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Did I discriminate?

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AZ Worker

Junior Member
What is the name of your state?What is the name of your state? Arizona
I was informed today by the president of the company I work for that I am being written up on Monday for age discrimination. I am 42 year old female and she is 22, I trained her at her new position. During a disagreement I commented that she and I were not at the same place in life because I was 42 and she was 22. There was another person (25 year old female) in the conversation as well and they both feel that the comment I made was discrimination. What exactly should I do, I plan to refuse to sign the write up.
My company is worried about her suing them.
Thank you for any advise in advance.
 


BelizeBreeze

Senior Member
AZ Worker said:
What is the name of your state?What is the name of your state? Arizona
I was informed today by the president of the company I work for that I am being written up on Monday for age discrimination. I am 42 year old female and she is 22, I trained her at her new position. During a disagreement I commented that she and I were not at the same place in life because I was 42 and she was 22. There was another person (25 year old female) in the conversation as well and they both feel that the comment I made was discrimination. What exactly should I do, I plan to refuse to sign the write up.
My company is worried about her suing them.
Thank you for any advise in advance.
When you refuse to sign, or even if you do, you can be fired. In fact, you can be fired for just about any reason in an at-will state.

If you feel this strongly about the issue, take the write-up and sit down, put your feelings on the write-up and then sign it.

Although the comments are waaaay short of age discrimination, and although your boss is seriously misinformed, it's his shop and his rules.
 

cbg

I'm a Northern Girl
In my opinion, you did not discriminate, at least not based on the facts in your post. What you said may or may not have been inappropriate depending on the circumstances. You haven't given enough detail to say. Either opinion may change depending on the detail.

Signing the write up does not mean you agree with it. It means you have been informed of the contents.

Refusal to sign the write-up can very well be seen as insubordination and you can be fired for it.

It will NOT be a wrongful termination if you are fired for refusing to sign the write up and you will have no legal recourse.

You may or may not be eligible for unemployment in that case; it will depend on how hard your employer wants to pursue it.
 

AZ Worker

Junior Member
Thank you for your advise.
As for more details; basically this is a personality issue...she started a bad trend of 'parking it' in my office and talk about her personal goings on for up to 2 hours per day. After hinting for a week, I resorted to shoo-ing her out rather abruptly for another week, I do think I handled that wrong and the last time I felt bad, I know I hurt her feelings. So I tried to sit down with her and a co-worker she felt comfortable with to explain where I was comming from, so to soften the blow I started by saying that she was 22 and I was 42 and we were in two different places in life, I was then cut of and told she would not discuss it further until our manager was present. So I respected that and said nothing until he returned form out of town. Upon his return 4/1/05 he informed me of the 'age discrimination' claim/written warning.
She made other claims like I did not train her and I that she did not feel like she could come to me with questions. Those comments were dismissed by him and he said he HAD to address the 'age discrimination' claim because of the legal ramifications. I offered to resign and he said he did not want that.
Thanks again.
PS, With the exception of the long chats, I think and reported to her that she was doing a great job in her position. Until 4/1/05 I did not mention the 'long chats' to my boss.
 
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cbg

I'm a Northern Girl
Okay. In my opinion, you did not discriminate. However, if she complains of discrimination, your employer is required under the law to address the situation. While he doesn't appear to have handled it in the best possible way, he is not acting illegally. Nor is your employer required to come to the same conclusion I did.
 

BelizeBreeze

Senior Member
cbg said:
Okay. In my opinion, you did not discriminate. However, if she complains of discrimination, your employer is required under the law to address the situation. While he doesn't appear to have handled it in the best possible way, he is not acting illegally. Nor is your employer required to come to the same conclusion I did.
is there an echo in here or are you hitting the wine early :D
 

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