Throwing a virtual rave in a company-sponsored hotel room complete with black lights and a full assortment of hard liquor, while at the same time seeking to secure business opportunities, is a recipe for disaster. Luckily for Dunder Mifflin, Michael was miserably unsuccessful in creating the bacchanalian setting he so desperately longed for. But other companies have fared far worse. By way of example, one company found itself embroiled in litigation for injuries suffered by its employee who, after spilling his beer on a fellow reveler at a karaoke bar on Bourbon Street, was kicked in the groin during a bar fight. Employers are also frequently held liable for injuries caused when their employee gets drunk at company-sponsored parties and then get behind the wheel. In one case in Alaska, the jury awarded $635,000 when an employee imbibed at a convention and then crippled a pedestrian on his way home.

This may be one time when Michael’s ineptitude actually saved Dunder Mifflin some money!

Total Litigation Value: $6,635,500+

There is no doubt that the crew from Dunder Mifflin (primarily Michael) had some expensive snafus this season. In approximately 20 weeks, Michael managed to out a gay employee; announce his affair with a Vice President at the CFO’s party; invite a pervert dressed as Ben Franklin to an office party; invite a stripper to the warehouse; ask a female employee to act out a lesbian love scene during anti-harassment training; and lock his staff in a conference room. If you are thinking that no work place could possibly have this much drama, think again. Using each week’s episode as a starting point, I am going to post new entries every week with real-life examples of situations where truth was, indeed, stranger than fiction. Who knows? Maybe we can give Toby some ammunition to finally stand up to Michael. With just a little push, I think that Toby would be quite the adversary.

LITIGATION VALUE: $50,000 (with the potential for a whole lot more)

So Creed has joined the millions of people blogging at (and about) work. I’d say that this could definitely cause trouble for Dunder Mifflin when Creed eventually learns how to post his musings on something more than a Microsoft Word document. Believe it or not, there are actual cases being brought by employees who have been dooced (fired) over the content of their blogs. Take, for example, the flight attendant who was fired for posting photographs of herself stretched out on a row of seats with her uniform hiked up and her bra showing. She sued the airline for sex discrimination. There is also a journalist who got dooced for posting a critical play-by-play about her company and its bad management practices. Dunder Mifflin should be very afraid of what the Scranton employees could post about their work place. Especially if Creed actually learns how to post his entries online or, god forbid, he learns how to post photographs.

As for Jan and her unfortunate demise, I think she may have a claim. Not a good one but a claim nonetheless. After all, she was fired and replaced by a younger male temp who has very little seniority and no management experience just a few days after she “enhanced” her more feminine qualities. Jan could also claim that Dunder Mifflin fired her because it “regarded her” as having a mental disability. After all, the CFO did tell her that she was “clearly unstable” when he terminated her. While Jan probably won’t be the next big winner in the litigation lotto, it will still cost some money to defend. But with any luck, Jan’s attorneys won’t be able to use anything from Creed’s blog as evidence in the lawsuit.

read more…

LITIGATION VALUE: $300,000+

Holding a Survivor-like contest to determine who will be recommended for a promotion to regional manager is not going to end well for Dunder Mifflin. At all. If the decision is challenged (which it almost certainly will be) then the company is going to be asked to articulate a legitimate nondiscriminatory reason for the selection. And I don’t think that an individual’s inability to eat an obscene amount of hot dogs, their prowess in inflatable sumo wrestling suits, or their willingness/unwillingness to walk through burning coals is going to be a very persuasive explanation. It becomes even less persuasive when considered in light of Michael’s generally egregious conduct. Like, for example, admitting that you are considering Stanley only because of his race and being wholly dismissive of promoting women.

Borrowing a line from the Kenny Rogers song that the employees sang on the bus, companies “should know when to walk away and know when to run” from managers who do not base employment decisions on business-related criteria. When a manager has openly mocked the company’s diversity program, sabotaged its sexual harassment training, and routinely stereotyped employees based on protected categories, the time has come for Dunder Mifflin to run away. As fast as it can.

LITIGATION VALUE: 1,000,000 +

The “women’s appreciation” meeting was a bad idea that was poorly executed. I’m not saying that Dunder Mifflin cannot or should not recognize the achievements of its female employees. It should. I just think that the meeting shouldn’t be announced by saying “I know the crap out of women” and should not end by taking the women to a shopping mall because the office is too much of a “male environment.” If the trip to the mall wasn’t bad enough, it was “game over” when Michael offered to buy them some new panties at Victoria’s Secret. The only way it could get worse would have been for Michael to use a company credit card and for Dunder Mifflin to actually approve the expense.

Should the women of Dunder Mifflin (collectively or individually) later choose to challenge the company’s employment practices as discriminatory, then this type of evidence is going to seal its fate. And, as for Michael’s inquiries whether female employees who are upset with him are having their periods and his reenactment of the “flasher” who exposed himself to Phyllis by putting his finger in his zipper and pretending it is a penis, well, that just introduced Dunder Mifflin to seven-figure damage calculations.