Abstract for: Addressing inequality in organizations: Group model building on harassment in academia

Inequality in organizations is one of the grand challenges of the 21st century. This paper focusses on understanding and addressing gender based violence and harassment at the workplace. Through a group model building intervention in a Dutch school of theology, we involved stakeholders in understanding the systemic aspects of harassment. We reveal feedback loops of awareness about harassment and the role of exemplary leadership behavior. Group model building helped to discuss sensitive issues and to co-create knowledge that provided leaders with better information to inform decision making. We also noted that the method is more suitable for analytical complexity than for emotional complexity: participants who experiences harassment need to already have come to terms with these experiences to be able to share them.