Once, I had a coworker report a sexual harassment to me (I was the team leader) but she said that she wanted me to deal with it personally, that she didn't want

Once, I had a coworker report a sexual harassment to me (I was the team leader) but she said that she wanted me to deal with it personally, that she didn't want to make a fuss about it and that I shouldn't say anything to HR. We had a good working relationship and, like OP, I also didn't want to violate the "trust" she placed in me. I respected her "wishes" and acted accordingly. This was a mistake for many many reasons, among them the fact that it also ended up biting me in the ass. After a while someone else said some very inappropiate things to her and she ended up hating the job and decided to leave. At her exit interview with HR she said why she was leaving and, needless to say, HR didn't like the fact that I was told of the harrassment and didn't report it to them. "she told me not to get you involved and I didn't want to break her trust" doesn't cut it as an excuse (and it's also very unprofessional). HR then had a meeting with me where they let me have it. After the meeting the coworker and I talked about it and she essentially said that yeah, I should've disregarded her wishes and gotten HR involved early on. The lesson is to do what you have to do and don't pay much attention to the whole "I don't want to make a fuss" thing. My guess is that women say stuff like that because of the "likability" tax imposed on them. The whole experience was very eye opening to me, I was very young and relatively inexperienced as a team leader. Being male I was also blind at the myriad of stupid shit women get thrown at them by professional men that really should know better. Well, not blind, I knew sexual harassment happened but I never expected it to happen so close to me. I guess that being young I always thought like it was something that other people (working at other places) did. I'm still stupefied at some of the things that she experienced while she worked there and amazed that stuff like that still happens in this day and age.