All Reasonable Steps
A 'must read' for HR leaders in 2026
This is a golden moment. A chance to create a change workplaces have needed for generations.
But the old tools won’t get us there.
All Reasonable Steps shows how real prevention works, using psychology to transform how organisations understand and prevent workplace sexual harassment.
“Laws alone don’t change workplace culture. The real challenge is turning intention into action. All Reasonable Steps offers a much-needed, brilliant and enjoyable, practical roadmap for doing exactly that. Nina’s words inspire by showing us that change is not only possible but not to be feared."
Zelda Perkins CBE, Founder, Can't Buy My Silence
Old Problem
Workplace sexual harassment is not a new problem, but expectations placed on employers have changed dramatically. Organisations have relied on policies, training, and zero-tolerance statements, yet too often these efforts have failed to create meaningful change. Employees, regulators, and the wider public are no longer reassured by initiatives that do not shift behaviour. The bar has been raised. Employers now face a more demanding question: how do you actually prevent sexual harassment from happening in the first place?
In All Reasonable Steps, psychologist Dr Nina Burrowes offers a new, powerful and practical answer.
Fresh Solution
Drawing on twenty years of specialist expertise in the psychology of sexual harm, the book approaches prevention through a psychological lens. It starts from a simple truth: sexual harassment is not about rules, policies and processes. It is about people, relationships, and culture. At its core, it is shaped by power dynamics, fear, denial, minimisation, and consent. Understanding these forces is key to making prevention truly effective.
From that foundation, All Reasonable Steps examines what drives harassment, why people do not report, and how workplace cultures can unintentionally protect harmful behaviour. It also shows how psychological insight can shape the solution, building practical skills, strengthening confidence, and empowering people to live their values in everyday interactions. By making the underlying dynamics visible, it enables organisations to respond with greater precision, confidence, and impact.
This book equips leaders, HR professionals, wellbeing teams, and senior decision-makers with the practical understanding they need to reduce doubt, lower defensiveness, and create the conditions where behaviour can genuinely shift. Alongside insight, it sets out a structured roadmap for clarifying expectations and building the organisational conditions that make early, proportionate intervention possible.
Rather than meeting incidents with stress and urgency, readers learn how to approach complexity with grounded calm. They move from guessing what might help or wondering whether they have done enough to understanding how trauma and power dynamics shape behaviour, and knowing they are ahead of the curve.
Grounded in sharp insight and real-world examples, and using a deliberately strength-based approach, All Reasonable Steps reframes prevention as an achievable leadership task. It shows how to embed psychological understanding into everyday practice, so prevention becomes part of how people lead, manage, and interact.
This is an invitation to move beyond surface responses and into real cultural change. To put zero-tolerance to work. And to be part of a generation of employers who use psychology to create the change that has been needed for far too long.
Nina is the founder of The Consent Collective.
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