The workplace policy of "Don't tell Don't care."

Discussing discrimination at work

In my last year of working as an engineer, I was forced to file a discrimination claim in an attempt to save my job. My manager had made false and damaging accusations about me to upper management. He characterized me as an incompetent, lazy, and difficult employee. I had worked for the company for 9 years before he took the team lead position for the team I worked on.

In those 9 years I was never written up, never had poor performance reviews, and was considered a competent employ. I also received a customer award for customer service, and in many cases had customers ask for me personally as the person to head up their projects. In one of my annual reviews, my previous manager said I was “a delight to work with.” But due to some workplace issues, and my being the most senior person on the team, I immediately was placed on my new managers hit list. He began to single me out and treat me very differently from everyone else on the team. He had made derogatory comments about females in front of me, so I quickly figured out where I stood and that I was now in a discriminatory and toxic work environment.

To make matters worse, HR and upper management believed his version of things and put me on a Performance Improvement Plan (PIP). For those not familiar with a PIP, I will briefly explain. It is when you are written up and given a period of 30, 60, or 90 days to show improvement to your manager’s expectations or you are fired. And indeed, it was his goal to get me fired. As with most people in the US, my job is my main source of income. And since I am a single person, I have no backup for someone else to pay my bills. To say it would’ve been devastating to lose my job would be an understatement.

I filed a claim of discrimination and provided proof to HR about the false accusations against me. I managed to hold on to my job. I decided to speak to some of my coworkers about the situation after I successfully maneuvered and was able to keep my job. All of my coworkers, including my new manager, where white males in the late 20s to early 30s. I was the only person of color and female in the group and was their senior by 20 years.

The first guy I mentioned it to, I actually showed him the PIP. He was someone I trusted and I had a good working relationship with him. He was in disbelief when I told him what happened. He commented how the wording was very vague and how he has seen other people do exactly the things that were being pointed out as poor work performance. And he said he knew for a fact that none of our other coworkers had been written up for the same offenses. He also later mentioned that our manager had come to him a couple of days later and bragged to him about putting me on the PIP.

The second guy was someone who worked in a different group. I was working with him one day, and because I was unsettled by what had happened, mentioned the PIP to him and how I felt I was being discriminated against. In fact, that same day, he had witnessed my manager lecturing me about some work I had done the previous week. My manager knew someone else was present while he racked me over the coals, and instead of taking the discussion to a private area, chose to make a scene in front of the other coworker. When the guy heard that I had filed a discrimination complaint his response was, ”I’m only a bystander. I don’t want to be put in the middle.”

The next conversation I had with a third employee was bewildering. I mentioned the PIP and the fact that I felt it was because I was a black female and he said, “That’s never happened to me.” I truly had no response for that. I simply thought to myself, “Hmm….really? Well, if you are not a female and your not black, why would it happen to you?”

So the phrase, “Don’t tell Don’t care” truly summarizes these interactions for me. My coworkers really didn’t want to know the truth about what I was experiencing. They were more troubled that I told them about the discrimination. They would have been much happier if I hadn’t brought up the topic at all.

The second part, Don’t care, was evident from their lack of empathy. These guys would never be put in the situation I had found myself in. They would never be targeted at work based on their gender or race, so why should they care that it was happening to me?

I know that these guys are not required to speak up. I know that their paycheck depends on them not doing so. But the startling thing to me was the complete apathy they had when I told them that I was in a very real sense being harmed in the place we worked. There was no, “I’m sorry this is happening to you.” There was no sense of concern. So the policy of “Don’t tell Don’t care” will always be there for those of us who are targeted in discriminatory workplaces. This is why discrimination is so painful. You are living this devastating reality and when you talk to coworkers, it falls on deaf ears. You might as well be talking to a wall.