Opinion ID: 220255
Heading Depth: 2
Heading Rank: 1

Heading: Events Prior to Davis's Termination

Text: In November 2003, Time Warner brought in a new Director of Business Class Sales, a white man named Ron Cleboski. Davis contends that Cleboski, who terminated him some three years later, did so because he was biased against Davis and other African Americans. Davis highlights as background evidence, [1] see Nat'l R.R. Passenger Corp. v. Morgan, 536 U.S. 101, 113, 122 S.Ct. 2061, 153 L.Ed.2d 106 (2002), various incidents in which Cleboski's alleged phobia of African Americans manifested itself. These incidents occurred sporadically over a three-year span and included Cleboski displaying motivational signs bearing the tagline Clebonics, which Davis perceived as an offensive amalgam of Cleboski and Ebonics; commenting that an African American's telephone demeanor was too urban; and telling a different African American salesperson, Ron Coleman, that he was not management material. In early 2005, two women joined the inside sales team. Victoria Rodgers, who is African American, took to her job quickly and meshed well with Davis and Coleman, the lead inside salesperson. [2] Mary Schmitt, who is white, had more trouble learning Time Warner's computer system, keeping her sales numbers up, and getting along with her colleagues. Coleman, Rodgers, and Davis, who consistently exceeded their sales quotas by wide margins (they regularly earned six figures despite having base salaries of $20,000 or $30,000 [3] ), felt that Schmitt's lackluster performance was holding the team back and complained to management about her. Schmitt in turn blamed her poor performance on the others' failure to train her properly and lodged her own complaints with management. Coleman testified that the atmosphere in the inside team's small workspace was tense, while Schmitt stated in her affidavit that she sometimes felt like a lamb in the middle of a wolf pack. John Woodrum, a human resources director, testified that the inside team was dysfunctional, and Rodgers reported that [t]here was a personality conflict between all four of us. The inside sales team's interpersonal problems became fodder for Time Warner's rumor mill. In early September 2006, Cleboski heard through the grapevine that some Time Warner employees believed that Coleman, Rodgers, and Davis were treating Schmitt poorly while Cleboski looked the other way. Cleboski and Jim Fraser, who directly managed the inside team, called a meeting of the team to discuss the rumors. Davis testified that during that meeting, Cleboski characterized the rumors as, I'm being told that... I'm allowing my blacks to get away with murder. Fraser and Cleboski emphasized the importance of teamwork and attempted to promote a cohesive team atmosphere by offering the inside sales team a monetary prize if they were able to work together to achieve a team sales goal. [4] Fraser and Cleboski then left the room to encourage the inside team members to talk through their conflicts. This attempt failed; Schmitt left the meeting before anything constructive could be accomplished. Coleman, Rodgers, and Davis jointly sought out Fraser and Cleboski for further discussion after Schmitt left. According to Davis, [w]e basically expressed our concern with the way that we were being portrayed as ostracizing Ms. Schmitt, not helping her ... we voiced our concern that, you know, from the very beginning we were singled out as the reason for her failures and that, you know, we didn't appreciate that. Cleboski responded by explaining that the underlying goal of the meeting was to foster better teamwork; instructing Coleman, Rodgers, and Davis to be more patient with Schmitt; and cautioning that he would be forced to resort to disciplinary action if the problems continued. During an individual meeting the next day, Coleman told Cleboski that he believed Cleboski's handling of the rumors was unfair. Davis also met with Cleboski individually at some point within the next few days. He told Cleboski that he too believed that he, Coleman, and Rodgers had been treated unfairly. Davis also told Cleboski that he believed the African American inside salespeople were being treated less favorably than our white counterparts. He gave as examples: Our white counterparts were allowed to sell to our accounts.... [O]ur white counterparts were allowed to demean us by calling us order takers and referencing us as not being salespeople. Us being blamed for the lack of success for our lone white counterpart. Davis told Cleboski that he blamed Cleboski for the perceived differential treatment. Davis's white counterparts included Schmitt and most (or all) of the outside sales team. There was longstanding hostility between the inside and outside teams, apparently due to the outside sales team's resentment of the large commissions the inside sales team earned without shouldering the responsibilities of cold-calling. Despite management's efforts to defuse the tension  Davis alleges that the inside team was instructed not to celebrate its success in front of the outside team, and that in November or December 2006 management put the issue of outside representative recognition on the agenda for a meeting of the entire sales staff  the teams occasionally squabbled. In or about September 2006, a dispute erupted between Rodgers and a white member of the outside sales team. Coleman brought the dispute to Cleboski's attention, which prompted Cleboski to comment to Coleman that his team of African Americans kept getting him into trouble. Davis did not learn of this comment until several months later.