Promotion and possible discrimination

[Nebeka]

What is the name of your state (only U.S. law)? Wisconsin

First Part:

Here's the scoop, I work for a government agency. Recently, one of my supervisors entered my office while I was out. He sat down at my desk where my cell phone (not password protected) was sitting. I received a text message on that phone. This supervisor, picked up my cell phone, looked at the notification screen, and then opened my messages. He continued to browse through about 3 weeks of messages that had taken place between myself and my immediate supervisor. He became angry because some of the messages were about him and his bad breath. He called me into his office, naturally I became very angry telling him he never had permission to do this and what gives him the right. He assured me he had every right citing our technology use policy and our cell phone use policy. One problem, these policies only cover department issued and owned technology. The only reference about personal cell phones is to govern how they are to be used while conducting official business. That is to say, how long calls should be and limited text messaging etc etc. There is absolutely no mention in either policy warning employees that personal cell phones are subject to inspection with or without permission. When I told the supervisor this, he told me "Your 4th amendment rights don't apply here". After discussing the matter, he assurred me he was not going to hold this against me.

My question is: Absent any language contained in a policy warning employees personal cell phones are subject to inspection at any time, Can a supervisor (without permission) search through a personal cell phone?

Second part:

About a month after the incident explained above, I was up for a promotion. I was competing against another employee of the same managerial level. We had just gotten our performance reviews and I was rated far superior than this individual in every evaluated category. My immediate supervisor even recommended me for the promotion. One problem, the person deciding who got the promotion was the same supervisor who searched through my phone. Needless to say, I did not get the promotion and believe it was a direct result of the text messages he read. I asked him for written justification explaining his decision and he told me "its not public record". I also requested a written development plan outlining areas I needed to improve. He refused.

My question is: What are my options? Can I force him to justify the promotion? What can I do If I feel I was discriminated against?

Sincerely,

Frustrated

 

[cbg]

Absent any language contained in a policy warning employees personal cell phones are subject to inspection at any time, Can a supervisor (without permission) search through a personal cell phone?

Probably not. But at this point I think you might be better served by putting a password on your phone and letting it go, than pursuing it further.

What are my options? You don't have any. If you feel you must do something, you can complain to HR, but you won't be doing yourself any favors by doing so.

Can I force him to justify the promotion? Not only no, but hell no.

What can I do If I feel I was discriminated against? Unless you have left out a WHOLE lot of information, you were not illegally discriminated against, so your best option is to move on with your life.

 

[eerelations]

Discrimination is only illegal if it's based directly on specific characteristics like your race, gender, disability, religion or age (if you're over 40). If you have evidence that the reason you weren't promoted is based on one or more of these characteristics, then you may file a claim with the EEOC. If you don't have any evidence of this, then the reason you weren't promoted is probably a legal reason and therefore not actionable.

Employers are not legally required to provide employees with justifications (written or otherwise) for not promoting said employees, nor are they legally required to provide their employees with development plans (written or otherwise).

 

[commentator]

If, as I assume this is state government that you work for, they will have an EEOC officer, and your state will have a "big personnel" or overall state department of human resources which will have someone you can ask these specific questions to. And I strongly suspect, this being state government that these questions have come up before and that they have been definitively answered and dealt with.

My take on the cell phone issue, after many years as a state employee/supervisor/policy maker is this. Picking up your non password protected (that was a mistake, huh?) private cell phone from your desk and scrolling through it wasn't nice of him, I would probably have not done that to one of my workers unless there was some justification aside from my being a nosy boss. We were, in my last venue, filmed a lot, and most of our behavior was caught on tape.

My question is how did the person know this was not a state issued cell phone? Next why did you leave it on your desk while you were out if you expected privacy? and Were you somewhere you shouldn't have been, (like on an unscheduled break) or say perhaps coming back late from lunch so that he could say he was checking on you and that was the reason he felt led to check your messages?

It sounds like the round you had with this person regarding the cell phone did leave a nasty taste in everyone's mouth. He may have discussed it with others. That was his right. And you may have picked up a slight gossipy reputation as a troublemaker, a snippy comments maker and a rights demander, which don't serve you well on a personal level in state government. Managers talk among themselves, and the last thing a state government manager wants to do is put a raging rights-demanding forthright pushy individual who makes disparaging remarks about co workers into their work group if they can avoid it.

In most civil service hiring arrangements, to be promoted from within, you are on a promotional register, and when they provide the person doing the hiring with a certain group of candidates to interview, say three or two or five, who are qualified for the position, they are allowed to pick anyone from that group. You do not have to pick, say, the veteran, or the minority candidate or the person with the highest performance reviews. The state system has told you that any of these so many will be qualified, and from these you may chose whom you please. And no, they are not required to tell you WHY you were not the picked candidate.

 

[Nebeka]

Thanks for the advice everyone! It was a mistake to leave my phone unprotected on my desk. It certainly has one now! I'll let everything go and just continue doing my job.