Speaker 1: Jonathan Pollard, Florida employment lawyer. Folks are always asking me what is the single best piece of advice I can give to employees who are experiencing discrimination at work. And so that's exactly what I'm going to tell you right here in this video. If you are an employee and you are being discriminated against, you are being sexually harassed, you are a woman who's not being paid equally to your male counterparts, you go to HR, you raise these concerns, okay? From this point forward, you have to understand that you are a target, okay? HR is not your friend. HR, human resources, is essentially an extension of the legal department. They just don't call it legal, okay? Because they want to trick folks into thinking that HR is on the side of people, on the side of humanity, on the side of doing the right thing, but HR is not, okay? There'll probably be a lot of folks out there in the peanut gallery who get all pissy over this. And the stone cold reality is, HR is on corporate payroll, HR exists to represent the company and mitigate risk, HR exists to protect the company, HR is not your friend, okay? Are there some good folks out there who work in HR? Absolutely. Are there people with good intentions who work in HR and good hearts? Absolutely. But by and large, there are a whole lot more folks who are basically just covert operatives for the company, okay? They're going to smile to your face and then behind your back, they're going to stick a knife in you, all right? So if you are experiencing workplace discrimination, if you're experiencing harassment or violence or assault or any of this sort of nefarious conduct, and you speak up about it, you are going to immediately be a target, all right? No matter what the situation is, no matter what the circumstances are, the numbers, the statistics, the metrics make it clear, you complain, you raise these sorts of concerns, you are on the chopping block. And the company is going to start looking for any possible reason they can find to push you out the door. I've done this for years, people, okay? How many cases have I seen where somebody raised a concern about racism or unequal pay or discrimination or sexual harassment, and the company said, you know what? You got us, okay? We messed up, we're going to do the right thing, we're going to fix it, okay? How many times have I seen that happen out of hundreds of situations, hundreds of disputes? I can remember two times when that's happened. Every single other time, right? Every single other situation and instance, the employee who raises this sort of concern is put on the chopping block, set up for termination, railroaded out the door, okay? That is the typical fact pattern. So when you start down this road, okay, when you raise concerns or complaints about discrimination, you have to start documenting. And documenting does not just mean you send an email or you send a letter to HR. It goes so much further than that. You have to think about it like this, right? You have to think strategically about if you get terminated, you're no longer part of the company, you no longer have access to the internal directory or database or your corporate email account, et cetera. You have to think several steps ahead and you have to start gaming out how you are going to maintain copies of relevant documentation going forward so that you could use these in the course of litigation or arbitration. What is the smartest thing you can do? Well, here you go. Step one, if you're going to raise concerns about racism or about discrimination or about sexual harassment, do it in writing, okay? None of this, we're going to have a conversation, let's just talk casually, let's have a meeting, we can speak about it verbally, okay? Companies want you to do that. Companies want to just talk about it verbally in a conversation. They don't want it committed to paper. They don't want it in writing, okay? Because if it's in writing, then it exists and there's a chance that try as they might to destroy all of the evidence, you may be able to maintain a copy of that documentation going forward. Companies will always try and force you down the path of having a verbal conversation about whatever the issue is. Let's have a conversation. Let's talk about it. Why do they do that? Companies want to avoid the hard physical documentation and evidence. I know that a lot of people, they think to themselves, well, I just want to keep it casual, right? I don't want to ruffle any feathers. I don't want to step on toes. I don't want to make this too serious or get on somebody's bad side, so I'll just casually raise these concerns, okay? That's nonsense. If you're being discriminated against, okay, and I'm not talking about your feelings, folks, so many people, and I'm just going to be blunt with you. So many people think that their feelings are the same thing as your rights, okay? I don't care about your feelings. I'm sorry to be the bad guy. I am that guy, right? In this context, in this space, employment law, when you deal with thousands, if not tens of thousands of inquiries and calls and emails and complaints and grievances, I'm over it, okay? Your feelings are not your rights. Just because somebody's a jerk, there's not a law against being a jerk, right? Talk to me about something else. Talk to me about your rights, okay? If your rights were violated, okay, then I'm concerned, all right? And that's what we're talking about here. So if your rights have been violated, if you're being illegally discriminated against or sexually harassed, document it. Send an email to HR. Copy the powers that be. Why? Because then the company cannot deny that it had knowledge of whatever the accusations or allegations were. They cannot deny that they had knowledge of the supposed misconduct. Send it to HR, copy multiple people, document it, and BCC your personal email account. Send a copy to your Gmail. Why? Because at some point, when the company terminates you, they're going to immediately cut off access to all of your email accounts and all of your other documents, and you need to make sure that you have copies of those documents that reside somewhere else, in an email account, a server, a Dropbox, et cetera, that you will still have access to after you leave the company. If there are other key documents or critical documents that exist, either in your corporate email account, on a corporate Dropbox, on a corporate server, et cetera, the company is going to try and scare you into not emailing these documents to yourself, not distributing these things to yourself, not letting these things leak outside of the four walls of the corporation. They're going to make all sorts of threats and allegations about, oh, that's our confidential and proprietary information. We'll sue you for misappropriation of trade secrets. I have seen that sort of threat. I have seen companies threaten employees with lawsuits for confidentiality or trade secrets over the employee simply attempting to maintain copies of internal documentation regarding their complaints to HR. What can you do? How can you get around this? Take your phone, okay? Take your phone and take a screenshot of whatever the relevant documents are, okay? If you're going to complain to HR, do it and BCC your personal email account, and then with respect to documents, if you're not comfortable emailing yourself a copy of those documents because you're worried about any sort of allegations of breach of confidentiality, et cetera, take a picture of it with your screenshot. We're not talking about formulas, methods, processes, trade secrets, financial data. We're talking about documents and evidence pertaining to your, i.e., complaint about racism, discrimination, sexual harassment, et cetera. We're talking about their response, right? You either hit forward and you forward a copy of that to your Gmail, and if you don't feel comfortable with that, you take a picture with your phone. You take a screenshot, okay? If you have any phone calls or Zoom meetings with these folks, right, because a lot of times what goes down is somebody from the site, right, a manager, and then somebody from corporate, from HR, okay? They're going to get on a Zoom meeting or a call with you, okay, and they're basically going to try and grill you. It's part of their investigative process. I've listened in on some of these, and it's absurd. It reminds me of a bad second grade teacher yelling at a student. It's preposterous. It's asinine, okay? You have to know what state you're in and what the state recording laws are, okay? Because depending on where you're at, you may or may not be able to record that call and have it be legal. Don't just go recording those calls without getting legal advice from a lawyer, and do not call me to ask me about whether or not you can record calls in this context, okay? That's not what I'm here for. You can find somebody else to advise you on the propriety of recording these calls, but that's something you might want to look into because you generally have, in terms of the legal landscape, you have some states that are one-party consent and some states that are two-party consent. One-party consent state means, guess what? If one person on the call wants to record it, then it can be recorded by law. Two-party consent states mean that both parties have to turn their key and say the call can be recorded, okay? So it gets a bit squirrely, and it's something you want to find some legal advice on or read up on or hire a lawyer to advise you on that, but you figure it out, and so you're going to have this call. Maybe it's a one-party consent state. Maybe you can record it, or maybe you can take notes on it contemporaneously, right? Whenever you have a conversation, a meeting, et cetera, the bottom line is you have to, in some way, document or memorialize what transpired on that call, okay? As soon as you get off of a call like that, as soon as you get off of a meeting like that, a Zoom like that, especially if there have been fireworks, false allegations, et cetera, they're twisting your story up, you sit down and you spend half an hour or an hour sending, writing an email, right, draft up an email that basically explains, right? There was a meeting held today, so-and-so and so-and-so attended. The topic of the meeting was discussing whatever investigation. Here's what you said. Here's what I said. Here's what she said. Here's what I said. Here are the false statements that were made. Here's where the facts got twisted, et cetera, et cetera. Document, okay? Document it and send it, and again, copy your personal email account. It's a contemporaneous record of what transpired in that meeting or that call, okay? Some people, again, they think, well, I shouldn't do this because I'm gonna ruffle feathers. Son, you already done ruffled the feathers, okay? You think that you're somehow saving yourself or you're flying under the radar at this point in the process? No, you are being set up to be pushed out the door, okay? So there ain't nothing you can do in terms of, oh, you copied somebody on an email, you emailed your concerns, you memorialized something, ain't nothing you can do that's gonna make the outcome any worse than it already is gonna be. They're gonna terminate you, okay? It's just a question of once they terminate you, what's the strength of your legal position? All the things we're talking about now are basically recognizing the inevitable that they will terminate you and strengthening your legal position. Again, I hate to be that guy, but when you get thousands upon thousands of calls and emails and inquiries, once again, do not call my office and say you want my help memorializing your recap of whatever meeting went down, okay? Again, that's not what I'm here for. Just don't get in your emotions, right? And have this knee jerk emotional reaction of, oh, JP is such a bald headed, jerk faced minion, he's such a terrible person, and how can he represent employees? Yes, I represent employees. I represent employees every day in egregious cases involving racism, discrimination, unequal pay, sexual harassment, sexual assault, retaliation, and the list goes on. And I have recovered millions of dollars for these folks, and I fight tooth and nail, and I do great work in this space, all right? But I am not here to play nursemaid to the entire world on every single situation and issue. Just think about it logically. Put your logic brain on, right? If 7,000 people all of a sudden start calling me because they want to know about the one party, two party phone recording laws in their states, and they want my help drafting this memorialization memo, no, that's going to prevent me from helping people who are already at a point in the process where they've been terminated, and they're under statutes of limitations and deadlines, and they have rights that need to urgently be pursued, okay? You're going to have to do a little something for yourself here, all right? Which is, back to the point we were just on, document, memorialize the meeting, right? Send that email. Send that email to HR, to management, et cetera. Let them know, hey, you were on the call, I was on the call, here's what was said, here's the things that were wrong, here's the things that were incorrect, want to make sure I have everything straight, right? Send it. Many of these lower level corporate bureaucrats, HR, et cetera, management, whatnot, many of the people who are tasked with addressing these sorts of issues, they're really cowards. When they get that memorialization documentation, one, they're going to be angry, and two, they're going to be terrified, all right? Keep doing it, right? Do more of it. Document the entire process. Document literally on your way out the door. When the company terminates you, in many instances, the company won't even give you something in writing saying, this is why we have decided to terminate you. Why do companies avoid giving you something in writing? Because if it's in writing, they can't change their story. People don't understand how nefarious the game is. People don't understand how nefarious the system is. It's not just this. It's on so many levels of society, and the legal system, and courts, and everything else. There's so much dysfunction and corruption out there. If you really were able to look behind the curtain and see what's going on, like I've done the last 10, 15 years of my career, it would blow your mind, okay? But it's real, folks. It's real. Companies will not give you any written documentation. Not always, but in many instances, they won't give you anything in writing stating why you were terminated because then that locks them down on the story, right? Maybe at that point in time, they're not quite comfortable with the story. They're not quite comfortable with whatever the reason is for your termination. They're not taking the situation super seriously yet. Somebody relatively low level has probably formulated, come up with the supposed stated reason for your termination. They don't want to be locked in on that, okay? Because say you leave the company, shit hits the fan, they're about to get a lawsuit, now all of a sudden, they can change their story, right? They fired you for complaining about racism, right? It was retaliation, and apparently, you accused somebody else of being a racist, and then that person cross-complained at you, and you were fired literally for calling the person a racist. I've seen this case. Right? And that's their stated reason to you. Well, you called Joe a racist, and he didn't like that, and so he complained, and that's misconduct, and so you're out the door. Never mind Joe was dropping the N-bomb every day and saying all kinds of absurdly racist shit, and the list goes on and on, but you called Joe a racist, and so that's the reason why you're being terminated for calling Joe a racist. That's their stated reason to you. That's misconduct. It violates our policy. How the hell does calling somebody a racist violate a company's policy? Blows my mind, but that's a real case again, okay? But on the back end, what are they going to say? Oh, well, no, no, no. You were terminated because you were chronically late. Yep. You were terminated because you didn't properly clock in. You didn't follow clock in and clock out procedures on 17 different occasions, and that's why you were terminated. You see? You see how that works? They don't want to actually document that so that they can change their mind, and shit, they could even change their mind in the middle of litigation, right? They give you one reason when you leave. They give you another reason at the beginning of the case, and then six months into the litigation, oh, they come up with another reason, right? This is actually the real ... Your Honor, it's the real, real reason why this person was terminated. The bottom line there is that you have to document, okay? Stop dancing around it. Stop walking on eggshells. Stop trying not to make waves or ruffle feathers, okay? You're either in or you're out. If you're going to raise concerns about discrimination, racism, sexual harassment, retaliation, et cetera, if you're going to raise these sorts of concerns, you either do it and do it correctly, which means you do it formally, you do it seriously, you do it in writing to the powers that be, or you don't do it at all. Because raising it in a conversation verbally one time, oh, I told the sort of mid-level person, whatever, whatever, no, that's not going to cut it, all right? You have to expect that corporate America, they are who we thought they were. They are who we thought they were, and we let them off the hook. They are who we thought they were, okay? They are exactly ... When somebody shows you who they are, believe them the first time, right? Believe them the first time. So if you're going to raise these sort of concerns or complaints, do it formally, do it in writing, document. And you document from there the entire duration of the process until you're ultimately out the door. And that includes making sure ... Documentation is not just about sending the email, it's also about making sure you have copies of the relevant documents and evidence. And you either get those copies by forwarding them to your personal email, to your Gmail account, or if you're not comfortable with that, you take a screenshot on your cell phone. You preserve these things, you always ensure that you have copies of it. I'll tell you another step further in there, right? Sorry to make this longer, but when you take a screenshot, you can actually take a screenshot and then the same day, send those screenshots in an email from your Gmail to your Gmail. So it's date and time stamped and have a note there on terms of what it is. Again, it's not a smoking gun, but it's contemporaneous documentation with a date and time stamp and what's called metadata, right? Forensic metadata on the actual email you're sending to document what the email was and sort of when it was sent, who it was sent by, et cetera. It's contemporaneous, all right? You document, you make sure you retain copies of the relevant documents, you document this thing the whole way out the door, you memorialize any phone calls, meetings, et cetera. Make sure it's always in writing, make sure you always have copies. Jonathan Powerd, Florida employment lawyer. Hope this was helpful. Have a nice day.