Our "friend" the pharmacist

I posted a little story yesterday about a pharmacist who made several inappropriate remarks. Not surprisingly, most of those who commented identified the man as a jerk and alternately asked for his dismissal, write up or behind in a training class.

The thing that concerns me the most about this story is not that the pharmacist was a jerk, but that the other employees laughed along with him.

Let's face it. Society has (for some unknown reason) determined that pregnant women are fair game and that your child bearing decisions are open for criticism. Before I had children people constantly asked when I was going to have children. Once I got pregnant, people started to ask when I was going to have my next one. (Answer: We're going to wait and see if we like this one first.)

When you're pregnant, your weight, your age, and your diet--normally forbidden topics--become the focus of strangers. (Another true story: When I was pregnant with offspring #1, a co-worker used to berate me for eating popcorn. Popcorn! Don't you know it's full of salt??? I did know it was full of salt, and I also knew that my blood pressure was on the low side and I wasn't having problems with water retention. I also knew that this coworker had smoked during her entire pregnancy. But in her mind, my salt was worse than her cigarettes.)

Women have story after story about how people have told them they are going to ruin their only child and they really need to have more kids or that they are going to destroy the earth by over-populating it.

So, it doesn't surprise me that this man felt that he could comment on this woman's family size. He thought he was being funny.

So, as for him (assuming and investigation confirmed the story), he'd get a formal warning with the clear understanding that questions of pregnancy and birth control are only appropriate when it is relevant to the prescription he is filling. He would also be informed that similar comments on someone's weight, height, age, marital status, whatever, are inappropriate as well. He would be required to write an apology letter to the woman.

But the real problem is the culture at that pharmacy counter. If the other workers knew what was going on enough to giggle at what he was saying, then they also knew that the victim was not amused and that his actions were inappropriate. And they not only giggled (I agree, sometimes you just can't help it, even if it is inappropriate), but they didn't stop the behavior either.

I would be concerned that we had developed a culture where employees are not willing (or not comfortable) stepping into a situation like this. This is a culture that is ripe for bullying.

The district manager, corporate HR, or even the store manager may be unaware that inappropriate behavior is occurring. And it appears that the only way to get truly through to a bully is through peers. The fact that the other pharmacist and the tech just laughed scares me.

One commentator, who labeled himself (herself?) as a pharmacist wrote:

the pharmacist is more educated than anyone in HR, so he can say what he wants and you won't do a damn thing.

This person is a bully. This person scares me. That culture is exactly what I want to stamp out. So, where would I start? With this person's boss. Not to punish, but to see what is going on that made this employee think this inappropriate comment was appropriate.

It's important, in retail and all businesses, to treat the customer right. But, in order to do that, you need to make sure that your employees feel comfortable doing what is right.