Opinion ID: 3063997
Heading Depth: 2
Heading Rank: 1

Heading: Brown’s Employment

Text: Brown, who is 56, worked in Northside’s human resources department for thirty years. Most recently, Brown served as a retirement specialist working with Northside’s 403(b) and 457 retirement plans. Greg Johnson managed the benefits department. In June 2005, Renee Ruffin was hired as the Benefits Supervisor and became Brown’s immediate supervisor. Shortly thereafter, friction developed between Brown and Ruffin. On several occasions, Ruffin told Brown to “shut up” in staff meetings, yelled at her and talked down to her in a humiliating way. In August 2005, after one such incident, Brown complained to Johnson. Brown told Johnson that she believed Ruffin’s treatment was because of Brown’s 1 Brown also asserted a hostile work environment claim, but the district court concluded that she abandoned it by not opposing summary judgment as to that claim. Brown does not challenge that ruling on appeal. 2 We review a district court’s grant of summary judgment de novo, viewing the record and drawing all inferences in favor of the non-moving party. Fisher v. State Mut. Ins. Co., 290 F.3d 1256, 1259-60 (11th Cir. 2002). Summary judgment is proper “if the pleadings, the discovery and disclosure materials on file, and any affidavits show that there is no genuine issue as to any material fact and that the movant is entitled to a judgment as a matter of law.” Fed. R. Civ. P. 56(c). 2 age. Johnson told Brown she needed to “work it out” with Ruffin. When Johnson followed up on Brown’s complaints of mistreatment, Ruffin denied Brown’s allegations and other witnesses did not corroborate Brown. Ruffin and Brown continued to have difficulty. Ruffin accused Brown of trying to get out of work and excluded her from some meetings. Also in August 2005, Ruffin hired a temporary worker in her twenties and told Brown she “loved being around these babies” because they were “so pliable” and that they were “something that [she] could work with.” In the Fall of 2005, the benefits department made a transition from specialized employees to generalized, cross-trained employees so that all benefits employees would be competent to answer Northside employees’ and retirees’ questions. In addition, Ruffin reviewed the department’s operations and began planning to convert many manual operations to automated processes. During this time, Ruffin told Brown “we’[ve] got to roll out all this old stuff and roll in the new,” and warned that “things are going to change around here and you will not be a specialist.” On October 6, 2005, Johnson and Ruffin conducted Brown’s annual performance evaluation and gave Brown a total score of 269 out of 300. In November 2005, Johnson called Brown into his office and asked her why Ruffin 3 did not like her. Brown responded that she believed it was because of Brown’s knowledge relating to pensions and her age. Johnson warned Brown that she would be discharged if she did not work out her issues with Ruffin. Brown sent Ruffin an e-mail asking her for a “guideline of what she wanted in an employee.” Ruffin did not respond to the e-mail. Instead, on December 7, 2005, Ruffin, Johnson and Bridget Green, the Director of Human Resources, met with Brown to counsel her about her behavior and performance. Johnson gave Brown a letter advising her that she needed to show improvement in several areas, including: (1) stopping the practice of copying several layers of management on e- mails; (2) attending scheduled departmental meetings; (3) paying attention to detail in preparing government filings; and (4) showing respect for management by being professional and polite. Johnson discussed the contents of the letter with Brown in the meeting, and Brown disputed items two through four. The second concern listed in the letter–attending staff meetings–was the only item contributed by Ruffin. Johnson contributed the remainder. As a result of these events, on February 19, 2006, Brown asked Johnson to transfer her to another department within Northside. Upon receiving Brown’s request, Johnson decided to terminate Brown from the human resources department, but to permit Brown to transfer so she could stay employed while she 4 looked for another position. Johnson made the decision to terminate Brown in consultation with Theresa-Dawson Collier, Northside’s Employee Relations Manager. Ruffin did not have the authority to terminate employees, did not recommend that Brown be terminated and was not involved in the decision to terminate Brown. According to Johnson, he terminated Brown because: (1) she was insubordinate to and did not want to be supervised by Ruffin; (2) there were complaints about Brown’s job performance; and (3) she was not a team player. As examples of Brown’s insubordination, Johnson noted that Brown determined which tasks she needed to complete before her transfer without consulting Ruffin;3 reassigned herself a different part of the alphabet in servicing benefits without Ruffin’s approval;4 gave a survey to an employee before it was to be released; and returned from medical leave with a half-day restriction without informing Ruffin.5 As to Brown’s job performance, Johnson explained that Brown transmitted inaccurate information to “Principal,” an outside contractor that 3 The record contains a February 22, 2006 letter from Brown to Johnson listing the “the areas that need special attention/clean up” before her transfer. 4 In February 2006, Ruffin directed that all 403(b) retirement plan work would be processed by all the team members (not just Brown) and each team member would be assigned a particular alphabet grouping. 5 Brown was out on medical leave to have surgery from January 18 to February 16, 2006 and was placed on a half-day work restriction by her doctor from February 16 to March 4, 2006. 5 handled 403(b) and 457 defined contribution plans.6 Several meetings with Principal and Brown to try to solve the problem took place, and ultimately the responsibility of transmitting the information was given to the payroll department. In addition, Brown failed to process an employee’s 457 deferral elections for several pay periods;7 failed to turn on her “out of office” reply to her e-mail account while she was on medical leave, which meant employees and retirees got no response to their emails; and incorrectly advised a retiree that he could have a retroactive annuity payment.8 On February 28, 2006, Johnson and Teresa Dawson-Collier met with Brown 6 Ruffin also testified as to Principal’s complaint about Brown. Northside outsourced to Principal the pension and 403(b) administrative functions, but Brown continued to perform those functions. Brown duplicated efforts and, in some cases, incorrectly calculated pension benefits and then sent out letters to employees providing that incorrect information. The employees thus would receive different information from Principal and Brown as to their benefits. 7 An e-mail chain in the record indicates that on November 3, 2005, the employee asked to change the percentages on her 403(b) and 457 plans, and Brown responded the same day that she would make the change. However, by February 10, 2006, the change still had not been made, and Johnson had to email another human resources employee to have the change made while Brown was out on leave. 8 An e-mail chain in the record reflects that, in June 2006, a former Northside vice president, Ken Kenton, began calling about a retroactive lump sum payment of $4,000 he said Brown had calculated he would receive. Johnson asked Brown about the payment, and Brown demonstrated the calculation to him. However, when Johnson inquired with legal counsel and with Principal, he learned that the pension plan did not contain a provision for such a retroactive annuity payment. Johnson averred that Northside was bound by the “quote” made by Brown and had to “tap[ ] its reserve assets to make [Kenton] whole” due to Brown’s misquote. Brown denied calculating the retroactive payment, stating that she merely provided the information to Principal to make the calculation. She did not recall whether she told Kenton he could receive a retroactive payment, but admitted that it was her understanding at the time that employees could get retroactive payments. 6 and gave her a letter signed by Johnson and Ruffin stating that her transfer request was accepted. The letter explained, however, that if Brown did not secure a position in another department by March 31, 2006, she would be terminated for cause. The letter listed a number of mistakes Brown recently had made, including: (1) failing to promptly process a payroll matter for an employee as promised; (2) failing to secure coverage during her absence; (3) failing to set up an “out of office” reply on her e-mail account while she was out for several weeks; (4) not allowing benefits staff to have authorization and access to reports and to set up payroll deductions in her absence, resulting in participants not receiving deductions for several pay periods;9 (5) giving an undistributed survey to an ineligible human resources employee; (6) failing to give advance notice of working half days when she returned from medical leave; (7) listing projects she would work on without receiving directions from her supervisor; and (8) asking another employee to “give her the alphabet” the supervisor had assigned the other employee without talking to the supervisor. 9 In an affidavit, Ruffin averred that she instructed Brown to give other team members the passwords so they could access the 403(b) retirement database while Brown was on leave. However, Brown failed to comply with this instruction and instead decided to process the work from home. Emails in the record indicate that, in January 2006, Principal asked Brown for authorization so other employees could access certain reports and employee messages while Brown was on medical leave, and Brown responded that she would continue to check the message center from home and fax work in. Because of Brown’s decision, for two weeks the benefits department had no access to the 403(b) database and became aware there were problems when employees began calling and complaining that no one was responding to their requests. 7 In a March 2, 2006 letter, Brown disputed some of the mistakes in the February 28 letter, calling them “trumped allegations.” Brown stated that her “efforts to form an effective working relationship” with Ruffin were at an impasse because Ruffin had made it clear she preferred a “‘younger team’” and had failed to share policy changes and departmental restructuring. Brown alleged that her supervisor did not want her in the department and that Brown was being forced out of Northside. Brown transferred to the human resources department at Northside’s Forsyth County facility. Although Brown worked with a Northside recruiter, she could not find another position within Northside by March 31, 2006, and the deadline was extended first to April 29, 2006 and then to June 30, 2006. Meanwhile, on April 20, 2006, Brown filed a charge of age discrimination with the Equal Employment Opportunity Commission (“EEOC”). On April 26, 2006, Brown sent a letter to Northside Vice-President Dwight Hill complaining of age discrimination. Northside enlisted the aid of an outside investigator to investigate Brown’s allegations. On May 12, 2006, the investigator concluded that no age discrimination had occurred. Despite two extensions, Brown was unable to get another Northside job and was terminated on June 30, 2006. Brown’s human resources position was filled by a woman in her mid-to-late thirties. 8