The Communicative Leader
On The Communicative Leader, we're making your work life what you want it to be. Do you need years of training or special equipment? Not at all my friends. Simple, yet thoughtful changes in your communication can make great strides in displaying your leadership ability. And why the heck should you care about leadership communication? Well, communication is the yardstick others use to determine whether or not they see you as a leader. Ahhh don't be scared, I got you. We will walk through common organizational obstacles and chat about small, but meaningful communication-rooted changes you can integrate immediately. No more waiting for the workplace to become what you hope it will. Nope. You, my friends, will be empowered and equipped to make those changes. Let's have some fun! Can't get enough?
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The Communicative Leader
Championing Workplace Justice: Communication and Advocacy with Taylor Crabill
Discover the essentials of workplace justice in this enlightening episode featuring employment law expert Taylor Crabill. Dive deep into the nuances surrounding employee rights, including discrimination, retaliation, and how to champion one's own welfare in a corporate environment. With insights drawn from years of experience, Crabill outlines the common pitfalls employees encounter and stresses the need for effective communication and proactive measures.
Whether you’re facing issues yourself or aspire to improve workplace culture as a leader, this episode provides actionable strategies to navigate the complexities of employment law. Crabill illuminates the process of addressing grievances without fear and empowers listeners by explaining their legal rights. His compelling stories and advice are invaluable for anyone wanting to foster a just work environment.
Tune in to gain insights that can help you advocate effectively for your rights and navigate the legal landscape of your workplace. Let’s make the work environment fairer together! Don't forget to subscribe, rate, and share this episode with someone who needs to hear this spotlight on workplace justice!
Hey leader! Thanks for listening. For more leadership communication tips, check out https://www.thecommunicativeleader.com/
Hi and welcome to another episode of the Communicative Leader. I'm your host, Dr Leah OH, and today we're diving into the critical topic of workplace justice, and we're doing so with the true abdicate, Taylor . As a dedicated attorney specializing in employment law, Taylor's committed to supporting and abdicating the rights of employees, those who face discrimination, retaliation, wage issues, you name it. With a practice built on integrity and resilience, he's taken on some of the largest companies, ensuring that those who've been wronged by their employers are not silenced, but rather empowered. In today's episode, we'll explore Taylor's journey as an advocate for workplace justice. We're going to discuss the vital role of communication in navigating legal challenges and shine a light on how individuals can champion their own rights.
Dr. Leah OH:Taylor's unwavering pursuit of justice not only emphasizes the importance of fair treatment in the workplace, but also inspires us to stand up against unlawful conduct. Whether you're an employee seeking to understand your rights or a leader looking to foster a more just work environment, this conversation will equip you with the tools and insights to advocate for fairness and integrity in your workplace. Let's dive in and have some fun. Hello and welcome to the Communicative Leader hosted by me, Dr Leah Omilion-Hodges. My friends call me Dr OH. I'm a professor of communication and a leadership communication expert. On the Communicative Leader, we're working to make your work life what you want it to be. Well, Taylor, thank you so much for joining us today on the Communicative Leader. I'm really excited to dive into your expertise and learn more about employment law, and I was hoping, before we do that, that you could share some of your journey to becoming an advocate for employees who are facing discrimination or other unfair treatment in the workplace.
Taylor Crabill:Yeah, sure, leah, happy to be here. Thanks for having me on. So yeah, I've dedicated my career, and will continue to do so, to employment law. I got my start in employment law out of college when I joined an employment side law firm in New York City that represents employees. So I worked there as a paralegal for two years and was able to get an understanding of the sorts of employment law situations out there, and the most rewarding part of that was getting to see when cases would settle, when they would resolve, and the client we were representing sort of had a huge weight lifted off his or her shoulders and was able to put this very negative, dark time in their life behind them and move on, focus on their career and their family. So that's how I first got introduced to it, went to law school, tried a couple of different things to make sure I knew what I wanted to do, kept coming back to employment law and here we are today.
Dr. Leah OH:That is awesome and thank you, thank you for what you do. I mean it's so being an employee is really hard, absolutely Like it's hard under the best case scenario, and then I'm sure you see a lot of you know, not so best case scenarios.
Taylor Crabill:Yeah, certainly no-transcript of that case, any other sort of questions you may have and ultimately you make the decision about whether you want to move forward. So it can't hurt to get the information that you need, and as long as you're making an informed decision, then you're doing what's right for you.
Dr. Leah OH:Yeah, and I love that giving employees more agency in that way too, and letting them drive, so to speak.
Taylor Crabill:Yeah, absolutely.
Dr. Leah OH:So, taylor, I want to think about some common issues, and when I was getting ready for our conversation, I was wondering you know what in your practice, what do you see in terms of maybe, discrimination, retaliation, wage disputes, anything else that's very common? And then kind of a second part are there things that our titled leaders out there can proactively do to either make sure these things don't arise or, if they do, realize, oops, right, there's an issue here. How do they prevent escalation?
Taylor Crabill:Yeah, so to the first part was what can, what can employees do? Just remind me of that.
Dr. Leah OH:But yeah, what are the common issues? The most common issues that you see.
Taylor Crabill:So there's, there's different types of discrimination, right. The laws protect against race discrimination, gender, age, disability, so there are all those sorts of cases exist out there. You mentioned retaliation, and maybe that's not something that most people are familiar with unless you're dealing with it. But in addition to obviously not being allowed to discriminate against people in the workplace, you can't retaliate against them in certain circumstances, right? So when someone is experiencing, let's say, sexual harassment in the workplace and and the employee goes to complain about it and makes a complaint in a specific way, you know, hi, hr, hey, supervisor, you know someone else at the company who can address this situation. I feel like I'm being sexually harassed. This is kind of. You know someone else at the company who can address this situation? I feel like I'm being sexually harassed. This is kind of what you know. Listing out what I've been dealing with email. What can we do to address this?
Taylor Crabill:You know, more likely than not, something similar to that might is going to be what's considered a quote, unquote protected activity under the law, and so if the employer responds negatively to it, you know, we don't want this squeaky wheel here. We don't want to deal with someone complaining, we just want to make some money. You know we'll see you later, right? Sometimes, or most of the time, it ends in a termination Because you've made that protected complaint, because you've you know and hopefully in writing explained that you feel like you're being discriminated against, you're experiencing sexual harassment. Now you have additional protection that, if you hadn't done that, you likely wouldn't have under the law.
Dr. Leah OH:Mm-hmm. Yeah, that's really good to know. And then the second part of that I'm wondering you know our title leaders or managers, directors, you know how do they proactively address these issues and also prevent escalation? If then they see something is going on, what happens next from a title leader position? What should happen next, I guess?
Taylor Crabill:Yeah, and being in that sort of leader or managerial role it's not easy, right? You obviously have, maybe, certain primary functions related to the company services. Obviously, you're managing a team of a certain size. You're probably expected to hit some sort of metrics or targets in order to demonstrate the value you're bringing to the company. So it's not easy.
Taylor Crabill:You're dealing with those things, and then on top of that, invariably you likely will encounter something related to employment law at some point during your career, and it's important to understand what the company's procedures are related to employment law, whether that's reviewing a handbook, speaking to HR, speaking to inside counsel if there is an internal attorney, or maybe having to speak to outside counsel if that's necessary as well, making sure that you have the full information about what you should do in response to a complaint. If someone comes to you and says, hey, I feel like I'm being sexually harassed and maybe, subjectively, you may not think the conduct was so terrible, or maybe you know this. I don't know that this rises to something that's a problem. Err on the side of caution, right, and make sure you're following the procedures and reporting things. You then you give your employer the opportunity to address something if something needs to be, addressed.
Taylor Crabill:So taking everything seriously and making sure that you understand the company's procedures and that you're not afraid to reach out to the professionals in that field.
Dr. Leah OH:Yeah, that's really helpful. So I think that's something that in the work I do as an organizational scholar working with leaders, a lot of it is a lot of fear associated with that, and recognizing that it's just kind of an awareness and knowledge is power, approach is oftentimes what's going to set them up to be most successful.
Taylor Crabill:Sure sure.
Dr. Leah OH:Excellent. So now, taylor, I'm wondering if you could let employees across America know a few things. What are some key aspects of employment law that you wish all employees were aware of, so they just were better informed and better able to advocate for themselves?
Taylor Crabill:Yeah, I think the biggest thing is being proactive. Right, a lot of what happens in employment law is reactive. Right, you weren't paid your wages? You contact an attorney, see if you can get your wages that you're earned. Right, you suffer discrimination in the form of unlawful firing? Contact an attorney to learn do I have claims here? What can I do? But being proactive can really position yourself to have the most protections possible, right? So you know, typically a consultation call with an employment attorney should be free and they should be able to assess your situation and help you to a certain extent. Right, I mentioned before those, you know, protected emails, complaints that you can make to HR or someone, a supervisor or someone that can do something about whatever's whatever's going wrong.
Taylor Crabill:Working with an attorney to make sure you have the right language right. If you're if you just complain, you know, hey, tim, down the down the hall, I really don't like him. We're not getting along. We've butted heads a couple of times, but there's nothing in there about the fact that you believe that the things that he's saying or the way that he's acting is because you're a woman, for example, right.
Taylor Crabill:Then without that sort of specific language, then it's my. It might not be that protective activity and you're losing some law, so um. So, being proactive in that way and feeling that you can reach out to an attorney like I mentioned before, you can reach out to an attorney. It's ultimately up to you about whether you want to do something about it, but at least you're informed. The next big thing is that these employment cases, they're, for the most part, not going to have a smoking gun, and what I mean by that no email that says hey, jane got pregnant, we need to get rid of her. She's not going to be dedicated to the company anymore, that's sure. Does it happen from time to time? Yes, most likely. No, and so there are going to be other things that you're going to want to look out for. Right, if you are disclosing a pregnancy, if you unfortunately suffer from some sort of disability, that you need to your employer.
Taylor Crabill:You know, if you are reaching a certain age and you feel like the age is now becoming a factor in your employment, trusting your gut right, and understanding that you know something's not right here and I need to do something about it, or I need to at least understand what I can do about it.
Taylor Crabill:So common things, you see, are you know someone discloses that they're pregnant, discloses that their disability maybe getting up into a certain age, and it's like, hey, listen, you know someone discloses that they're pregnant, discloses that they're disability, maybe getting up into a certain age, and it's like, hey, listen. You know, since those things have happened, since I told you about my pregnancy, my disability, or since, you know, now I'm 50 years old, I've noticed I'm not getting the same sort of jobs, not being put on these high-end projects. I was a great performer, excellent performance reviews prior, but now, ever since then, I'm rated a lot lower. I'm being micromanaged and I'm seeing people who aren't pregnant or men, you know not being. You know being given opportunities or promotions that I feel I should deserve. Right, so understand. And another big one is comments, right, you know, in the pregnancy circumstance, you know how long are you going to be out.
Taylor Crabill:It's going to be so tough for us, with you not here, you know, are you really going to be putting in the same amount of time? Now that flag that you know, hopefully nothing happens, hopefully everything works out. But I need to know how I'm protected and what I can do if things start to continue to go in a negative way.
Dr. Leah OH:Yeah, those are really helpful red flags to look for too, and I think, like you're saying things that we've kind of societally overlooked and just like, oh, that's part of it, but it shouldn't be part of it.
Taylor Crabill:Yeah, it's so tough because you know we all have jobs. No one's perfect. You're going to make mistakes, right and so you know, maybe the feeling is I've, you know, I've made a couple of mistakes. You know the ship's going to right itself in a couple of weeks. But oftentimes because it's you know, because the employer is trying to rely on some other reason other than the fact that you're disabled, you're getting older, they're going to. You know, try to paper poor performance.
Taylor Crabill:And it has to be over weeks or months. So just you know again hopefully nothing. Hopefully nothing goes wrong. Unfortunately they do, they do sometimes. Hopefully nothing, hopefully nothing goes wrong, unfortunately they do, they do sometimes. Uh, but trust in your gut and just reaching out to somebody as soon as possible, just so that you understand where, where you, where you sit, and you can get someone to help you out.
Dr. Leah OH:Yeah, and this next question. I mean you've already hinted at this, but I want to think about self-advocacy and the advice that you have for employees, especially in terms of being able to kind of clearly articulate their concerns to management, but also protecting their rights about the employment laws and what certain things might be considered protected activity, like the written complaints that we talked about earlier.
Taylor Crabill:But self-advocacy has its risks, right? Maybe, like I said, you don't word the email in the correct way so you don't have those protections under the law against retaliation, or it's harder to prove it right. Maybe it's more nuanced, like oh, when I said this I meant this, and it's less clear than if you had had help, likely from an employment attorney to do something like that.
Taylor Crabill:There's also oftentimes audio recordings come into play, right? Someone wants to record a meeting that they're in because they feel that something's going wrong and they want to understand. But, depending on where you are, in certain states you can't secretly record, right? You need to let the other person know that you're recording In other states completely fine right.
Taylor Crabill:Yeah. So there's just, I mean, and there's no reason for the average employee to know these sort of things unless you're dealing with it right, Exactly so in that sort of way. Yes, you know, certainly you can do some stuff on your own, but there shouldn't be a hesitancy to reach out to an employment attorney, because reaching out doesn't mean that you are moving forward. It's a private financial conversation. Reaching out doesn't mean that you are moving forward. It's a private, confidential conversation.
Taylor Crabill:Your employer is never going to know that you reached out to an attorney if you don't decide to move forward with legal action, and it's really our job to help employees in these situations, and then, if things unfortunately take a turn for the worse, then maybe a more formal representation and doing a lawsuit.
Dr. Leah OH:Yeah, that's really helpful. And I'm wondering too, with self-advocacy, do you recommend you know, if you say I'm pregnant and there's one comment, don't think anything of it, but then I hear something similar do you recommend employees just kind of jot this down or document in that way, like what you know? What are your views on kind of abdicating or kind of proactively building protections?
Taylor Crabill:and just in case, yeah, I mean that's certainly a good idea, right, Having a record as things are happening so that it's clear in your mind you're remembering things, maybe in more detail. It's certainly a good idea.
Taylor Crabill:You're going to want to make sure that, if you're doing that, whether it's electronically or handwritten notes, you're labeling them, you know, ideally on each page. You know, for my attorney, anticipation of lawsuit or anticipation of litigation, because that sends a really clear message that these should be protected. Right, if I do decide to sue my employer. These notes weren't for, you know, just for any reason. They're for a specific reason and the law recognizes that patients to an attorney, or if you're, if you're doing something in anticipation for a lawsuit, that they should be protected because you should be able to have, you know, frank conversations about your, about your legal rights. So, again, making sure that you're documenting things in that way, but and again, reaching, if you're talking, to an employment lawyer, I can, I can tell you how to do that Right, and I can tell you the sort of things that you should be jotting down.
Taylor Crabill:So, um, yeah, that's a good point, though.
Dr. Leah OH:Yeah, and that might be a sign if you're starting to realize you have to document it. That's the sign to reach out.
Taylor Crabill:Yeah, right, I mean, again, it happens so often that um, it's, it's reacting right, and then you know there is maybe some optimism that things, that things work out. But, um, you know there is maybe some optimism that things, that things work out. But, um, you know, I've had situations where I've spoken to people, help them draft these complaints, and you know I haven't heard from them again.
Taylor Crabill:right, because you know I hope everything's resolved yep, and other times we've, we've, we've drafted those things, uh, those sort of complaints, and it's unfortunately led to a termination, and then we talk about you know, what can we do to fix the situation.
Dr. Leah OH:So yeah, yeah, I can really see why you need the expert there to assist in these, especially the employee versus an organization, and I know a lot of times it either goes unnoticed or it is so subtle that a lot of times people don't quite know if they have a legitimate concern or complaint. So, in thinking about retaliation in organizations, what are some strategies that leaders could employ to start to recognize it and to prevent it within their work groups or teams?
Taylor Crabill:Yeah, so from a leader standpoint, when you get that the sort of complaint that we're talking about, again following the right procedures, taking it seriously, because you want to avoid any sort of action that you're engaging in to be perceived as retaliation, right? Maybe, um, you get a, an email from somebody. I feel like I'm being discriminated against based on, you know, abc, protected characteristic gender, age, disability. These are, you know, these are the examples of why.
Taylor Crabill:Show that, why I believe this and, um, you know, maybe you decide to take action on your own. Well, okay, I'm going to move you over here or I'm going to put you on a different team, away from this bad person, yeah, but but perhaps, maybe that that transfer is um, could be seen as as an act of retaliation. It might, it might seem innocent on your part and you might think that you're actually trying to do a good thing, but without sort of consulting with the employer side legal team or, you know, hr.
Dr. Leah OH:you want to avoid those sort of minefields of doing something that might trigger, whether legitimately or not, potential liability. Yeah, yeah, that's really helpful. And this next question is also leader related and I know we talked a little bit about kind of the role that leaders can play. But I'm wondering, you know, how would you recommend they ensure that they're being held accountable for keeping a fair workplace and if you've seen any practices or anything you would suggest that they could implement to ensure that? You know they're a lot of times we're blind to biases, so you know what would that look like? What would you coach a leader on to say this is these are some best practices to keep a culture of accountability.
Taylor Crabill:Yeah, again, that could be something that you have like a one-on-one conversation with HR or legal or legal you know, internal, external, professional about. It could also be part of your trainings. Right, there are different trainings that employees do, specific to implicit bias, sexual harassment, other trainings related to the workplace, implicit bias, sexual harassment, other trainings related to the workplace. So making sure that those sort of materials are taken seriously, you know it can be easy. We've all kind of been there, sat in conference rooms or you know ballrooms and hearing speeches about the things and you know, maybe you just want to get back to your work. You have other things on your mind.
Taylor Crabill:So it can be difficult from, let's say, an HR or trainer standpoint to to, you know, convey the seriousness of the information but bit corny or not really relatable. So, relying on real world examples that maybe don't have some sort of connection like someone might have a reference outside of an employment situation, the recent one that comes to mind is Blake Lively's lawsuit in connection with her sexual harassment claims on the movie set. Obviously, probably most people understand who Blake Lively is. It's in the news outside of you know legal world. So you know, drawing on something current events that's happening, to shed light on an example, or, you know, if you're speaking to your legal team, maybe a recent case that has an interesting set of facts that you can build into examples. So it's, I would say, focusing on storytelling in a way to array these sort of ideas and the seriousness in them, because people are going to remember stories more often than they remember. You know me just reciting what the employee.
Dr. Leah OH:Yeah, that is really helpful. And I think with that you kind of answered my next question, which was these practical steps leaders could take to create a workplace culture that recognizes rights and supports them. And thinking about the Blake Lively case, you know, I imagine there are a number of individuals on sets that are really rethinking what these interactions might look like. What would be some suggestions you would have for them, just kind of anywhere, or it can be related in the context of the film industry, but what were some things that you would then coach these employers to say, hey, I'd like you to be mindful of these things, or these are some steps you can take to create this environment where everyone feels safe.
Taylor Crabill:Yeah, and again, I think it comes through those sort of trainings, if you're talking about people on set who aren't maybe directly involved in any sort of alleged unlawful conduct, encouraging them to come forward as well.
Taylor Crabill:If they're in some sort of manager role, they might have an obligation to come forward, right, yeah, and taking that seriously, I think sometimes not everyone that experiences an insensitive joke or discriminatory joke or comment or you know, not everybody comes forward, and for different reasons, right, and so it maybe happens in the workplace that you know you hear an off-color comment here or there, a joke here or there, and you know it doesn't nothing really happens, right.
Taylor Crabill:So it's like, you know, maybe this, um, you know, maybe that adds into the work culture a little bit, but then it might downplay, like you know, I've seen this before nothing really happens. You know it was, it was, you know whatever wasn't wasn't too bad. Again, just just taking it seriously, because you know, maybe an employee is going to decide to to stand up and you know, and I, I I thought about it and I'm going to, I'm going to take some action to to fix what I think was something wrong that happened to me. So maybe maybe even having that assumption, that that any, everyone who experiences that is going to come forward so that you're, so that you're treating it with the appropriate level of seriousness that it deserves.
Dr. Leah OH:Yeah, I really like that. I like starting with that assumption and being really clear about it as well, so everyone knows what the expectations are.
Taylor Crabill:Yeah, I think it's important to communicate that and to reinforce it right. It's important to communicate that and to reinforce it right. We talked about different trainings. You know, maybe you do an implicit bias training once a year, you do a sexual harassment training once a year, follow-up emails, right, like hey, you know, here's you know we had this a couple months ago here's a little reminder about what we discussed, about what we discussed or, you know, there's different, um, different days dedicated to uh, you know sexual harassment.
Taylor Crabill:You know, certain days like that those could be good opportunities to say hey, you know. A little reminder about what we talked about. Um, so, finding finding ways to, to sort of follow up and uh keep people engaged in the material is also likely to uh likely to help mitigate these situations.
Dr. Leah OH:Yeah, that's so important because, you're right, there's so many trainings. It's like check it's off my list, I will do that in 365 more days, and I like too. Then we're reinforcing this workplace where we're saying this is really important to us. This is not just a compliance issue, that we are checking off the list. This is something that we take seriously and you should too.
Taylor Crabill:Exactly, yeah, exactly, very important.
Dr. Leah OH:So you've mentioned communication a few times and I am interested in communication and conflict and I imagine a lot of your job revolves around trying to resolve conflicts and finding resolution, and so what are some techniques you'd recommend either, for, you know, employees who are in this situation, looking to de-escalate something with their leader, or vice versa, if there's a leader who's trying to address a grievance effectively? You know what are some of the communication strategies you have seen work the best.
Taylor Crabill:Right.
Taylor Crabill:So communication, like, let's say you're saying a situation where someone comes and complains about potentially unlawful behavior, yeah, so I mean keeping that dialogue, making sure you know you're not dismissing it, allowing the employee the time and space, obviously sure you know you're not dismissing it, allowing the employee um, the time and space, obviously privately, whatever the employee feels comfortable, you know, in a situation, to explain what's going on, um, you know, documenting that, perhaps in a way that you can, you can share it with uh, with um, with counsel.
Taylor Crabill:Obviously you know you're going to want to speak with your own legal team to make sure that you're following the practices that they want you to follow. But yeah, again, what I spoke earlier about, if there's sort of a change in the employee situation, maybe that becomes something, whether intentionally or unintentionally, is retaliatory right, maybe the employee can make out a claim of retaliation. So trying to keep things, you know continuing as they were to the extent that you can. Obviously, if you're dealing with a situation where it's not possible for two people to work together, making sure you're communicating with professionals on how best to do that, because it can be a very difficult thing to have to manage an employee who is pursuing those sort of claims.
Dr. Leah OH:Yeah, certainly. And then for that employee who's pursuing the claims, if things are feeling really heated when they're interacting with peers or with their leader, you know what are some coaching strategies you leave them with so they can communicate effectively, but you know, it doesn't always feel explosive.
Taylor Crabill:Sure, and the communication a big part of it is what we talked about in terms of making those complaints. Right, if you're being criticized and you feel like it's unfounded or you know, I wasn't being criticized for this stuff before making sure you're pushing back against those performance issues and sort of giving giving your side again because every, every person, every situation is different. Right, you're going to want to, uh, speak to a lawyer so that you're getting that professional advice tailored to your situation, uh, rather than relying on something more generally, um, but, yeah, keeping making sure that you're communicating clearly what you feel is unlawful and then very clearly how you feel your performance.
Taylor Crabill:Critiques of you are justified.
Dr. Leah OH:Yeah, and I think with that it's probably taking a step back, trying to write things like objective, trying to remove the emotion and not such a reactive response.
Taylor Crabill:Yeah, right, I think that's fair and that's a really good point, because these employment situations are very personal, are very emotional. Oftentimes employees are putting years of hard work into a company and all of a sudden they're let go after you know I've decided to start a family, or I've suffered some sort of injury, or you know I'm getting older, um, and that comes with, if you know, an unlawful firing. Obviously you lose your compensation, um, unfortunately, so many people live paycheck to paycheck, so that can be a devastating thing to happen. Our healthcare system is tied a lot to employment. Most people get their healthcare through employment, so you're losing your healthcare and then having to figure that out, which can be very difficult, difficult. So yeah, you know, um, trying to take yourself out of it and a good way to do that is to, is to speak to a lawyer because they're going to be an advocate for you.
Taylor Crabill:They're not personally invested in sort of the uh, the dynamics of the situation personally invested in in achieving the best outcome they can for for the client or prospective client. But, um, it's a way to to maybe temper very real and justified feelings that you may be having.
Dr. Leah OH:Yeah, that's really helpful. And my two final questions for you and this is how we end every episode of the Communicative Leader, and there are two questions that are connected. So the first part, this is for our titled leaders and the second part is employees across all ranks, all industries, thinking about what is the pragmatic leadership, a communication, tip, advice or challenge that you'd like to leave them with.
Taylor Crabill:Sure For the leader in terms of communication, especially in these employment situations. I would say the communication with your again, with your professionals, right, with hr, with legal professionals. Don't be afraid to have those conversations with them, even if you feel that the conduct might not be all too serious, or at least that's how you perceive it and someone might perceive it differently. So, while you may have a good understanding right, you've attended the trainings, you've done the follow-up materials, you know you have, you've been in this space for a long time and you feel like you've dealt with these situations Keep those lines of communication open.
Taylor Crabill:It can be you know, very easy to take a misstep. Take a misstep that that leads to a bigger issue. If you're not, if you're not, regularly communicating with HR or with um, with you know, an attorney at the at the company, it'd be difficult, right, because we talked about the other things that you have to do as part of your job. But, um, very important to address those things. Keep that communication open so you don't create a bigger problem. Yeah, yeah, that is really helpful.
Taylor Crabill:Yeah For for employees again, just um the communication with a potential advocate right. Honestly, I can't I say it all the time, I just can't stress it enough. It's being proactive about it. Right you are. If you are experiencing something at work, you might feel like you're alone, right you might feel what can I do? I'm an employee, I'm working at this, you know company nationwide company with offices all over the place.
Taylor Crabill:They have hundreds of, you know, tens of whatever employees, employment attorneys inside the company. How am I going to ever stand up to them? And you can do every day? Um, so, while you may uh, you know, maybe it may feel easy to sort of, you know, put this on the shelf. Hopefully it doesn't come, uh, doesn't become any worse. Um, in that idea of communicating with a professional, because it really is, it really is, or really should be, a sort of no risk and free and private conversation.
Dr. Leah OH:Yeah, and that that's so helpful. I think, especially you know, in our society, when we're so largely defined by what we do, that is a huge part of how we present to others and how we get to know others that if that isn't going well and you feel isolated, I mean that's a really hard place to be. So I love that idea and and to acknowledging that the initial consult should be should be free.
Taylor Crabill:So, yeah, I really really like that some, some attorneys may charge for it, but do your homework, right? There's no like anything else, right? You're going to read reviews. You're going to talk to multiple law firms. You're going to speak to multiple lawyers you'll hopefully get a sense of okay, you know this person did a 30 plus minute. Uh call with me all the details down, requested documents, you, if we're having a follow-up call to talk about things in more detail you know, other than maybe something shorter than that right.
Taylor Crabill:So getting a. It's important to reach out to someone, but then someone who's going to be invested in your situation as well.
Dr. Leah OH:Mm-hmm. Yeah, and thank you for the work that you do. I just I I left industry to do this PhD for research to hopefully make people's work lives a little bit easier and feeling like they have some agency, and it's so nice to know there are a lot of protections out there for them.
Taylor Crabill:Yeah, certainly are, and I guess you know we're all in this fight together and hopefully we are making progress, I think slowly but surely, but we'll keep the fight going.
Dr. Leah OH:Yes, well, thank you, taylor, for stopping by and joining us on the Communicative Leader. I've really enjoyed our conversation and I know our listeners will as well.
Taylor Crabill:Thank you so much.
Dr. Leah OH:All right, my friends. That wraps up our conversation today. Until next time, communicate with intention and lead with purpose. I'm looking forward to chatting with you again soon on the Communicative Leader.
