If you’re the victim of discrimination at your place of employment, you have two options: Fight back to protect your legal rights or move on to remove yourself from the situation.
There’s nothing wrong with standing up for yourself, as employment discrimination is against the law.
While there’s no exact playbook to follow, here are five steps you can take as a victim of discrimination:
- Keep a log of incidents: This is where you write down every act of discrimination against you, with as many details as you can remember. Include things such as what was said to you, what was done to you, the date, the time and the day of the week.
- Report the discrimination to your HR department: Even if it’s the first act of discrimination against you, report it to your HR department so that they have your complaint on file. If you don’t do this, you may regret it in the future. Also, be sure to follow up regularly to ensure that they’re taking the appropriate action to get to the bottom of the problem.
- Watch for retaliation: This doesn’t always come into play, but a specific employee or employees may retaliate against you. For instance, if you filed a formal complaint against your supervisor for discrimination, they may demote you, demean you or even attempt to terminate your employment.
- Protect your legal rights: You’re in a tough spot because all you want to do is get back to work as usual, but others are taking action that makes that impossible. There are both state and federal laws that protect against workplace discrimination, so don’t hesitate to take steps to protect your legal rights. There’s never a good time to turn a blind eye to this serious violation of the law.
These are the most basic steps to take if you’re a victim of employment discrimination. When you do these things, you’ll feel better about where you’re headed and what you can do to protect yourself.
Never lose sight of the fact that you have legal rights as an employee. There’s never a right time for discrimination.
