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Unfair treatment at work can cast a looming shadow over your whole life. The stress and anxiety that can come from facing such treatment can be overwhelming and employees should not have to suffer it. We all expect equitable treatment at work, but this is not always the case. If you are facing unfair treatment at work, you may have legal recourse options available to you to put right what is wrong in your work life.
What to Do If You Face Unfair Treatment in the Workplace
When we say “unfair treatment,” what does that actually mean? Well, we are referring to unfair treatment at work in the legal sense. For example, unfair treatment at work may involve experiencing illegal harassment or discrimination in the workplace due to your membership in a protected class. A protected class or characteristic will include something like race, religion, nationality, sex, and age, among other things. Harassment or discrimination in the workplace can easily create a hostile work environment, an untenable situation that no employee should have to endure.
If you are facing unfair treatment at work, there are steps you can take to protect your rights and help enforce them.
1. Document Everything
You should immediately begin to document incidents of unfair treatment that you are experiencing in the workplace. The more detail you can provide in this documentation, the better. Documenting will likely include saving email messages and internal memos along with other forms of relevant office communications. You will also likely need to write down specific instances of unfair treatment you have experienced. Writing these incidents down while they are still fresh in your memory is always best practice. This type of documentation can play a critical role in bringing any legal claim for harassment, discrimination, or a hostile work environment.
2. Take Care of Yourself
As you take steps to document incidences of unfair treatment, you should also make a concerted effort to take care of yourself. After all, experiencing unfair treatment in the workplace can be stressful, to say the least. You go to work to earn a living, to support yourself financially and we all spend a significant portion of our lives at work. When work becomes a toxic environment, it is especially important that we prioritize self-care. Talk to your family members and friends about what is going on in your life. Avoid isolation.
3. Stay Off of Social Media
Another thing you should consider if you are facing unfair treatment in the workplace is staying away from social media. Staying away from social media can be a form of self-care and it can also help preserve any legal claim you may bring relating to your work situation. Why? Well, in using social media when you are confronted with such serious work problems, it can be very tempting to vent your work grievances online. This, however, is a bad idea. Posting about your unfair treatment can put your whole claim in jeopardy. If you think what you post on social media will remain private, you are wrong.
Contact Our New Jersey Employment Law Attorneys Today
Are you experiencing unfair treatment at work? Talk to the dedicated employment law team at Castronovo & McKinney about your options for rectifying these wrongs and seeking legal recourse. Contact us today.