Woman asked to smarten up said boss was ‘mansplaining’
A TRAINEE accountant was sacked after accusing her boss of “mansplaining” when he asked her to wear smarter clothes to work.
Zhihui Lu asked KPMG manager Matt Brunton “who was he as a man to be telling her what she can and cannot wear?” after she turned up in the office in jeans and a jumper.
In a “loud and aggressive tirade” the Durham University graduate asked whether he thought her bra was appropriate and tried to show him the strap, a tribunal heard.
The “completely inappropriate” outburst was one of a number of incidents of misconduct that led to Ms Lu being fired after three years at the accounting giant.
Aggressive
She was accused of being aggressive, emotional and rude and was repeatedly warned about her behaviour.
The tribunal heard Ms Lu responded to the news that she had missed out on a position by telling a senior manager she would have done better if she had slept with one of the firm’s male partners.
She repeatedly referred to a senior member of the firm as “the bald partner” despite knowing his name and told a female colleague she had bad skin and “looked terrible”, the panel was told.
Ms Lu ignored requests to stop taking too much food for herself from lunches laid on for staff and on one occasion turned up with containers so she could remove as much as possible.
She also refused to sit on the same floor as the rest of the insurance team, commandeering a meeting room five floors below in which she installed a rice cooker.
Ms Lu joined KPMG as an audit assistant in 2015 after graduating with an accounting and finance degree but within two years bosses were raising concerns about her performance and erratic behaviour.
In the autumn of 2017 she went off sick having been diagnosed with stress and depression. When she returned the following February to the office in Canary Wharf, London, she was given an email warning about inappropriate clothing.
This prompted Ms Lu to launch “a loud and aggressive tirade against him” demanding to know “if the bra she was wearing that day was appropriate, and trying to show him her bra strap”.
When Mr Brunton emailed again to warn her she replied: “I do not appreciate mansplaining on dress codes. Bras are clothing.
“My work wardrobe support such weather...
“May I know if I am able to expense winter clothing...to ensure that I dress to your desired taste?”
Several weeks later, Ms Lu got into a row after she was spotted helping herself to large amounts of food at a work lunch.
“Despite being asked not to take the food, she did not stop. On at least one occasion that day she was very rude to staff stating she was going to take the food notwithstanding their protestations,” the tribunal in East London heard.
She was suspended and then sacked in November 2018 for gross misconduct. She took KPMG to the tribunal claiming discrimination.
But the panel sided with the firm and dismissed her claims for unfair dismissal, harassment, and disability and race discrimination entirely. does not