Boss Gets Divorced, Goes Insane, Causes Hostile Work Environment (Part III)</h1> <article> <h1>Boss Gets Divorced, Goes Insane, Causes Hostile Work Environment (Part III)</h1> <p>Curt — Fri, 11 Nov 2011 18:51:34 +0000</p> <p><a href="http://worklawsexposed.com/wp-content/uploads/2011/11/Depressed_bed.jpg"></a><strong>PART III:</strong></p> <p>In Part I & Part II of this article we covered how Sharon Kaytor filed a hostile work environment claim after her boss made repeated sexual and violent comments toward her. He yelled “you have a flat ass” after her as she was walking away. He yelled “she’s going to spread her legs for the doctor,” loud enough for other employees to overheard. Sharon’s boss gave her a “Pussy Willow” plant with a suggestive note, which became the talk of their department. Finally, Sharon’s boss told her that he wanted to see her dead. He also said he wanted to see her “in a coffin”.</p> <p>Despite all of these facts, Sharon’s employer — submarine manufacturer Electric Boat of Connecticut — denied that Sharon was subjected to a hostile work environment. Electric Boat claimed that Sharon was suffering from paranoia, and told her that if she didn’t undergo psychiatric testing she would be fired. When she took longer than 8 days to schedule a psychiatric exam, Electric Boat fired her for insubordination and maintained that it had nothing to do with her hostile work environment claim.</p> <p>On March 1, 2009, the trial court issued it’s opinion on Electric Boat’s summary judgement motion — where Electric Boat asked the court to throw out Sharon’s hostile work environment lawsuit. For Sharon, everything got a lot worse before it got better.</p> <p>The federal district court judge (the trial court judge in our federal court system) dismissed Sharon’s entire case against her boss and Electric Boat. The court’s reasoning makes me so mad, that it’s actually difficult to write about.</p> <p>The judge wrote that what Sharon’s boss Dan did to her only amounted to “a few incidents that spanned a number of years”. The judge downplayed Dan’s explicitly sexual actions, calling them “episodic over a number of years” and “not sufficiently severe to overcome their lack of pervasiveness.”</p> <p>The judge also opined that Dan’s gift of a pussy willow plant to Sharon (with a note about it giving her “pleasure”) was not necessarily sexual. The judge actually wrote that the note had no sexual references (“pleasure”?!?!).</p> <p>But what about the death threats, and claims that Dan wanted to see Sharon in a coffin, you are probably wondering, right? Well, the judge noted that Dan told Sharon he wanted to choke her six times during one year. And, the judge acknowledged that six more times the Dan told Sharon that he wanted to see her in a coffin. So in the judge’s eyes, did a supervisor threatening to kill his employee equal a hostile work environment?</p> <p>This is what the judge said: “the Plaintiff has not offered any facts from which a reasonable jury could infer that these threats were made because of the Plaintiff’s sex.” (WTF!?!?!?)</p> <p>How many men did supervisor Dan threaten with death, or claim would look good in a coffin? When a man threatens a woman with physical violence after the woman refuses social invitations from the man, how can threats be caused by anything other than gender/sex? But the trial judge ruled that none of this amounted to a hostile work environment based on Sharon’s gender, or due to refusing Dan’s sexual advances. Trial court opinions like this one give the law a bad name. Fortunately, for the law, for Sharon, and for you, we have Courts of Appeal.</p> <p><strong>THE APPEAL</strong></p> <p>Sharon Kaytor appealed the trial court’s decision to throw her case out prior to trial. Her employer, Electric boat, responded by arguing that the judge correctly determined that “[Sharon] McCarthy’s alleged statements and conduct did not create an actionable hostile work environment.”</p> <p>The court of appeals first reviewed the trial judge’s decision to throw out the hostile work environment claim (it also reviewed Sharon’s retaliation claim). The first thing an appeals court does is set out the law. What is the legal standard for a hostile work environment claim?</p> <p>“[w]hen the workplace is permeated with `discriminatory intimidation, ridicule, and insult’ … that is `sufficiently severe or pervasive to alter the conditions of the victim’s employment and create an abusive working environment,’ … Title VII is violated,” Harris, 510 U.S. at 21, 114 S.Ct. 367 (quoting Meritor, 477 U.S. at 65, 67, 106 S.Ct. 2399</p> <p>An important thing the appeals court did, that the trial court did not do, is look at the sum total of all thing things that Dan did to Sharon. The trial court judge looked at each event in isolation, ruling that each discrete event did not amount to a hostile work environment. But the trial court never really added all those smaller events all together and considered whether all the smaller harassing events added up to a hostile work environment.</p> <p>The court of appeals explained it this way:</p> <p>As to “whether an environment is `hostile’ or `abusive,’” Harris stated that the matter “can be determined only by looking at all the circumstances.” 510 U.S. at 23, 114 S.Ct. 367 (emphasis added). These may include the frequency of the discriminatory conduct; its severity; whether it is physically threatening or humiliating, or a mere offensive utterance; and whether it unreasonably interferes with an employee’s work performance. The effect on the employee’s psychological well-being is, of course, relevant to determining whether the plaintiff actually found the environment abusive. But while psychological harm, like any other relevant factor, may be taken into account, no single factor is required. Because the analysis of severity and pervasiveness looks to the totality of the circumstances, “the crucial inquiry focuses on the nature of the workplace environment as a whole,” Cruz, 202 F.3d at 570 (emphases added); see, e.g., Perry, 115 F.3d at 150-51.<br /> This was not the only area, however, where the appeals court chided the trial court judge for applying the wrong standard to Sharon’s hostile work environment claim. The appeals court also zeroed in on the way that the trial court judge decided not to count Dan’s threats of violence, because (in the trials judge’s words, not mine) those threats were not based on Sharon’s gender.</p> <p>The court of appeals (thankfully) felt differently, and cited caselaw to back up the idea that threats of violence CAN be related to a protected class when all the circumstances of the hostile work environment are considered together. The court of appeals stated:</p> <p>“However, even if overtly gender-based discriminatory conduct is merely episodic and not itself severe, the addition of “physically threatening … behavior” may cause “offensive or boorish conduct” to cross the line into “actionable sexual harassment.” Cruz, 202 F.3d at 571.</p> <p>In the case of Sharon working for Dan at Electric Boat, the “overtly gender-based discriminatory conduct” were things like Dan yelling about Sharon “spreading her legs for the doctor,” having “a flat ass,” and the pussy-willow incident (even though the trial judge disagreed about the plant).</p> <p>The addition of “physically threatening behavior” was Dan threatening Sharon with choking, putting her in a coffin, and wanting to see her dead. The court of appeals is telling the trial court judge that these things should not be evaluated separately, but rather should be looked at as the total actions of one abusive boss toward an abused female employee. Because the violent threats come from the same person and are directed toward the same person, the violent threats should be considered part of the same pattern of creating a hostile work environment based on gender.</p> <p>“Circumstantial evidence that facially sex-neutral incidents were part of a pattern of discrimination on the basis of gender may consist of evidence that “the same individual” engaged in “multiple acts of harassment, some overtly sexual and some not.”</p> <p>That is EXACTLY what Dan did to Sharon at Electric Boat. The appeals court recognized that Sharon testified that Dan threatened her because she turned down his social and sexual invitations. When the trial court is deciding whether or not to allow Sharon’s case to go forward to a jury, the trial court is supposed to assume that the plaintiff (Sharon) is telling the truth. Instead, this trial judge tossed out much of Sharon’s story as unbelievable.</p> <p>One of the most important points the appeals court made addressed Electric Boat’s argument that Dan threatened to choke a male employee too, so Dan’s choking threat toward Sharon was not based on her gender. Basically, Electric Boat was trying to use the equal opportunity jerk defense — arguing that Dan’s actions were not discriminatory toward women because he did the same type of jerk-behaviors to all types of employees, not just women.</p> <p>This “equal opportunity jerk” defense is the basis for every H.R. investigation that ends with “Sorry complaining employee, although your boss did do a few unfortunate things, your boss did not do anything illegal.” This is H.R.’s response to almost every employee complaint about a bullying, harassing boss who has created a hostile work environment. “Your boss was merely rude, but did not say or do anything illegal.”</p> <p>First of all, who says H.R. gets to decide? Well, if you take your claim to H.R., you are giving H.R. permission to decide for you. Don’t. If you want someone else, outside the company, to decide if what the boss did was merely rude or actually created an illegal hostile work environment, I explain what steps to take in my book. But before you go that route, consider the court of appeals decision in Sharon’s case.</p> <p>“[T]he inquiry into whether ill treatment was actually sex-based discrimination cannot be short-circuited by the mere fact that both men and women are involved…. It would be exceedingly perverse if a male [supervisor] could buy… his company immunity from Title VII liability by taking care to harass sexually an occasional male worker, though his preferred targets were female.” Brown v. Henderson, 257 F.3d at 254 (internal quotation marks omitted).</p> <p>This is SO important! I know of a supervisor wanting to fire an African American employee, and to escape discrimination charges fired a Caucasian employee two weeks before giving the African American her pink slip. Basically, the appeals court here is saying that a boss should not be able to hide behind the “equal opportunity jerk” defense. A bully should not be able to get away with picking on the mostly female administrative staff by occasionally yelling at one of the men in the office (or vice versa).</p> <p>The court of appeals ended its review of the trial judge’s opinion by restoring Sharon’s case against Electric Boat and her supervisor Dan. The court stated that “the totality of the evidence… was sufficient to… show that because of her gender she was subjected to an abusive environment that altered her work conditions.” The court clearly stated that all of the bullying boss’s threats should be included when considering whether there was a hostile work environment. The court said:</p> <p>“A rational juror may permissibly find that a reasonable employee would view any serious death threat or threat of physical harm as sufficiently severe to alter the employee’s working conditions and create an abusive environment. Even such threats communicated in jest, if made repeatedly, may reasonably be viewed as sufficiently severe.”</p> <p>And the court of appeals didn’t stop there. The appeals court actually said that even without the threats, there was enough evidence of a hostile work environment based on gender and sex that the trial court judge should have let Sharon’s case go to trial:</p> <p>“Further, a rational juror could permissibly find that a reasonable employee would have viewed [Dan] McCarthy’s sexual comments and actions—including his frequent leering at [Sharon] Kaytor’s body and his calling attention to her private parts by “yell[ing] out at the top of his lungs” for everyone to hear that Kaytor had a “flat ass”, “yell[ing],” when Kaytor was heading for the gynecologist, that she was “going where every man wants to be”, and finally giving Kaytor a pussy willow bush, which was the talk of the entire facility for days —as creating an environment that was abusive, humiliating, and materially worsening Kaytor’s working conditions.”</p> <p>As mentioned earlier, it is a great thing, not just for Sharon Kaytor but also for you and me, that this case went all the way to the 2nd Circuit Court of Appeals. The panel of three judges correctly applied the law and reversed a horrid opinion by a trial judge who wouldn’t see evidence of sexual harassment if it was yelling about the judge having a flat ass.</p> <p>Now we have a clear statement that the “equal opportunity jerk defense” should not be allowed to hide discrimination that causes a hostile work environment.</p> <p><strong>CURT’S TAKE-AWAY TIPS:</strong></p> <p><strong>1. Do NOT Expect H.R. to Help You In Any Way.</strong><br /> HR will agree to “look into the matter” and then always always always come back to you and say “Nothing illegal happened.”</p> <p><strong>2. Learn Your Legal Rights!</strong><br /> You don’t have to accept H.R.’s blow-off of your complaint. H.R. is not the only place you can go to complain. Why go the one department you know will say “there is no hostile work environment”?</p> <p><strong>3. Don’t Give Up:</strong><br /> Consider Sharon Kaytor. H.R. and the company where she worked for 34 years accused sided with her boss. Then the company accused her of being paranoid and fired her, even after she was sexually harassed and threatened with death. Then a federal trial court judge blew off her complaint too. But she didn’t give up, and at the court of appeals level, she won. Now her case is setting important precedent for other employees, and sending a chill down the spine of HR people. You can be the next Sharon Kaytor if you are willing to learn about your rights and take action.</p> <p>I explain all about how to fight back against a hostile work environment caused by an irrational bullying boss in <a href="http://worklawsexposed.com/book/" target="_blank">my e-book, “Work Laws Exposed”. Click here to learn how</a> you can use my letter template today and hand it to your employer tomorrow to start fighting back and taking control of your work life right now.</p> </article> <article> <h1>Boss Gets Divorced, Goes Insane, Causes Hostile Work Environment (Part II)</h1> <p>Curt — Wed, 19 Oct 2011 21:09:21 +0000</p> <p>PART II:</p> <div id="attachment_75" class="wp-caption alignleft" style="width: 310px"><a href="http://worklawsexposed.com/wp-content/uploads/2011/10/pussy-willow.jpg"></a><p class="wp-caption-text">Pussy Willow Plant a Sexual Gift?</p></div> <p>The first thing HR did when Sharon made her complaint was to transfer her to a different office down the hall from Dan, where she would have a new supervisor named Crogle. A harassed employee should not have to keep working for the harassing boss, so this was a good move by the company to avoid creating a hostile work environment for Sharon. Or was it?</p> <p>The “terms and conditions” of Sharon’s employment should remain the same according to law. Sharon’s pay did stay the same. Her “new” office, however, was much worse. Lead based paint was flaking off the walls and landing on Sharon’s desk. Her new boss, Crogle, answered to Dan. So ultimately Dan was still her boss. Was this really a better, safer situation for her, or was it worse? It contributed to a hostile work environment.</p> <p>The court even pointed out that the company never offered Sharon a position that did NOT ultimately answer to Dan. Her chain of command remained the same, but her office got worse.</p> <p>First Crogle changed Sharon’s work hours. Then after about two months Crogle started screaming at Sharon. Sharon believed Crogle was retaliating against her on Dan’s behalf. Even though he took away her responsibilities and she had little work to do, he would yell at her in front of the rest of the people in the department. One other female employee said that Sharon was “ostracized” by Crogle and other co-workers because Sharon had reported Dan’s harassment. This also contributed to Sharon’s retaliation claim and hostile work environment claim.</p> <p>When HR interviewed Dan about Sharon’s report, he claimed that she was just upset with him for not being more supportive when she filed for workers compensation. When HR asked about the “flat ass” comment, Dan admitted saying it, but claimed he was merely repeating what Sharon herself had told Dan.</p> <p>HR also asked Dan if he said that he wanted to choke Sharon. His answser?</p> <ul> <li>“I do not recall”</li> </ul> <p>Did you say you wanted to choke her?</p> <ul> <li>“I have no recollection of saying that”</li> </ul> <p>Did you say you wanted to see her in a coffin?</p> <ul> <li>“I have no recollection”</li> </ul> <p>Did you pick up scarves from her desk and smell them?</p> <ul> <li>“No recollection”</li> </ul> <p>Did you make a comment about Sharon “spreading her legs for the doctor”?</p> <ul> <li>“No recollection”</li> </ul> <p>Then Dan claimed that Sharon had initiated conversations with him about her breast size and her sex life! If essence, he was trying to claim that: 1) no I didn’t say any of this; and 2) if I did say any of this, Sharon consented to it when she started sexual conversations with me, so these comments cannot contribute to a hostile work environment (because she “welcomed” the comments).</p> <p>This is a classic case of the company turning against the whistleblower and trying to scorch the earth all around the harassed person, in order to spare the company. I actually don’t think the company cares about the harasser or the harassed one way or the other… the company really doesn’t care if there are employees working in a hostile work environment. The company just doesn’t want to lose money. One wrinkle is that the company will go to great lengths to protect the harasser if the harasser is making the company money. This is why top sales people can get away with murder.</p> <p>And in this case, Dan must have been making money for Electric Boat, since they tired to protect him despite the fact that he told Sharon he wanted to see her in a coffin. How can you get any closer to threatening to kill someone without actually saying “I’m going to kill you.” And one time, remember, Dan did say to Sharon, “I will kill you.” Despite all that, the company claimed that Sharon welcomed Dan’s behavior and none of what he said would cause a “reasonable person” to feel she was working in a hostile work environment.</p> <p>THE LAWSUIT</p> <p>First Sharon filed an EEOC complaint against Electric Boat for creating a hostile work environment based on sex, for intentional infliction of emotional distress due to the comments by Dan about seeing her dead and choking her, and for retaliation because she lost responsibilities, work hours, her work station, and was screamed at, beginning right after she filed her hostile work environment complaint.</p> <p>In December of 2006, after receiving a “right to sue” letter from the EEOC, Sharon filed a lawsuit against Electric boat and Dan McCarty for: 1) hostile work environment; 2) retaliation for blowing the whistle on the ways Dan was causing a hostile work environment; and 3) intentional infliction of emotional distress.</p> <p>One month after she filed her hostile work environment lawsuit, in January of 2007, Electric Boat told Sharon she had to undergo psychiatric testing because the company believed she was suffering from paranoia. Sharon agreed to the test “under protest”, but after 8 days she had not scheduled the exam. The next day Electric Boat fired Sharon — a 34 year employee — because she had not scheduled the exam quickly enough.</p> <p>During the litigation, the company claimed that ordering a psychiatric evaluation was in no way connected to Sharon’s hostile work environment complaint.</p> <p>The company also claimed that everything Sharon complained about — the “flat ass” comments, the pussy willow plant, the scarves, the “spread your legs for the doctor” comments in front of others, and the threats of wanting to choke her, see her dead, or in a coffin — all of it, even if true, did not amount to a “hostile work environment.”</p> <p>On March 1, 2009, the trial court issued it’s opinion on Electric Boat’s summary judgement motion — where Electric Boat asked the court to throw the case out.</p> <p>Find out what happened by checking back and reading Part III of this article. It will be posted soon!</p> <p><strong>TAKE ACTION NOW</strong></p> <p>I explain all about how to fight back against a hostile work environment caused by an irrational bullying boss in <a href="http://worklawsexposed.com/book/" target="_blank">my e-book, “Work Laws Exposed”. Click here to learn how</a> you can use my letter template today and hand it to your employer tomorrow to start fighting back and taking control of your work life right now.</p> </article> <article> <h1>Boss Gets Divorced, Goes Insane, Causes Hostile Work Environment (Part 1)</h1> <p>Curt — Sat, 15 Oct 2011 01:44:15 +0000</p> <p><a href="http://worklawsexposed.com/wp-content/uploads/2011/10/kim-kardashian-in-coffin.jpg"></a>Sharon Kaytor worked at Electric Boat in Groton Connecticut from 1973 until her termination in 2007. She claimed that her supervisor caused a hostile work environment and generally made her life insufferable through his comments and actions. Her supervisor and Electric Boat, however, filed a summary judgement motion against Kaytor’s lawsuit, asking the trial judge to throw the case out before trial. The judge did through the case out, and said that no reasonable person could find that Kaytor experienced a hostile work environment, so, there’s no need for a trial.</p> <p>Kaytor appealed the dismissal of her hostile work environment lawsuit against her boss and Electric Boat, and (here’s the good part) a panel of three appellate judges reinstated her hostile work environment claim — so her lawsuit gets to move forward after all.</p> <p>Has Your Boss Done any of the These Things to You?</p> <p>From 1998 until 2005 Sharon worked as an administrative assistant for Daniel J. McCarthy in one of the Engineering Departments at Electric Boat. Sharon’s relationship with Dan started out professional enough. For six years she handled ordering supplies and other admin functions for the hundreds of engineers that Dan supervised. Sharon testified that during this period there was no hostile work environment; but that ended in 2004 when Dan’s personality started to change.</p> <p>According to Sharon, Dan went through a divorce and suddenly became much more sexually suggestive toward her. Sharon testified that Dan made suggestive remarks, frequently spoke negatively of women for being overweight, and would frequently compliment Sharon on her clothing.</p> <p>These comments, by themselves, did not rise to the level of a hostile work environment. But, as is so frequently the case, the comments did not level out or stop.</p> <p>Dan walked up to Sharon’s desk at one point where two of her scarves were laying. He picked them up, inhaled, and commented in a positive fashion about how much he liked the way the scarves smelled like Sharon. He then stood close to Sharon. She thought he was trying to smell her hair. Frightened, she tried to turn away and type until he left.</p> <p>Even at this point, though, adding up all these facts doesn’t really amount to a hostile work environment. But again, Dan didn’t stop.</p> <p>Sharon was sure that Dan “had designs on me”, and that he had grown angry and bitter because she refused to socialize with him outside of work. One day while in the office with other engineers around Dan shouted to Sharon, “YOU HAVE A FLAT ASS!”</p> <p>Not only did Dan repeat this comment, but he also started repeatedly telling Sharon that he wished she were dead, that “I want to see you in your coffin” (six times), and that he wanted to “choke” her. Co-worker even began to warn Sharon that she need to take this seriously.</p> <p>Instead of reporting Dan to Human Resources for threatening violence and causing a hostile work environment Sharon acted like the ultimate, easy going, “roll with it” employee. She said she didn’t report him because she was “trying to cut him some slack” because “he was going through a divorce”.</p> <p>But guess what? He didn’t stop.</p> <p>The next phase of harassment came when Sharon told Dan that she had to leave to go see her doctor. Dan had overheard Sharon telling other women in the office that she was going to her gynocologist for an annual exam. So as Sharon is leaving, Dan got up and loudly yelled down the hall, “You are going where every man wants to be” and told others that Sharon<br /> was “spreading [her] legs for the doctor.”</p> <p>It was finally at this point, in April of 2005, that Sharon said she would report the comments to a company vice president if Dan didn’t stop. Dan got a “horrid look on his face” and said, “I’ll kill you.” Sharon was so frightened that she said nothing until late 2005, after what Dan did on administrative assistants’ day.</p> <p>There had been a tradition at Electric Boat of managers giving their secretaries nice gifts or flowers on administriative assistants’ day. In 2005, however, Dan gave Sharon an unnatractive plant with the following note: “I wish you the best and thank you for your help this past year. The plant is/can be planted outside and I hope bring[s] you pleasure in the years ahead.” Can you guess what kind of plant it was? A “Pussy Willow”. Read Dan’s note again with that in mind. Would you be offended?</p> <p>Feeling that the Pussy Willlow gift and note was too much, Sharon finally went to Human Resources with her hostile work environment complaint. The offense, however, wasn’t merely the plant and note. The incident had become the talk of the company. One employee had been gone on admistrative professionals’ day. When he returned, he said more than a dozen people came up and told him about what “Dan had done to Sharon” in giving her a Pussy Willow. So it wasn’t just the insult, but the public shame of having the insult repeated over and over and over by all of Sharon’s co-workers. Her work environment had become hostile to the extent that she couldn’t take it any more.</p> <p>If you think Dan’s actions, words, and pussy willow gift were dumb… just wait until you hear about how the company reacted to Sharon’s hostile work environment comlaint: coming in Part II of this article.</p> <p><strong>TAKE ACTION NOW</strong></p> <p>I explain all about how to fight back against a hostile work environment caused by an irrational bullying boss in <a href="http://worklawsexposed.com/book/" target="_blank">my e-book, “Work Laws Exposed”. Click here to learn how</a> you can use my letter template today and hand it to your employer tomorrow to start fighting back and taking control of your work life right now.</p> </article> <article> <h1>What Makes a Hostile Work Environment an ILLEGAL Hostile Work Environment?</h1> <p>Curt — Thu, 13 Oct 2011 00:20:54 +0000</p> <p><a href="http://worklawsexposed.com/wp-content/uploads/2011/10/hostile-work-environment.jpg"></a>As I mentioned in the previous post, many people don’t realize that there is a difference between a hostile work environment (meaning you feel harassed for no good reason and so utterly stressed that you feel sick about going to work), and an ILLEGAL hostile work environment. To help show you the difference I’m showing you the key portion of a 2010 court case from the 2d Circuit Court of Appeals. (The Second Circuit covers New York, Connecticut, and Vermont, but the legal principles cited here apply everywhere in the U.S.)</p> <p>In this case, the court gives the definition of an ILLEGAL hostile work environment:</p> <ul> <li>“Title VII is also violated when a “workplace is permeated with discriminatory intimidation, ridicule, and insult . . . that is sufficiently severe or pervasive to alter the conditions of the victim’s employment and create and abusive working environment.” Kaytor v. Electric Boat Corp., 609 F.3d 537, 546-47 (2d Cir.2010).”</li> </ul> <p>To here, the court is saying that federal law (Title VII) is broken and an illegal hostile work environment created when a workplace is permeated with <strong><em>discriminatory</em></strong> intimidation, ridicule, and insult. Notice that it’s not just plain insults, general ridicule, and intimidation (which might also be called bullying). All of these things must be <strong><em>discriminatory</em></strong>. What you need to understand is that discriminatory = related to a protected class such as race, age, gender, religion, disability, national origin, use of FMLA leave, previous use of the Work Comp system, or whistleblowing.</p> <p>If it feels like your boss is just a general jerk, you need to learn to rephrase his general jerkiness into terms of protected classes. That’s what I go to great lengths to explain in my book “Work Laws Exposed”, to show how you can re-make your work situation into something that is an ILLEGAL hostile work environment, and so you can push back against your boss and take back control of your workplace.</p> <p>I explain all about how to fight back against a hostile work environment caused by an irrational bullying boss in <a href="http://worklawsexposed.com/book/">my e-book, “Work Laws Exposed”. Click here</a> to learn how you can use my letter template today and hand it to your employer tomorrow to start fighting back and taking control of your work life right now.</p> <p> </p> </article> <article> <h1>What is a “Hostile Work Environment”?</h1> <p>Curt — Tue, 11 Oct 2011 21:53:41 +0000</p> <p>What is a “Hostile Work Environment,” you ask?</p> <p>If you have been so stressed out at work by a supervisor that won’t leave you alone, who nit-picks your work, and holds you to insane standards that apply to no one else, then you have probably felt like you were working in “A Hostile Work Environment.”</p> <p>For example, at one point in my legal career it felt like I was working in what is commonly called a Hostile Work Environment. I worked for a partner who was sugar-sweet to her associate attorneys and her legal secretary one day, and then the next day would be yelling that we were all worthless and should be fired.</p> <p>One day when I came back from lunch, I found the partner screeching at the legal secretary (who was an excellent employee, by the way). After the partner walked away the legal secretary put her index finger on her chin, rolled her eyes at the ceiling, and said “Gee, who didn’t take their Prozac today?” I cracked up because whether our workplace was hostile, or all hugs and smiles, was unknowable until you got into the office and talked to the boss to see what kind of mood she was in.</p> <p>The total unpredictability of the bosses’ mood and disposition toward us made it feel like our workplace had become a hostile environment, characterized by overwhelming stress and a paralyzing fear that we would be fired for unknown, and thus unavoidable, mistakes.</p> <p>This is the common, non-legal definition of a Hostile Work Environment: a workplace that has become overwhelmingly stressful due to the irrational and unpredictable behavior of an angry boss that appears hell-bent on running you out of your job for unknown reasons, despite the fact that you have a solid work performance.</p> <p><a href="http://worklawsexposed.com/wp-content/uploads/2011/10/Interview_chair.jpg"></a>Unfortunately, there’s nothing illegal about a boss who acts irrationally, yells, screams, treats employees unfairly and threatens to terminate good performers. In fact, the United States Supreme Court has said “We will not mandate civility in the workplace.” <em>Oncale v. Sundowner Offshore Services</em>, 523 US 75 (1998).</p> <p>But there is something illegal about a boss who irrationally treats someone worse who is part of a protected class. This is actually how the phrase “hostile work environment” came into being. It was first used to describe a type of sexual harassment, where the whole workplace had become so charge with sexual banter, sexual jokes, sexual talk, sexual pictures (like email pictures or automotive calendars) that all together it equaled a hostile work environment based on sex.</p> <p>Here’s the definition from the case law: “A Hostile Work Environment is caused by unwelcome sexual conduct that unreasonably interferes with job performance or creates an intimidating, hostile, or offensive working environment. The conduct does not necessarily have to be overtly sexual. In other words, name calling or other harassment of women because they are women can be sexual harassment.”</p> <p>Don’t be discouraged if what you are going through seems to be the “legal” type of hostile work environment. You can learn how to rephrase what is happening to you, using legal terms and the protected classes that will make your boss, your HR department, and the EEOC sit up and take notice.</p> <p>I explain all about how to fight back against a hostile work environment caused by an irrational bullying boss in <a href="http://worklawsexposed.com/book/">my e-book, “Work Laws Exposed”. Click here</a> to learn how you can use my letter template today and hand it to your employer tomorrow to start fighting back and taking control of your work life right now.</p> </article> </main></body></html>