Protecting your Workforce: Bill C-65 Compliance for Workplace Harassment and Violence 

Workplace harassment and violence are serious issues, but talking about them shouldn’t add to the employee’s overwhelming experience. To fix these issues, the Government of Canada committed through Canada’s Bill C-65 to act to ensure that federal workplaces are free from harassment and violence.  

Bill C-65 is an amendment to the Canadian Labor Code enforced into the first day of January 2021. It sets clear expectations for federally regulated industries and workplaces to proactively act with harassment and violence preventive policies and risk assessment; workforce training and quick and confidential workflows to resolve incidents related to these issues. 

First, it’s important to truly understand the new workplace harassment and violence definition by The Canada Labor Code (subsection 122(1)): “any action, conduct or comment, including of a sexual nature, that can reasonably be expected to cause offence, humiliation or other physical or psychological injury or illness to an employee, including any prescribed action, conduct or comment”. 

The key objectives of the Bill C-65 are: 

1. Prevent harassment and violence in the workplace.
2. Respond effectively when incidents occur.
3. Support affected employees and employers throughout the resolution process. 

This bill affects all workplaces regulated federally, like banks, telecommunications, and interprovincial transportation in Canada; members of parliament and Senators’ offices, public service employees and Canadian Armed Forces supervisors. 

Organizations must provide mandatory training, have a clear prevention policy, channels and tools for employees experiencing or witnessing harassment and violence to make a complaint anonymously, if desired. 

After a report has been made, organizations must acknowledge workplace harassment and violence complaints within seven calendar days, begin resolution efforts within 45 days and complete the resolution process within a year, with ten years of records and annual reports to the Labor Program. 

Beyond these requirements, there are hidden challenges to comply with Bill C-65. 

Challenges in Reporting and Resolving Workplace Harassment & Violence 

1. One Place to Report, Respond and Resolve: In many organizations, incidents of harassment and violence are reported through fragmented channels, such as emails, phone calls, or spreadsheets, which makes it harder to ensure timely acknowledgement and confidentiality.
2. Confidentiality and Fairness: With Bill C-65, organizations are required to conduct investigations by qualified and impartial professionals, safeguarding the privacy of all parties, from complainants and witnesses to respondents.
3. Preventing incidents: A key element of Bill C-65 is identifying and mitigating risks before workplace harassment and violence incidents occur. Without instant access to relevant data, HR leaders are unable to create safety plans.
4. Audit-ready documentation tracking: To be compliant, organizations must retain and keep track of training records, policy acknowledgements, investigation outcomes and corrective actions. Even with the best intentions, managing this data across emails, spreadsheets, and platforms is nearly impossible.
5. Meeting Annual Reporting Obligations: Achieving the Minister of Labor’s requirements for annual reporting may be an issue for organizations that don’t use a system that tracks data securely and accurately without disclosing personal identity information.  

While these requirements may sound overwhelming, with Sodales’ platform, organizations can make compliance manageable while elevating their safety culture across departments. 

6 Ways Sodales Can Help Manage Workplace Harassment and Violence with Bill C-65 Compliance 

1. Manage complaints in one single connected platform: Sodales offers a single portal where employees can anonymously or openly report harassment or violence through a web browser or from their cellphone with a mobile app. Once the report has been issued, designated recipients receive immediate notifications and can visualize a step-by-step workflow that mirrors Bill C-65 timelines. Forget about missing deadlines for acknowledging a case or initiating resolution within the mandated window.
2. Protect confidentiality: Sodales platform helps you protect the confidentiality of identities and sensitive information from all the involved parties with role-based permissions, single sign-on authentication and secured case files with all actions logged for audit purposes. Moreover, our platform integrates with your employee assistance programs (EAP), making it easy for affected employees to receive confidential counselling and support.
3. Create a culture of safety, trust and accountability with Workplace Violence Incident Prevention, your organization is enabled to manage workplace violence cases swiftly and in full compliance with regulations like Bill C-65 (Canada), SB 553 (California), and global anti-harassment laws.  
4. Support policy enforcement and progressive discipline tracking with Sodales’ Discipline Management to ensure consistent and compliant handling of employee conduct. Most importantly, you can implement performance improvement plans that follow your organization’s workflows. 
5. Eliminate redundant data entry by connecting with your existing HR Information System, such as SAP, Workday or Dayforce, to ensure employee data and training completions flow into incident records automatically, increasing compliance during audits. By centralizing document storage, policy updates and audit trails in Sodales, you can maintain records of all harassment and violence occurrences for the lifecycle of the organization, meeting the required standards set by Bill C-65.  
6. Generate reports in minutes: Replace manual spreadsheets with comprehensive dashboards and AI-powered reports tailored to different audiences like leadership, regulators and provincial agencies. Identify trends and risks on time and track the effectiveness of corrective actions.  
   With Sodales, information is captured consistently at each stage of the process, making the Labor Program annual report requirement a matter of minutes, instead of days.  

A Platform That Grows with Your Organization 

While Bill C-65 is just part of the regulatory puzzle that organizations operating in Canada must put together, we know there are other requirements organizations must be compliant with from provincial laws, union agreements or internal policies. But we don’t serve only Canadian organizations. 

Sodales is the true COTS (Cloud Off the Shelf) system for organizations fighting harassment and violence, not only in Canada, but also in the U.S.A., where many states are adopting proactive measures through laws that mandate harassment prevention and training. At the federal level, protections are primarily covered under Title VII (harassment and discrimination) and OSHA’s General Duty Clause (employer responsibility to provide a safe workplace). 

Having a COTS cloud-based system like Sodales significantly increases employee trust in how the organization handles harassment and violence cases. Unlike in-house solutions, a cloud platform ensures greater transparency and impartiality. Employees feel reassured knowing their reports are securely submitted, thoroughly investigated, and free from internal bias. It sends a clear message: their voices matter, and the organization is committed to a fair and accountable process. 

Sodales not only helps organizations with Bill C-65 compliance. Our platform is designed to scale, with capabilities to proactively manage health and safety and employee relations for companies in different countries like Canada, the U.S.A., Saudi Arabia, and more. 

Beyond our Employee Relations Complaint Management or Workplace Violence Incident Prevention, with Sodales, you can manage from accommodation cases to incident and disability or from managing HR cases to overseeing grievances, arbitration, time claims or CBAs and more. You can manage as much as you want to with one single connected platform. 

Sodales simplifies compliance, supports employees and fosters a culture of safety and respect. By investing in a platform that meets legal requirements and empowers your team, you send a clear message: We’re making safety and compliance a priority. 

Book a demo to learn more about how Sodales can support you to be compliant with Bill C-65 and prevent workplace harassment and violence.