Microsoft carelessly handled over 100 sexual harassment complaints, lawsuit alleges

The tech behemoth Microsoft, particularly known for its software products is facing a lawsuit which alleges that women at Microsoft are “sexualized by their male managers” and coworkers, and these events often go unpunished, as reported by Reuters.

According to an unsealed court filling, the lawyer Michael Subit has remarked that Microsoft’s culture is a “Rife with Sexual Harassment”. The women at Microsoft who work in technical jobs had filed 238 internal complaints claiming to gender discrimination or sexual harassment from 2010 till 2016 and Microsoft’s internal investigation team known as ERIT has not taken these matters seriously. According to Michael Subit,

“Company records indicate that women at Microsoft are sexualized by their male managers and co-workers, leading to a substantial number of incidents of alleged sexual harassment, and even several incidents of sexual assault, that often go unpunished.”

Out of 238 complaints received by Microsoft, 108 complaints were of sexual harassment, 119 complaints were of gender discrimination, eight complaints were of retaliation and three of them alleged pregnancy discrimination, the filing states.

The class-action lawsuit was originally filed in 2015, however, these figures have been recently uncovered when Microsoft handed over years of records to the plaintiffs’ lawyers after the court ruling.

In response to this matter, a Microsoft spokesman, Scott Whiteaker has stated,

“Diversity and inclusion are critically important to Microsoft. We want employees to speak up if they have concerns and we strive to make it easy for them to do so. We take all employee concerns seriously and have a fair and robust system in place to investigate employee concerns and take appropriate action when necessary.”

The lawsuit alleges that women at Microsoft have filled complaints on gender discrimination and gender pay-gap, but the company has never taken these matters seriously. Microsoft is not the only company to be accused of systematically underpaying women. Back in September 2017, a report revealed a massive gender pay gap at Google as well.