Subordinate claus
Tribunal finds in favour of employee forced to play Secret SantaA tribunal case between former employee James McClellan and the publishing and news giant Dow Jones has reached a financial settlement after it was found he was constructively and unfairly dismissed. The sticking point? Poor old Father Christmas.
Accountant McClellan, 53 and from Maidstone, took issue with his line manager, Azmina Airi, claiming that she “demanded that I dress up as the Secret Santa” and would not take no for an answer. We can’t blame him for objecting, really: those fake beards can be really scratchy.
He felt he was being typecast as middle-aged and sexist, so he resigned. Although the tribunal disagreed with his claims of age and sex related discrimination, it did find the actions of his line manager to be a “breach of trust” which supported his claims of unfair dismissal.
Interestingly, the judge Tamara Lewis dismissed McClellan’s claim that he had been stereotyped as being rigid and stuck in his ways because he was old. She said being considered stuck in your ways was a stereotype that could also be said of younger people, which significantly undermined his case.
That’s a stereotype we’re all surely familiar with. Damn kids these days and their insistence on face to face communication and traditional values. Why can’t they use text and e-mail like everyone else? Wait a second…
Anyway, while it’s probably not right to force anybody to dress up as something they don’t want to (we’re all back legs of the donkey people here at HRville, and not bitter about it at all), we reckon being asked to dress up as Santa doesn’t rank too highly on the list of objectionable things to do. You haven’t felt shame until you’ve put on a Teletubby costume and been forced to dance for Tubby Toast.
That’s a memory no amount of scotch can heal.
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