Cassie is a marketing professional in her late twenties who joined a new project at her firm in the midst of the COVID-19 pandemic. Despite the challenges of working remotely, she is proud of her contributions to the project and feels valued by her new team members. However, after downloading the transcript from a recent virtual meeting, she discovered that two of her coworkers had been badmouthing her appearance in what they believed was a “private” chat. Cassie is embarrassed and heartbroken that her colleagues would speak about her in such disparaging terms. She is torn about whether to confront her coworkers, bring the issue to her Human Resources Department, or simply pretend that nothing occurred.
Cassie is in her late twenties and for several years, has been working at a marketing firm. Recently, she has been promoted to a role with more responsibility. As a part of her switch to the new role, she joined a new project with a new team of people. Unfortunately, due to the pandemic, the firm’s offices closed, and Cassie has yet to meet some of her colleagues in person. Although all interactions have been online, she has enjoyed working with the group.
Recently, Cassie hosted a virtual brainstorming meeting for her work team. At the end of the call, she downloaded a transcript of the meeting’s group chat because it contained a handful of important reminders and suggestions for an upcoming presentation. As she read through the transcript, Cassie noticed that a private chat between Nicole and Helen, two of her co-workers, had been included in the file along with the public group chat.
In the private conversation, Nicole messaged Helen that Cassie looked “horrible” and that she had “piled on the quarantine weight.” Helen replied with agreement and added that if she looked like Cassie, she would “never leave the house.” The conversation included further malicious comments about Cassie’s appearance. Cassie was upset and embarrassed by Nicole and Helen’s comments, especially as she believed they had become friendly during her short time with the project team. Afterwards, Cassie received a short email from Nicole, following up on the meeting and wishing her a nice weekend, which only made Cassie even more distrustful and uncomfortable.
Cassie feels awkward and uncertain about what to do. Clearly, Nicole and Helen believed they were speaking privately and did not know that “private chats” in the online meeting are not private to the host. Cassie considers letting others on her team know about the incident so that no one else is put in a similar situation, but she doesn’t want to attract attention to herself and is embarrassed by the thought of having to raise the issue to the full team. She could send the transcript of the conversation to HR and ask them to handle the situation, but Cassie does not like conflict and wants to stay on good terms with Nicole and Helen. The situation is further complicated by the fact that Cassie is still relatively new to the project team and wants to continue to make a good impression.
What should Cassie do? Would you send a copy of the transcript to HR? Would you talk to Nicole and Helen privately? Are there other possible solutions to this situation? Why is trust among members of a team important? How might this situation affect Cassie’s ability to do “good work”?