Sales meetings at strip clubs? Supervisors licking whipped cream off the breasts of strippers at office functions? Demeaning and vulgar language used against female employees?

That's just some of the inappropriate corporate behavior being reported in today's Wall Street Journal (WSJ) in an article on the corporate practices of data-storage giant EMC.

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The behavior described in a lawsuit brought by two former employees, Tami Remien and Debra Fletcher. The charges include creating a work environment that was hostile and offensive to women, systematically underpaying female employees and penalizing women for taking maternity leave, not atypical of behavior recently described to DiversityInc by Kimberly Copeland, a young black woman who was subjected to both racist and sexual intimidation when she worked on Wall Street. (Click on the audio icons and links to the right for Kimberley's story.)

"EMC tolerates sexual harassment by its male employees and its environment attracts prospective male employees who have a propensity to engage in sexual harassment," according to the lawsuit.

The lawsuit alleges EMC participated in other gender-discrimination practices on a regular basis, including:

·         Considering gender and pregnancy, marital and parental status when making employment decisions

·         Failing to credit women for their experience and failing to consider them for timely promotions or title changes on the same basis as men

·         Engaging in occupational segregation

·         Making significant employment decisions based on gender stereotypes

·         Defaming women to their clients, corporate partner-relationship representatives and current and former coworkers

In addition, Fletcher was harassed on out-of-town company business meetings and would often have to block phone calls to her hotel room from intoxicated coworkers that were both harassing and filled with sexual innuendo, according to the lawsuit. 

When Remien sought to take over a larger, more lucrative sales account within the company in 2001, she says she was told she would not "smoke, drink, swear, hunt, fish and tolerate strip clubs" and thus was not appropriately qualified for the larger account.

"One of the most telling facts about EMC's view of women is that it wasn't until 2001 that EMC issued a formal announcement that the company would no longer reimburse client entertainment expenses for strip clubs," according to the lawsuit. "Women at EMC were often forced to accompany their male coworkers and clients to strip-clubs or male oriented dining establishments like Hooters."

When interviewed by DiversityInc, Kimberley Copeland described similar sexual harassment that she experienced on Wall Street. Copeland said there was an older man in the office who would come up from behind her coworker and squeeze her on the waist and lower torso.

Is It a Pattern?

Charges of sexual harassment against EMC are not uncommon, reports the WSJ. The paper cites six sexual-discrimination lawsuits filed since 2003 by former female employees of the Massachusetts-based company. Another suit filed in 2004 by two former female employees in EMC's Chicago office is seeking class-action status.

The WSJ also cites the 2003 discrimination lawsuit filed in San Francisco by former EMC employee Lisa Nelson, a strategic account manager with the company. Nelson said that when she worked in the firm's Chicago office, a stripper was hired to provide entertainment at a hotel where a company meeting was being held and a celebration was planned for two managers being promoted. Nelson waited in the hallway while the strippers performed, according to the lawsuit, but as male coworkers were leaving the room, she overheard one of them say her boss licked whipped cream off the strippers' breasts.

Nelson's case was dismissed because her contract with EMC required it to go to arbitration, reports the WSJ.

EMC employs more than 17,000 people worldwide and maintains more than 100 sales offices, according to court documents.