Sacked Nine boss Amanda Paterson is suing the media company, claiming she was wrongfully dismissed after 31 years of service.
Ms Paterson was dismissed from her role as news director of Nine’s operations in Brisbane, Gold Coast and Darwin on November 7.
Last week she launched legal proceedings against Nine Entertainment and news and current affairs director Fiona Dear, claiming damages arising from wrongful termination. The Australian reported.
On the day she was fired by Nine, Ms Paterson was asked to attend a brief meeting with Ms Dear, who appeared via video link in Sydney and told her her employment was being terminated with immediate effect.
She was then escorted out of the office without a chance to say goodbye to staff or collect her puppy from her office, which was there as part of Nine’s workplace pet policy.
An HR worker later gave her the puppy outside the office.
Ms Paterson was reportedly told she was being dismissed as a result of three alleged workplace breaches.
This included failing to complete ‘training modules’, the poor handling of the contract renewal of one of her employees and an office incident in which she light-heartedly referred to a recent removal of ‘bastards’ from the company.
Amanda Paterson was reportedly told she was being fired as a result of three alleged workplace violations
Fiona Dear is said to have told Ms Paterson that her employment was being terminated with immediate effect
Ms Paterson had been with Nine for 31 years and joined the company at the age of 19.
She was not told that her axing had anything to do with Nine’s recent cultural review, nor is it suggested otherwise.
The report, published on October 17, found that Nine’s embattled media empire had ‘a systemic problem with abuse of power and authority; bullying, discrimination and harassment; and sexual harassment’.
Ms Paterson had been with Nine for 31 years and joined the company at the age of 19
More than 120 past and present employees participated in the evaluation and reported their own experiences of inappropriate workplace behavior within the company.
The survey found that 57 percent of staff in the media company’s broadcast division had experienced bullying, discrimination or harassment in the past five years, while a third said they had been sexually harassed in the same period.
The company’s toxic culture was enabled by “a lack of accountability from leadership; power imbalances; gender inequality and a lack of diversity; and significant distrust in leaders at all levels of the company,” the report said.
Nine’s board said the report had made 22 recommendations to reset the company’s culture and that it had committed to implementing all of them.
But angry staff said the recommendations did little to address the very personal complaints raised during the investigation, and took no action against those who had behaved inappropriately.