If I had only not made that call. . .

A good friend of mine pointed out that my posts are lacking context for those who have not been aware of my situation regarding my discriminatory termination.  I realize they are 100% correct, so I am posting this information to add context.

Picture it. . .2017 – I had been having issues with an employee, someone who had always been a high performer and at that time I had known for 15 years.  It began with small things, a favor asked to work remotely while they were in Florida with family, which turned out to them not being available when I needed them during the workday.  You know, late lunch that ran long, a bit of shopping, but will get me what I need soon.  Not ideal, but I rolled with it as we had history. 

Over the course of 2017 when this individual would work from home, which in our department was allowed 1 day a week – a rule set by management not me, they would not be readily available.  I would text and IM on our internal messenger system and they were either slow to respond or I would not hear back until the end of the day.  I shared this situation with my manager as it was becoming more of a problem.  How can I do my job when they aren’t available during the work day to do theirs?

Side Note: Those who live in Virginia and worked in DC, you may recall 66 used to be free during morning and evening rush hour if you had a hybrid vehicle as this individual did, but in 2017 they started to charge everyone who used it unless you had 3 people commuting.  So, it went from driving my hybrid in alone to needing to carpool with two others.  This became a problem for this individual, to the point that when we would have business meetings with partners and at the start you are waiting for the meeting to begin and catching up, they would tell these outside business partners, within my hearing distance - always, that they could no longer afford to come into the office.  The tolls were too high and they just didn’t make enough to cover them. Not that they couldn't commute to work another way like my other employees.

All of this boiled over in August 2017, this individual was leaving on vacation to Europe for two weeks and I had already approved them working from home the day they were flying out which was a Thursday.  I wrote the day off, knowing they would be getting ready for their trip, but I needed them available that Wednesday to ensure I was up to speed to cover for them for their time out of the office.  Seems simple, no? There was a meeting that afternoon with another individual for a project I would be working on for them while they were gone.  Wednesday morning, I got to my desk and logged on.  This individual sent me an instant message sharing they had to see their doctor that day and wanted to work from home.  Honestly, I was annoyed as I already approved them working from home the next day and really needed to do proper handover to ensure I had what I needed to be able to cover while they were gone. Regardless, your health is important and I knew this trip meant a lot to them.  I approved them working remotely that day so they could go to the doctor.  What happened next sorta shocked me.  I got an email that they cancelled the meeting that afternoon with the other individual and me for the project I was covering. I honestly don't think they recalled I was on the meeting. When I checked their calendar, they had cancelled their entire day. Is that remote work? Why didnt this person just take a sick day and that would have been the end of it? I don't know, they had the time.

As my previous manager Victoria shared during her testimony on the stand at trial: “If you are sick, you are sick.  If you are working, you are working and are available to do so.” 

I sent this individual an instant message sharing that I just got a cancellation for the meeting and saw they cancelled their entire day.  Well, I guess that was the last straw for them. I mean, how dare I expect them to work on a day they were working?!? They called me on my office phone and started yelling at me at the top of their lungs. SCREAMING.  The call didn’t last long and I was physically shaking when I hung up.  I had put up with a lot from this person and tried to accommodate them as they had always been a hard worker, but I would not put up with an employee disrespecting me and yelling at me on the phone because I questioned them cancelling their entire day when they were supposedly working remotely.

There are times in life when you realize that hindsight is 20/20. This is one of those times.  I wish I would not have called our HR contact Rebecca Mason to ask for help.  Remember, I had told my manager I was having issues, she did nothing to help.  I didn’t know what else to do and this person just screamed at me over the phone when I questioned them being available to work on a workday.  I truly wish I had never made that call because it started a chain of events that left me exposed and vulnerable and ultimately led to my discriminatory firing. Sorta crazy. . .I should have been apathetic and allowed them to just do whatever and not care. I mean, how could I expect my employee to work, who the hell did I think I was?

Anyone who manages people, I will tell you, HR is there to protect the company, they don’t give a sh*t about you.  I was stupid and naive thinking that HR would help me with tools to cure this situation, which is all I wanted.  I didn’t want to have conflict with this person, but I also could not continue to be treated this way and have one employee on my team that was not performing at the same level as the other members, regardless of my relationship with them.

Following this, everything I was coached by HR to do made the situation worse.  I thought HR knew better than me, even if I had been a manager multiple times in my career, I was just at my wits end.  I realize now, it wasn’t me, it was this person didn’t want to work anymore, they were ready to retire and trying to do the minimum.  I knew they were obsessed with their retirement as they had a spreadsheet they showed me on multiple occasions that they constantly updated with how much money they would have for retirement. Password protected and all.

Following a tumultuous Fall where nothing I did to try to make the situation better worked. Typing that now, I realize, why should I the manager who was only asking my employee to do their job have had to work so hard to smooth out the situation they created? Again, hindsight is 20/20. Then the NYC travel issue happened in December where I asked my manager about what to do and was instructed to speak with HR, which I did. Following the advice of those above me. You can check my post "Oh Newman" Its sorta long, but adds a lot of info.

So, my manager and HR knew I was having issues with this employee.  They knew that I had reported the travel issue as I spoke with them both, a travel issue that would become part of MY termination (see what they did there?!?).  Funny when you consider I reported the travel issue to not get caught up in them violating our travel policies on a trip I approved but hadn't been informed of the whole story. Then in January there were two ANONYMOUS complaints put into the complaint box and not one person in management stopped and thought, “Hmm, this individual has worked here almost 11 years and never had an issue and now there are anonymous complaints against them?  We know there is an employee that he is having issues with, he shared all of that information with us and even reported what he thought might be a travel policy violation. Is the employee retaliating against him? Maybe we should investigate that?!?” 

Allegedly, AARP has ZERO tolerance for retaliation, except they totally allow it to happen, well if you are gay.  Straight people, meh, we will find you guilty of horrible things, document it, and allow you to keep your job. We'll even promote you! But you homosexuals, you are bad and you need to be fired!  It didn’t take Sherlock Holmes to see I was being targeted, but ECO, HR, my management, and the CEO didn’t care.  Hey, he’s just another gay guy we can get rid of.  Look, that makes two, yay us! Gotta fire 'em all!

Remember, a jury found that I was discriminatorily fired and AARP settled with the other gay man - like Mitt Romney said when asked about the Hush Money Payment - "You don't pay someone $130K to NOT have sex with you." Facts are facts.

Hope this post adds some context to what I experienced. Make sure to subscribe.