HRMG204 Organisational Behaviour

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Course Title:
Australian Defense Force Academy (Sexual Harassment of Women)
Date:
Name:
Word Count:

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Executive Summary
This report provides an analysis of the organizational failure experienced in the Australian
Defense Force Academy involving the sexual abuse of women. Organizational behavior factors
that contributed to the failure of the institution are divided into individual factors, group factors,
and organization factors. Individual factors include excessive consumption of alcohol by the
cadets, abuse of power, abuse by fellow cadets, past experiences of abuse by cadets while they
were children, and exposure to multiple partners and sexual activities by cadets. Group factors
include perception that cadets deserve to be abused, passing down of sexually abusive behaviors
by cadet predecessors, and rape myths. Organizational factors comprise of a male-dominated
environment, discouraging the reporting of abuse, inexperienced staff members, inadequately
handling abuse cases, and not investigating abuse cases by officers (Segal & Lane, 2016, p.13).
The academy has set up changes to mitigate the situation including modifying the leadership
team, employing skilled staff, and seeking role models for cadets. Change of perspective,
carrying out psychological evaluation on cadets, eradicating alcohol consumption in the
academy, and increasing security in the academy will ensure that abuse cases are reduced
drastically (McDonald, Charlesworth, & Graham, 2015, p.43).

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Table of Contents
1. INTRODUCTION.............................................................................................4
1.1 Organizational Failure........................................................................4
1.1.1 What happened?.................................................................................................4
1.1.2 Who was responsible?........................................................................................4
1.1.3 How did it affect the organization as a whole?..................................................5
1.1.4 Who are the main stakeholders?........................................................................5
1.1.5 How are they affected?......................................................................................5
1.1.6 What are their interests?.....................................................................................5
1.1.7 How important/serious are their concerns?
2. ORGANIZATIONAL BEHAVIORS THAT LED TO FAILURE.................................6
2.1 Individual Factors...............................................................................6
2.2 Group factors....................................................................................7
2.3 Organizational factors.........................................................................8
3. POST-FAILURE RESPONSES.................................................................................10
3.1 What changes were implemented?...........................................................................10
3.2 What did these changes hope to achieve?................................................................10
3.3 Who will benefit from the changes? .......................................................10
3.4 How effective were they? ....................................................................11
3.5 Recommendations.............................................................................11
4. Conclusion................................................................................................11

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1. Introduction
Australian Defense Force Academy is a special institution that houses cadets and allows
them to work, study, and socialize. The nature of the environment has acted as a hotbed for
incidences of abuse, sexual harassment, discrimination, and assault. There are a number of
females at the institution who felt that they were being treated fairly and equally and incidences
and reports of sexual abuse would only lead to their success being undermined. However, there
is another group of females who have been treated unfairly and this has led to their abuse. There
have been incidences of behavior that is unacceptable including sexual harassment. The abuse
has ranged from single incidences to abuse in multiple occasions (Bainbridge, Perry, & Kulik,
2018, p128).
1.1. Organizational Failure
1.1.1 What Happened?
There had been several recorded cases of abuse at the Australian Defense Force
Academy. The abuse has spanned from when the academy was established in 1986 to the present
time. The female cadets in the academy had raised concerns over being abused sexually by
members of a higher rank. Other females had explained that they had been on the receiving end
of more than one type of abuse during their duration at the academy.
1.1.2 Who was responsible?
Senior officers and staff members at the base often sexually abused their younger recruits
or forced them to abuse each other. 42 reports of the abuse reported abuse by their fellow cadets.
Other cadets experienced abused from members with a high ranking in the academy such as