The Inexcusable Acts

Once upon a time in a workplace, a high achiever found themselves in a repulsive situation with their manager. It evolved slowly. First thought, well that behavior is odd. Then the mind starts questioning, did that just happen? Did I misinterpret that? It’s not something you typically see in the workplace during meetings.

Decades in the workforce and I have never encountered this. I've had many conversations with other employees and harassers over my career. Many forms of harassment conduct at work, done the detail investigations, and educate on awareness. Any type of harassment is unacceptable.  

In this case, it happened right up to the day of departure. As a professional, you would think that I should be able to address it. I can be direct. I can be blunt. I’m not afraid of conflict. My mind struggled with the comprehension of what my eyes were seeing.

Stuck in a weird cycle of shock, disgust, and numbness. I've never been in that place before, I help others in these situations.

He had no fear or anxiety. It was clear, he was more than comfortable with the action. No concern of the surroundings, behaviors or act itself. Up to this point, many employees had labels, stories, and names about him. None mentioned this.

The vanishment of any respect of him as a human being, family man, father of children, or leader was swift.

As in any normal work environment, personal shares would occur. There were occasional surfacing of snippets of pity stories from childhood, wife in a prominent role, sister, and large extended family issues. Clear sightings as to how multiple professional failures resulted with having no dignity or power. He was a paid employee in a constant battle with the owner his father. That father would consistently and brutally undermined everyone. Emails only were sent out which appeared to be supporting his son, then second emails or call going out to disregard that email and keep him informed. These are excuses.

There is no excuse for inexcusable acts of any kind. As adults we all have the ability to control behaviors and make choices.

As a professional, I can and do power through adversity. Fires need to be put out, projects have deadlines and work must get done. Struggles and justifications came into play; as a way of self-protection and to push what I did have control of - work. So the 1:1 meeting purposely became farther apart. Then the acts would happen with others in the room. Very subtle and when others would head out it, it was a random guess as to what would happen.

Irritability over anger most of the time, but anger would cut through when I needed information related to the business. Important financial or operational signoff to move processes forward. Real work, the one thing I had control of. My already heavy workload, was being harder to manage because of him.

I know, from years of training, that sexual harassment is about control and power. Many believe it is only about attraction, it’s not. Harassers can use sexualized words or behaviors, or just actions. The motive for saying the words or acting the behaviors is intimidation, dominance, and/or control for authority. Individuals lacking in character, confidence, and abilities resort to this. False promises, change the narratives, and shift the topics to attempt control.

I’m a confident, educated, well-versed subject matter expert on many topics and skills. Worked for or with the spectrum of personalities. Know behaviors and how individuals use them. Having a knowledge base didn't help me. This was mortifying on many levels to me. The organization was toxic, which I was trying to fix ironically. This was another level of toxic behavior on top of a toxic culture in a toxic environment. My options were attorney and quit or quit and attorney.

He and his father, the sole owner, were anti-employment laws. Burnout the competent employees and praise the incompetent ones. It was fascinating how they perceived themselves in a light no one else saw or agreed with. Clients to employees would use ignorant, selfish, unethical, deceitful, demoralizing, and manipulative. Many saw through their words, especially in their actions. Even competitors knew the polished image was an illusion. It's what made taking employees and contracts away from them easy.

To be clear, an owner and their business can choose to run it anyway they want. They can be fraudulent, unethical, fabricate compliance reporting to cover up problems that would lose contracts, and other questionable acts. It's their choice. Just like on the flip side, a company can choice to be ethical, transparent, appreciate and support employees and clients.

As a fraudulent faker, he perfected how to regurgitation a few lines from a successful professional. Use latest lingo traveling around social media, like he understood the meaning or context. For perspective, imagine a conversation between two individuals with one being an expert and other not. The faker using words and not their meaning trying to impress the expert. The expert attempts clarification, which fails. The expert leaves that encounter stunned by the ignorance of it all.

When you can't articulate what any of it means, credibility is lost. Taking words or credit that belongs to others does not make someone impressive. With him, there were real moments when others thought he was outright delusional. A primary reason why most did the bare minimum. Most would drop an important task and literally walk away from it. Once the curtain falls, you can't replaced it and unsee.

Embarrassment. Caught in lies. Changed narratives. Went from earnest to angry when confronted. Enjoyed twisting stories to reflect that the blame was on them. Some were outlandish. Others landed wrong and caused more problems. It was never okay to have a straight talk conversation or call him out of his behaviors. He'd preplan conversation that needed to happen, but the other person had no idea what he was talking about. Imagine having a stunted, fragmented conversation like you had to navigate a live explosive field as a manager.

Refused to put things in writing. If it was not in writing, he could argue given his title that his word carried more weight than any other. All the game. Delete or loss documentation, then it must have never existed. Tell a lie so often and it becomes the 'truth'. Absolute pillars of the community and industry. To the smallest group that lived only in their minds. Dare to accuse them of wrongdoing? It's how business is done. Best way to save money to not pay all the hours. How dare a vendor cut them off for non-payment. Facts aren't true. Pictures aren't real. Recording are all fake.

This was the environment. The non-toxic employees needed help. Clients needed help. Those in the community needed help.

When the inexcusable acts occurred, he knew it was being recorded. Purpose of cell phone technique was to prevent inexcusable acts from continuing to occur. At first, I convinced myself that it worked. It didn't. The infrequent in person meetings helped. There was more masturbation and masturbation to completion sessions. It's triggering, this still brings bile up to the back of my throat at the recall. Trying to control a vomiting response. So, the recordings became documentation.

To be clear, a quick adjustment of male genitals is quite different from masturbation. While masturbation is a natural physical and psychological response driven by hormones, brain chemistry, and emotional habits. It should not be anywhere in the workplace. The act was purposely done. Years ago at a sexual harassment training, the speaker made a point, that I struggled with understanding it. Thought was odd. The point was some harassers gravitate to victims they feel comfortable with. A belief that they are safe. That the victim is a safe choice. No one would ever believe them.

Imagine trying to discuss real business issues, project review statuses, or gain answers. You get hand and arm motions, glazed eyes, and audible grunts. Looking at someone, your boss, who is completely lost at what was being discussed. I'm reviewing information on my laptop, giving detailed information and just doing my job. When I started, he insisted that I sit next to him always. A united front. I moved to an nonadjacent seat, once the realization solidified at what was happening. Beyond the masturbation episodes, he would leave the door to the bathroom open. Wide ajar, because my nonadjacent seat was directly in front of the bathroom in the conference room.

Knowing him and the situation, I'd call it a deep emotional inferiority issue. Secure strong men can control themselves. Control their behaviors. They understand emotional intelligence, integrity, respect, manners, and basic decency. All of which he was lacking. Playing a character and paying for a social society membership doesn't cloak who someone really is as a person.

He thought he was sly. At team-building talks, he would make the same statement about how he prefers physical touch. Imagine a room small conference room with about fifteen in it, having lunch. Business information is given, then a 'teambuilding' piece where he starts about himself and physical touch. It was suffocating in the room. Heavy uncomfortable silence. No one moved. Those still eating, stop. No one making eye-contact. It didn’t bother him at all. No one else mattered in the room. He seemed to derive a sense of power from it.

The framework of five love languages by Dr. Gary Chapman. It’s not subject matter appropriate or fully relatable to the workplace. It’s about how people express and receive emotional recognition and affection. As individuals in a relationship feel valued and understood, under these categories: acts of service, gifts, quality time, affirming words, and physical touch. It doesn’t remotely align with any type of relationship in the workplace.

He had interesting beliefs in gender roles, supportive of women in leader roles in private and tears them down in front of others. Like the owner, women never received equal pay. An example: two male managers were paid six figures, it was an undisputed known and documented that neither of them actually worked. Limited to no work completed. Talking on their phones and driving around. He refused to terminate or reduce their salary. Their work was split between two, with one being highest paid female. Their work, along with her normal heavy workload. When she asked for comparable salary, she received a snicker as response. Then an excuse. Then the infamous 'growth path' talk.

Gravitated to females who were on the same or lesser of knowledgebase. Happy to re-hire those that couldn’t do the job or previous terminated from the role. They were easier to blame, control, or abuse. Insecurity requires a higher need for less intelligent subordinates. They would be flattered to return to work for him or the owner. If asked, those employees would gladly do anything asked of them. Legal or illegal request. I would be done without question.

Examples: making color copies of license plates, gluing them to formboard, and placing them on trucks and trailers. Entering fake emails, entering wrong social security numbers, committing wage and hour fraud, their own time card fraud, compliance reporting, and so much more. They would willingly lie if asked. Blame tossing on command for those no longer working at the company. If fined by a federal or state agency, would point the finger on one of them and terminate. Disposable employees.

I'm sure many reading this have strong opinions, from one side of the spectrum to the other. As mortifying as it was to endure, limiting the in person and working from home where under my control. My primary reason for staying, will not make sense to everyone. I am and always will be pro - positive workplaces, supportive work cultures, employees and ethical business practices for the betterment of the company and employees. Payroll wasn't under my umbrella. There was a history of wage and hour fraud.

Through enormous adversity, I had almost completed an foundation and structure with processes at the company. No more paper. Everything automated for tracking, efficacy, and eliminating known payroll problems to the highest degree possible. The critical piece was an automated build with implementation of electronic timesheets for nonexempt employees. Give the history of payroll problems, this was important. I was terminated. Timing suspicious?

The toxic ones held the majority, not the minority. Strong employees will be gone. Clients will leave. Vendors will decline to service them. Fines will be incurred. Bills won't be paid. Downsizing will happen. Property damages will continue. Lawsuits will happen. The toxic ones will deny responsibility, spread false narratives, and all my incredibly hard work will be dismantled.