Opinion ID: 799606
Heading Depth: 2
Heading Rank: 4

Heading: Gross's Discharge

Text: The lawfulness of Gross's discharge implicates dual motivation analysis. Initially, the General Counsel must establish a prima facie case that protected conduct was a motivating factor in the employer's decision to fire. The burden then shifts to the employer to show, as an affirmative defense, that the discharge would have occurred in any event and for valid reasons. National Labor Relations Board v. S.E. Nichols, Inc., 862 F.2d 952, 957 (2d Cir.1988) (internal quotation marks omitted); accord Wright Line, 251 N.L.R.B. 1083, 1089 (1980), as clarified by Director, Office of Workers' Compensation Programs v. Greenwich Collieries, 512 U.S. 267, 276-78, 114 S.Ct. 2251, 129 L.Ed.2d 221 (1994). With regard to the first step in the analysis, the General Counsel established a prima facie case that Starbucks's discharge of Gross was substantially motivated by Gross's union activity. As noted, it is undisputed that Starbucks unlawfully sought to restrict employee unionization efforts through a number of discriminatory policies. From this, it was reasonable for the ALJ to infer that Starbucks possessed a general anti-union animus. In addition, it is undisputed that the company was aware of Gross's union activities, and it was reasonable for the ALJ to find that Gross's later performance reviews, and in particular the April 29 Update on Performance, were persuasive evidence of negative animus directed specifically toward Gross for those activities. This sufficed to make out a prima facie case. The ALJ, however, appears to have misapplied the second step of the burden-shifting analysis. As noted, at that step the issue is whether Starbucks would have fired Gross absent his union activity. Here, there was strong evidence that it would have done so. It is undisputed that Gross was, in many respects, a poor employee. Indeed, the ALJ found that the picture that emerges of Gross' work performance, in general, is one of an employee who worked infrequently, whose primary goal was to organize employees on behalf of the IWW and [who] was otherwise disengaged from the Starbucks employee culture. No Starbucks employee consistently worked as few hours as Gross from May 2005 up to the date of his discharge. In addition, Gross told employees and managers not to perform their assigned tasks, actions which two Members of the Board found were not protected by the Act. Finally, although some of Gross's low evaluation numbers might have been pretextual, many were related to legitimate deficiencies in his performance. In particular, the ALJ found that Gross did not meet company standards in other areas such as utilizing existing organizational methods to recognize coworkers, training new hires and communicating partner morale issues to store management. Moreover, the undisputed evidence shows that Gross was placed on notice of many of these deficiencies and did nothing to correct them. First, Gross was placed on notice as early as May of 2005 that he needed to participate in the employee awards program and that he needed to communicate more effectively with management. Despite this notice and repeated remarks to the same effect in subsequent evaluations, Gross never attempted to remedy these deficiencies. Second, it appears that Gross was aware as early as January 2006 that his low attendance was a problem, yet did little to correct it. Gross's January 29, 2006, performance review stated that he does not maintain adequate hours of availability, he has had little exposure to the seasonal lineup because he worked only infrequently, and he has not demonstrated that he has kept up his knowledge of current promotional items. Three months later, Gross's April 27, 2006, Update on Performance stated that [your] inadequate attendance record largely contributed to your inability to demonstrate several of the key responsibilities and core competencies of your barista position and that he would be terminated if he failed to improve in these areas. Thus, by late January 2006, and at the very latest by April 27, the documented evidence shows that Gross was on notice that Starbucks considered his low availability to be a serious performance issue. Gross, however, made little or no effort to increase his availability. Despite this evidence of poor performance, the ALJ determined that Starbucks would not have fired Gross absent his union activity because, [w]hile Gross may not have been a model employee, ... he was proficient in preparing beverages and customer service[,] ... [and h]is cash-handling skills were adequate. But an employer is entitled to conclude that preparing coffee drinks and making change does not insulate from discharge an employee who consistently fails to abide by legitimate store employment policies. Gross's documented performance deficiencies provide a sufficient and independent reason to fire him.