Are we being too PC these days?

18 comments Social Media/Technology, Uncategorized

Jul 15

As you might already know, my partner works in the media industry and I like to hear about what he does when he comes home just as he listens to me and my HR adventures for that particular day. He’s accompanied me to HR events and I like to go along to some of his events. I like to do this because I am interested in social media (not that that is all he does by the way!) and also because it reminds me to step out of that HR mindset at work i.e. I remember not everyone thinks like us.

Yesterday on Mumbrella, there was an article posted on Crust, (Gourmet Pizza Bar) because they tweeted this comment “Need a laugh? Hilarious compilation of female driver madness” and provided this link to a video showing bad female drivers.

There was a bit of a reaction on twitter about it being offensive and a few hours later they tweeted “Sorry guys, we apologise for the video and meant no offense to drivers, female or otherwise. Lesson learned and thanks for the feedback.”

People then started commenting on Mumbrella with both sides of the argument being represented. I posted the following comment:

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Basically what I was saying is, that even in the workplace there are times when this sort of thing happens and its no scandal or major issue because we are all human and diverse individuals. In a working environment there is bound to be times when someone makes a comment like this which in hindsight they might later regret. My point though was that this was clearly a one-off that they have already apologised for and not something that needs to be made into a huge deal. It was a “silly” comment, and even when bullying and harassment complaints are considered in the courts, they take into account how affected the individual was, what a reasonable person would consider to be offensive etc. I just thought people should lighten up a bit, as there are many more serious incidents which need to be represented.

Someone anonymously replied to my comment with this:

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While I find this person’s language towards me offensive (lol), I would like to reply and invite your comments as well- as the Sydney Human Resources Community.

Let’s treat this as a real workplace scenario. Someone in the workplace makes a comment about females being bad drivers in a clear attempt to be humorous and make others laugh.

Workplace bullying or harassment involves the persistent ill treatment of a person (get NSW info here). In other words:

It is repeated or persistent over a period of time
It is offensive, intimidating, humiliating, or degrading and ridicules or insults the person at work.

The tweet concerned was not repeated or a persistent message over a period of time so you would be hard pressed getting this one across the line as bullying and harassment. Not to say it should be ignored, it should be addressed if the individual wishes to, but it’s important to note that it isn’t bullying or harassment generally until it is repeated (serious breaches would be handled differently). Now I acknowledge that some may have found it offensive or even degrading towards women- so let’s run with that line i.e. you have someone that comes to you at work saying that they feel that way.

As a HR professional, the steps that I would normally recommend to someone who is being bullying would be listed as following:

Keep detailed records about the incidents- this could be jotting down something in an email or on paper
Talk about it with someone who can provide assistance such as your manager, HR staff or an Equity and Diversity Officer.
If you feel comfortable let the bully know that their behaviour makes you feel uncomfortable
Do not retaliate- and walk away from the situation if it becomes out of control
Seek resolution – informal or formal process

So in the workplace, the person who was offended would have come to me and as per the above, I would recommend that they speak with Crust Pizza and let them know that it makes them uncomfortable (which the twitter community did). What was the outcome?

Crust Pizza apologised and reiterated that it “meant no offense to drivers, female or otherwise”. They then articulated that they had learned their lesson and then thanked the community for the feedback.

You couldn’t ask for this to have gone any better in the workplace.

My personal opinion was that it wasn’t a big deal and I personally wasn’t offended by it. I am able to have a laugh at myself and acknowledge that I will make mistakes. Coming from a sport background it’s important to remember that Babe Ruth is remembered as the home run king even though he still holds the record for the greatest number of strikeouts!

So keen to hear your thoughts. Did I deserve the bashing from @HR Infraction for voicing my personal opinion?

  • David Fox

    Geesh Jess – I would seriously not be concerned about some person's misinformed rant at you. She obviously has no sense of humour and is probably a major contributor to workplace bullying in her own company with language like that to a complete stranger. What a ridiculous attack on your character and professional standing in the HR community. I would respond to her but not in any major way because that looks like you are defending yourself and you dont need to.

    And by the way I would love to have drinks with you so we can laugh at all the stupid things both males and females do in the workplace on a regular basis!

  • http://www.recruitercritic.com John Millican

    Totally agree with your position Jess.

    Crust's approach was a fairly benign and reasonably harmless. Perhaps inappropriate – but ultimately not that serious. They did apologise to anyone who found it offensive and frankly in my experience there is often someone who finds most things offensive.

    As for HR Infraction not wanting you as their HR practitioner, I think that would be a blessing. Who wants to be that HR person who feels it necessary to police company wide humor for any signs of anything inappropriate.

    Sometimes its necessary to come down hard on someone for such behavior. But if HR infraction expects the HR community to operate with a militant no tolerance approach, instead of representing a more reasonable morale view, then that reinforces the notion of HR as being “the fun police” and that's a stereotype I find offensive.

  • Jared

    I find it pretty amusing that someone who thinks it's against the rules to generalise on the basis of gender has no problem using your age as a measuring stick of your capability.

    The willingness to admit a mistake and thank people for their feedback was pretty mature. We've seen how poorly companies can handle social media feedback (Nestle and BP, for example) so that's a good outcome for them. There will always be people who are more upset by humour that's based on stereotypes, and they now have the opportunity to voice their opinions, just like everyone else does. That's their choice, just as it's yours to decide whether they have a point in there, or whether their argument can be dismissed without consideration.

    Personally, I'd have expected that someone arguing against discriminatory stereotypes wouldn't use one against you, or adopt such a patronising tone. But that's just my opinion :)

  • http://twitter.com/koshaughnessy Kelly O'Shaughnessy

    Hi Jess

    I think there are two issues here… one is the individual and one is the brand.

    If we're treating this (as you say above) like a workplace incident, then you could say that the individual involved made an error of judgement, received feedback and apologised. Definitely an incident, definitely inappropriate (regardless of anyone's personal views on 'how inappropriate'), and definitely resolvable.

    However, I don’t think in this case it’s as simple as “Hey buddy, you messed up, we still love you”. Because the second part here is the brand side. When someone is representing a brand in the public arena they should be aware of the impact their behaviours will have… and tweeting for a brand should have the same level of consideration as writing copy for a billboard advertisement. That’s what I think the uproar is about… using this medium for brand activity is so quick and simple and (as we say a lot) anyone can set up an account and get started. Too easy! For me that’s the hard part… you have people holding an organisation’s brand in their hands and not fully considering how important that is. And I don’t think saying that takes away from the ‘human side’ of an organisation being represented through their brand activity… actually, I think it’s as simple as think before you tweet.

    I guess what I’m saying is that if this was someone’s personal account, we probably wouldn’t be having the conversation. And unfortunately, Crust’s tweeter has impacted their consumer brand. Sure, that individual has done what they can to rectify the mistake, but it’s a good example of not considering the importance of embodying an organisation’s reputation. And that’s probably a good point here: it’s a good example of a mistake, not a full-blown scandal.

    Oh, and (actually answering your question) no, you didn’t deserve a bashing on Mumbrella for speaking your opinion. Fingers crossed I don’t get a bashing here either for mine ;)

  • http://www.teknetia.com/ Chris Watt

    I think this is a case of the Internet blowing a situation well out of proportion as it is so capable of doing, especially with the real time nature of things like Twitter. Add to that the willingness for people to express their outrage more than their happiness and you get these kinds of stories.

    Crust absolutely made poor judgement in posting the video at all, however they have owned that and apologised to the community following the upset replies they received, rather than delete the tweet and pretend it never happened. I think this is an amicable outcome and similar to what would be expected inside a company should a similar event occur (i.e. one off poor judgement).

    I think you are spot on with the fact that we are human and will make mistakes, after all to err is human. If we do not learn from our mistakes, how do we more forward at all? We have got to where we are through a process of making and learning from mistakes.

    All of that aside though, the way in which that comment was put forward is absolutely ridiculous. HR Infraction makes themselves look like a child through use of bullying language and using your age as a reason as to why your opinion on something is not relevant. I'm sure they will be upset if their age, sex, qualifications, etc. where used against them in a similar case.

  • http://twitter.com/JessicaBooth Jessica Booth

    Thanks Kelly- can always count on you for a level headed response giving a different perspective :)

  • Peter Robinson

    On the issue of ‘PC’ I absolutely agree that we can take this to unnecessary heights.

    A heightened awareness of the offence we can cause and an ability to adapt are communication to prevent offence is sufficient.

    The anonymous respondent could learn some lessons from this point.

    Finally feedback should not be taken as judgement – I review feedback (no matter how poorly or inappropriately presented) and make objective choices about how I will or will not respond.

    Your view is valid and genuinely delivered the anonymous respondent does not change my view and is not therefore valid.

    Pete Robinson TLS

  • Olivia

    Congratulations Jess! Now you know you've really made it as an influencial and relevant blogger! You've got a critic! ;-)

    Here's a link to Tim Ferriss' (Author of The 4 Hour Work Week) “7 Great Principles for Dealing with Haters”. ;-)

    My favourite is this, “If you are really effective at what you do, 95% of the things said about you will be negative.” (Scott Boras)

  • Olivia
  • Jane Copeland

    Kelly I totally agree with your comment that when someone is representing a brand in the public arena they should be aware of the impact their behaviours will have. Chris, definitely agree that Crust absolutely made a poor judgment in posting the video.

    In reference to John’s comments that Crust’s approach was fairly benign and reasonably harmless, and Peter’s comment that we can take this to unnecessary heights.. my reply to you is that – words are powerful. Language is powerful. Belittling women and perpetuating a stereotype that makes women appear stupid is not harmless and does have far reaching implications.

    Jess, you will come across the glass ceiling, you will realise that you are paid less for doing the same job in a man in the same position, and you will realise that demeaning casual sexism – works against you and not for you in a trillion ways.

  • http://twitter.com/JessicaBooth Jessica Booth

    Sounds great David and thanks for your comments. I'll have to get my skates on and organise some drinks!

  • http://twitter.com/JessicaBooth Jessica Booth

    Thanks Olivia. I don't really like confrontation so this is a bit out of my comfort zone, and I'm surprised at the personal attack via mumbrella and some of the comments around my age relating to my experience. Interesting discussions though and it's always good to get someone else's point of view :)

  • http://twitter.com/JessicaBooth Jessica Booth

    Thanks Peter- that's a good point.

    There is always room to sift through the feedback and turn it into something you can use for good

  • Julianne

    Seriously, it was a video on a Pizza shop site, where do you expect the benchmark to be – will I cease to buy Pizza from them. Probably not. It's not like they are deforesting the whole of indonesia? If they were not giving jobs / promotions etc to women that would be a problem to really get mad about.

    I reakon Crust will never make this mistake again and that is a really good thing. In the lifecycle of where they are at as a company, its probably a lesson learned at the right time. Sometimes mistakes are the biggest learning curves. What you do after the mistake says something about your character.

    I have spent some time being the 'no fun police' in HR as most people who choose this career have done and its no fun – for anyone. What I learnt from that is – when you beat people over the head with stick, they just stop listening, then you have lost the battle. This issue of discrimination needs a conversation to continue.

    Finally Jess, I hope that you enjoy a career in an equal workplace. I hope that you don't hit a glass cealing. When I think about what you will enjoy throughout your career, the opportunities that will come to you…I hope the fact that you are a woman will NEVER come into the equation. I hope your talent continues to shine and your 'keep it real' approach continues making this a profession we can feel proud to be part of. Not embarrased because we treat people like naughty school children.

  • http://www.myhellisotherpeople.com TheHRD

    Well, well, well…..a sense of humour failure at the mocking of one gender by another….who'd a thought it?

    Being a Brit, I'm not aware of the brand involved and personally it sounds to me like a bit of macho bullshit to post such a video. Girls can drive just as well as boys right?

    However, that said where do you draw the line? There was an advert in the UK (http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=DrnOqwXWJDA) that essentially said that men were crap and incapable and that was cleared by the Advertising Standards Agency who side it was light hearted and not intended to cause offence. A rare moment of intelligence from the powers that be.

    The fact is there is a whole world of difference between being politically correct and being a humourless idiot who spends every waking hour looking to pick up the smallest unintended error from an innocent bystander. I believe women are the equal to men. FACT. But at the same time I am not against a bit of teasing, a bit of banter – as long as the intention is right.

    I work in HR, I spend most of my time with women – the things I hear – the circular emails that I see about men – it is all light hearted and in jest. And as a point of interest, I also think HR people are some of the most pragmatic and down to earth in this area because we hear both the genuine cases of discrimination and harassment AND the casses where people are crying wolf.

    So Jess, I wouldn't spend a further moment thinking or worrying about what this slightly wrong headed, inarticulate, emotional (and probably sex-starved) individual has to say. If we take life too seriously, before we know it, it will have pasesed us by and all we will be left with is a nasty taste of bitter incrimination left in our mouths.

  • Heather

    Think HR folks and other pros need to find balance – there still is a lot of unconscious bias out there that bubbles up at wrong times. The fact that Crust took the feedback seriously and acted on it demonstrates faith and a willingness to learn and from that, change behavior. Kudos to them. The key here is was any protected class harmed – and if so, was the offender told of the offense and given a chance to correct. Crust was told and took action. Done deal. Nuff said. Let's move on.

  • Jason Murray

    Jess, my humble (non HR) opinion is that your feedback was on the money. We cannot take life too seriously or we'll never get out alive!!! If the incident in question was one that was truly damaging then fair enough, the strong retort was justified, however, it was a wisecrack made and then apologised for. I do not know ANYONE who relishes or thrives in a workplace where fun interactions & wisecracks are not appreciated, in fact quite the opposite, it is exactly this kind of lively, energetic banter that keeps us going sometimes in the face of our toughest days. Again, to be 100% clear, if there was any real malice or mean spirit in the comment from Pizza crust, then of course it's not appropriate to back them up, but given all the evidence I think someone was just having a bad day ! ! !

  • Studyingagain

    no way. i can tell you as a victim of bullying that was very mild compared to what i had to put up with and your way to deal with bullying is very correct. @hr infraction is taking it too far.