Megyn Kelly detailed her experience with sexual harassment, and shared the advice she'd give to women who are afraid to speak out

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Megyn Kelly onstage with Business Insider Editor in Chief Alyson Shontell.

• NBC News anchor Megyn Kelly shared her experience with sexual harassment during Business Insider's IGNITION conference.
• Kelly said her former employer Roger Ailes sexually harassed her at the start of her career at Fox News, but that she initially did not recognize that she was being harassed.
• Kelly urged women to try and report any sexual misconduct when it occurs.

NBC News anchor Megyn Kelly detailed the sexual harassment she faced when working under deceased Fox News boss Roger Ailes, during an interview at Business Insider's IGNITION conference in New York City.

Kelly said that at first she didn't recognize she was being harassed.

"He was always bawdy and had an inappropriate sense of humor," Kelly said of Ailes. As someone who didn't easily take offense to those kinds of remarks, Kelly said she brushed it off.

"The harassment that I went through wasn't obviously harassment in the beginning," Kelly said.

But eventually, Kelly said that Ailes' behavior toward her got "worse, and worse, and worse," and got to a point where she felt she "couldn't deny it."

"It was explicit quid pro quo sexual harassment, which was basically: 'You sleep with me, and I'll give you a promotion,'" Kelly said.

Even still, Kelly said that she laughed off the advances and tried to convince herself that nothing was happening because she didn't want to have "a direct confrontation with him."

But things came to a head when Ailes had Kelly meet him in his office, she said.

"It culminated in him trying to be with me physically, and it was only at that point where you couldn't pretend it wasn't happening anymore, that I really had to come to terms with it," Kelly said. "And, I ran out of the guy's office, he tried to grab me three times and make out with me."

Each time Ailes grabbed Kelly she pushed him off of her, she said. And the last time Kelly pushed him off of her, Ailes asked her when her contract was up, she said.

Kelly said she reported Ailes' behavior to a supervisor but was told to "steer clear of him."

Kelly said she was uncomfortable, and, because of the powerless position she was in at the time, it seemed like good advice, but in retrospect she said the advice was "terrible."

The NBC News host advised women to try and find a way to seek people out and report inappropriate sexual behavior in the workplace, even if it seems futile.

"I want to say to those women, I understand. It's not that I'm oblivious of how hard it is to report," Kelly said. "But I want to say: Find a way. Because the culture, I don't want to say has changed, but it is changing, meaningfully by the moment. Thanks to the women that are finding the courage."

Ailes resigned as the CEO and chairman of Fox News in 2016 after being accused of sexual misconduct by multiple women at the network, including Gretchen Carlson, who filed a lawsuit against the mogul in July 2016. Ailes died in May.