In my defense
| • Inappropriate comments: It had come to my attention in the first 6 weeks there were inappropriate comments being made to the female employees. I discussed this with you January 13 and said this was inappropriate behavior and must stop. This has continued throughout the past months and has been reported to me. |
During the first six weeks I assumed that the comments were more about casual language and my patented "jerkoff" gesture. And naturally I had to guess, because she would not tell me precisely what I did wrong, just as now. I suppose I guessed wrong. Here is an excerpt of the email I composed:
| Subject: Salient points of our meeting Importance: High Thank you for bringing these things to my attention. Thank you for removing the point about my conduct towards clients. I will try my best to improve on these points you made. We discussed what I plan to do in the case of inappropriate comments to female employees. I would like to add a few comments on that. I fully understand that it is not my intent, but the other party's perception that determines what actually is appropriate and what is not. However, I feel that I am unduly targeted for this type of warning. I cannot provide any proof of this any more than you can provide proof of my wrongdoing*; it is a feeling. Further, I do believe that whomever made these comments neglected to mention the work-related positive comments I have also made. This is why I have made the decision to only communicate the most professional and neutral thoughts to them, and even to minimize eye contact lest it be perceived in a way that I did not intend. I also have a problem with the fact that not one of these people has ever come to me to discuss how they feel, but rather they went directly to you so that I now have a black mark on my record. Perhaps it is because I am intimidating to them. It is unfortunate that it has to be this way. |