Calling an employee’s work “messy” was not considered discriminatory

In the recent case of Shevlin v John Wiley and Sons Limited, the Claimant, a senior HR operations manager (C) brought claims of discrimination arising from disability and harassment related to disability after being told that his work was ‘messy’.

Background

C had ADHD, which he claimed resulted in ‘dyslexia traits’, but did not disclose this during his employment.

Following a mid-year review, in relation to emails and notes in Teams channels, C’s manager wrote ”There are often a lot of typos which can seem messy”. C did not raise any issues at the time but later stated that he was too humiliated to complain.

In a year-end review, C’s manager discussed C’s self-assessment and performance before submitting her review. She was very positive about C, describing him as “an excellent colleague, hard-working, diligent and always keen to get things fixed”.

In response to the question, ‘what could the colleague have done differently to achieve or exceed their goals?’, C’s manager wrote:

“When Thomas is very busy he has a tendency to rush the work which he is doing, which can culminate in typos in emails, use of capitals when they shouldn’t be as well sentences that don’t make sense. As his manager I am generally okay with this, as I know it is because he is super busy and is rushing to get onto the next thing. However I don’t think this is good for his personal brand when dealing with stakeholders from across the globe as it can be seen as messy work.”

C alleged that this amounted to discrimination arising from his disability and harassment related to disability.

C’s manager, who has dyslexia, suggested that C might also have dyslexia. C denied this and did not disclose his ADHD as a possible cause of his spelling and grammar difficulties. C resigned because of the ’messy work’ comment.

Decision

The Employment Tribunal (ET) determined that C’s resignation was likely due to lack of promotion opportunities and that he had already had a job lined up.

The ET reviewed C’s medical report and concluded that his spelling and grammatical errors were not caused by C’s ADHD, and C had not proven a link. They also determined that C’s manager was unaware of his disability.

The ET examined whether the manager’s comments were discriminatory and concluded they were not, as they were accurate and did not constitute unfavourable treatment. The comments were part of a performance review template intended to help C improve and were deemed necessary to achieve R’s legitimate aims. The ET noted that managers must be able to address performance weaknesses explicitly to ensure employees understand.

C’s disability discrimination and harassment claims were dismissed.

Comment

Although this decision offers some reassurance to employers, it is important to recognise that constructive feedback may still be perceived as discrimination or harassment, depending on the circumstances of each case. Managers should carefully consider their tone, context, and potential impact of their feedback, especially if it could be linked to a protected characteristic.

For support with addressing performance-related issues, please get in touch with a member of the Employment team.