Human Resource Blog

Inappropriate comments, a violation?

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An employee was in a meeting the other day with one of his customers along with his sales manager and our company’s CEO. During the meeting, our CEO asked the customer what they liked about our company/product. The Customer replied something like “his shining personality and committment to service” to which the CEO replied “are you sure it’s not his shining…” while he was rubbing his head. The employee is balding, and not at all bothered by it, but he doesn’t appreciate those kinds of comments and don’t believe them to be appropriate in a workplace, let alone in front of a customer with the comment coming from a CEO. To top it off, the customer is an HR organization, so I can only imagine the conversation after they left.

Is this an HR violation?

Its really sad when the CEO of a company is this clueless about HR, isnt it? The CEO missed a golden opportunity to bask in the glow of this customers compliment, which was directed at the salesperson and by extension, the organization that hired him. Instead of replying graciously, \\\\\\\”Thank you. We think Bob does an excellent job, but it is always great to hear that from our customers\\\\\\\” the CEO decided to act like a donkey. (You know the word we mean, but this is a family website.)

In fact, we would like to give the Idiot of the Month award to this CEO.

Unfortunately, this comment is not agains the law. It is in poor taste, it is asinine, tactless and stupid. It no doubt caused comment at the HR firm after the CEO and salesperson left…but there is nothing illegal about it. Title VII of the Civil Rights Act of 1964 prohibits discrimination based on race, religion, color, sex, and national ancestry. Other laws prohibit discrimination based on disability and age (over 40.) However, there is no federal law that prohibits discrimination based on baldness. Lack of hair is not even considered a disability under the legal definition (although in some cases it may be caused by cancer or another disability.)

Some companies have policies requiring employees to be polite and respectful of each other. Given the maturity level of this CEO, we are going to bet that this one does not.

Being rude, cluless and asinine is not currently illegal. Nor would it be against any law or regulation for the salesperson to look for a better job with a company where he would be treated with respect — and to take his customers with him.