She was suspended without pay after filing a formal complaint with the federal Equal Employment Opportunity Commission after alleging sexual harassment.

Before her suspension, she had been transferred to a less desirable position after complaining to management that her foreman had treated her differently from male employees and had made two inappropriate remarks.

The full 6th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals upheld a jury award after her union filed a grievance and after a three-judge panel of the court had ruled that a minor adjustment in work assignments and a temporary suspension with full back pay and benefits did not constitute "adverse employment actions."

But the railroad complained in seeking review of the case that the injury to the worker was not substantive enough to be considered discriminatory under the law.

"Most companies fill this gap by buying employment practices liability insurance," Mr. Hartwig said. So, this case points up the need for this type of coverage.

"There are very few large corporations who have not been at the opposite end of employment discrimination allegations over the past five years; that is regardless of the industry we are talking about–retail, services, manufacturers," he said.

"Corporations have probably gotten better at managing this sort of risk over time," Mr. Hartwig observed. "Unfortunately, the workplace today is still populated by people who, inadvertently or otherwise, exhibit behavior that can be construed as bigoted, racist or sexist," he said.

"This case points up the need to protect yourself in this area, he noted. "An important aspect of employment practices liability cases is adoption of policies and programs designed to immunize your firm from this type of claims," he said.

Such practices, Mr. Hartwig advised, involve development of formal policies and procedures for handling claims alleging sexual harassment or discrimination.

Critical when a court views a case, Mr. Hartwig said, is whether a company has procedures that allow the aggrieved to report the claim anonymously to someone who is not their direct supervisor.

"Another thing is whether employees are aware that employers offer this program and whether they have undergone formal training," he added. "It is one thing to have such a program in place in a manual, but it is another that employees are aware of it and have been trained in company policies."