STORY 21

I was working in a privately owned company as a senior lawyer.  I went on maternity leave with my first child and keep in contact with my line manager with regular keep in touch days.  On my return, the staff that had been reporting to me had been reassigned to a colleague with no explanation.

I requested to work from home one day a week in order to spend more time with my son, who was not yet a year old.  My line manager informally approved the request but when the CEO of the company heard of this, he complained as he felt it would “set the wrong tone” for the company and my request was denied.  When I met the general counsel to discuss this, he told me that the company “broke laws all the time, so it had no problem breaking employment law too” and advised me that I was better off “being a stay at home mother”, as his wife had done.  He also said that, given that I was not a man or the right nationality, I had no future in the company anyway. 

A few months later I was told my role would be moving to a new location and that, given the whole working from home fiasco, there was no opportunity for me to stay in London where the rest of my team were located.  At that time I was pregnant with my second child and was finding the hostile work environment unbearable.  I signed an NDA (or settlement agreement), in which I agreed to remain silent in return for a payout and left the company.