Posted on 03/07/2007 2:34:46 PM PST by qam1
What happens when a twenty-something manager tells an older worker to turn up her hearing aid or take an herbal memory medicine? In this Oregon case, it got the employer in trouble with the feds.
Scott and Patty Corp., formerly Woodburn Fertilizer, Inc., agreed recently to pay Carolyn Arzino, a former longtime 55-year-old accounting secretary, $85,000 to settle age discrimination claims brought by the U.S. Equal Employment Opportunity Commission.
The case arose, agency trial attorney Teri Healy told The Oregonian, from the actions of a female manager in her 20s, who criticized Arzino's work, telling her, among other things, that she should take ginkgo biloba, an herbal memory tonic, and turn up the volume on her Miracle Ear.
The manager gave Arzino a poor performance evaluation, withheld her raise and placed her on a 30-day probation before firing her on July 20, 2004, according to the EEOC's complaint. But EEOCs investigation revealed that Arzinos coworkers said she was an exceptional performer.
Scott and Patty Corp. denied liability.
This case, noted EEOC district director Joan Ehrlich, illustrates a phenomenon of today's workplace: It spans four generations -- Millennials, Gen Xers, Baby Boomers and the last of the Silent Generation born before the end of World War II -- and their members don't always speak the same language or work quite the same way. Employers need to be aware and sensitive to those dynamics.
"Now I'm old enough to know I didn't know squat back then! Live and learn. "
Mark Twain (I think it was Twain) said,
"I'm not young enough to know everything."
;-)
Gender quotas. Only a person who did not earn their position could treat their employees with such utter disdain.
Please remember that your behavior reflects on the Army and the Armed Forces. Frankly, you are shaming all of us.
I really like you two!! You remind me of myself......when I was young and stupid.
;^)
Nam Vet
I'm shaming the entire US Army and Vets 'cuz I don't like old hippies?
I'll give you my commander's number, maybe you can get me an Article 15 for Gratuitous Dislike of Old Hippie Baby-boomers....
Then you saw the light, grew up and decided to like old hippies?
Youth and enthusiasm doesn't have a chance against old age and treachery ;^)
Ah, I think you have me mixed up with someone else. What comment of mine are you responding to?
They were moved up and have all done well. I knew two of them to be total morons as managers, but they had "the connections."
Your alligator mouth and your hummingbird butt are at it again. Yeah, Freepmail me your CO's address and I will be happy to tell him or her what a pathetic child he/she is babysitting.
Just don't forget to mention the part that you're angry at me 'cuz I don't like hippies.
I waiting for the Freepmail with your CO's address.
You really think I'm going to have some crackpot call up my CO and rave at him!? I don't think he would appreciate that at all.... You're a kook!
I hope you, your alligator mouth and your hummingbird butt will act more responsibly on this forum in the future.
Please.... There is nothing I said on this thread that brings any discredit on myself or my branch of service. Get a grip.
It's a mere difference of opinion:
I think the weird old Baby-Boomers were handed the finest country in the world and they are leaving it worse than when they got it; and they won't leave soon enough!
And you, in turn, are sticking up for the wierd old hippies out of some misplaced generational loyalty. Hardly an earthshaking issue....
I am not representing the US Army here, and neither are you, so your 'rank pulling' just makes you look like a crackpot.
Nobody on the internet knows who you are: You have no reason to believe I'm in the Army, other than my statements and I have no reason to believe you are either. You live or die here by your ideas and your writing style.
For all I know, you're one of the guys who show up at the Vietnam Vet memorials wearing parts of a uniform, a ponytail and indian beads and feathers and crap!
Now that doesn't reflect well on the Army, Vietnam Vets or Baby-boomers in general....
I hope you, your alligator mouth and your hummingbird butt
You really need a new catch phrase there....
will act more responsibly on this forum in the future.
Or else what? I'd use your catch phrase here, but really, it's played out....
>>Yup. And, we aren't going to leave you anything in our will.
I wish that were true, instead, I expect a bill.
I tangled with a “Female” manager once. She wasn’t directly over me, but I had to interface with her. She claimed to have been a DBA yet wanted to do things that just aren’t possible (a relational database without unique keys…) I called her on it in a meeting, and she threw markers and an eraser at me and ran out of the room crying (I am NOT making this up)
She came to my cubicle later that day (I had been “At Work for over 36 hours) and wanted to “Talk to me” privately. I guess I was just too tired or too fed up, when she asked me why no one seemed to like her, I told her she used gender to her advantage and no one is going to respect her for it. We discussed her behavior in the meeting. I told her no male could get away with what she did. She wound up charging me with sexual harassment, she thought she had won and I would be cowed.
I was called to HR, listened to what they had to say, and said, OK, so now I never have to meet with her alone; I no longer have to talk to her directly if I can avoid it; I will never be on one of her projects; how do I lose? They did not appreciate my attitude. (Grin) so I asked them, how many people in the company has she accused of this (to which they looked surprised, but it was obvious I was not the first.) I then told them they should find out if she had charged others at the companies she had worked at before ours, because that would prove a pattern, to which they looked thoughtful. And then I said “I will not Back Down if sued this will go to court, and her past will be examined for this pattern with the power of discovery that I will then have, you can tell her that for me.” The HR director told me I was not to discuss this with anyone, especially her.
When I left HR, she was waiting in the hall; she held out her hand and said, “No hard feelings, OK?” I responded “about what?” She tried to get me to talk about it, I feigned Ignorance to the point of obnoxiousness. She kept trying to get me alone for meetings. (I assume so she could say I had harassed her) I kept bringing her VP.
She kept coming over and talking to me about it, in vague terms, I gave her “legally correct” answers yet was purposefully obtuse so she was saying way more than she intended to. After two days a bunch of the “guys” came over and stated that they thought she must have reported me to HR for harassment. I responded that I could neither confirm, nor deny their assertion. When she heard (through the grape vine), she blew her top and was came over to my cube, screaming at me in front of everyone telling me how she was going to take me and the company apart in court. HR came and took her away. They called me in later and the “Mood” was way more comfortable. They told me that her lawyer had come in and told her “Now they can get away with anything” and “you blew it” he told her my answer was acceptable before any court, and blowing her top and letting everyone in on the “Secret” was just dumb. She quit two months later.
Women can be great in the work place as long as they play fair, and Men need to play fair too. The problem is with the 1% who don’t play fair.
Now go peddle your childishness elsewhere. This is an adult forum.
And I don't pull rank. I never did and I never will. I think you had better quit while you are only this much behind, because each time you post, you lose more ground and more credibility.
AR
There are a lot more of us around here than you, little fella. Better watch yourself.
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