees and 2 hours for supervisory employees, and it must be repeated every two years.
Under California law, employers with five or more employees must provide sexual harassment training every two years. Supervisors are required to complete a two-hour training session, while non-supervisory employees need one hour of training. This training must cover harassment prevention, bystander intervention, and the reporting process, in compliance with SB 1343 and AB 1825.
All supervisory and non-supervisory employees in companies with at least five employees must undergo sexual harassment training in California. This includes part-time, temporary, and seasonal employees, who must be trained within 30 days of hire or within 100 hours worked if employed for less than six months.
Sexual harassment training must be completed every two years by both supervisors and non-supervisory employees. New hires and promoted supervisors must receive training within six months of assuming their role, and temporary or seasonal employees must be trained within 30 days of hire or 100 hours worked.
California’s sexual harassment training must cover legal definitions of harassment, types of harassing behavior, and practical examples of how to prevent harassment. It should also provide information on reporting procedures, victim protection, retaliation prevention, and bystander intervention strategies.
Yes, online training is acceptable for compliance with California’s sexual harassment laws. Training must still meet all legal requirements, including interactive features, quizzes, and real-world examples. Employers can offer online courses to both supervisors and non-supervisory employees to fulfill the mandated training.
Note: Laws and regulations can change over time. It’s always a good idea to consult with legal counsel or official state resources to ensure you have the most current information.
Steps to Complete California Sexual Harassment Training:
- Determine Training Requirements for Your Organization – Identify if your organization is required to provide sexual harassment training under California law, which generally applies to companies with 5 or more employees.
- Select an Approved Training Program – Choose a California-compliant sexual harassment training provider that meets state standards, ensuring that it covers both supervisor and employee training.
- Complete the Mandatory Training – Supervisors must complete at least 2 hours of training, while non-supervisory employees are required to complete at least 1 hour. This training must be conducted every two years.
- Verify that the Course Content Meets California’s Legal Requirements – Ensure the training covers key topics such as identifying harassment, legal responsibilities, bystander intervention, and how to report incidents.
- Document Completion and Maintain Records – After completing the training, ensure you maintain accurate compliance records, including participant names, completion dates, and certificates for at least two years.
- Renew Training as Required – Make sure to renew the training every two years to stay compliant with California’s sexual harassment prevention laws.
Delivery Methods:
