One of the hardest things about standing up against discrimination in the workplace has to do with the size of the company. If a company is very well known and is large, an employee may feel powerless to speak out about any type of discrimination that is going on. Nonetheless, there are those brave individuals who do so with the hope that the company will change its ways as a whole.
This is currently the case with J. Walter Thompson, an advertising agency that is facing a lawsuit that has to do with discrimination. The company’s chief communications officer filed a lawsuit against the company and against the company’s chief executive, who recently resigned, claiming that he made racist and sexist remarks in the workplace. The woman also said there was touching that was unwanted as well as other unlawful conduct.
These are very big accusations for a company as large as J. Walter Thompson, but it appears that the company is listening. They initially took the former chief executive’s side in the matter, saying they found nothing to substantiate the charges, but now they are bringing in an outside law firm to investigate the accusations.
Recently, the chief executive resigned and has been replaced by the company’s chief client team officer. These types of accusations are not easy to level against a big agency, but in many cases it can be very well worth it. If one individual at the company is dealing with discrimination, it is possible that others at the company are dealing with it as well.