My experience with a Weinstein-type

By Helen Mackenzie

It was the late 80s, early 90s when I had my first encounter of a Weinstein-type character. What followed was something I had pushed to the back of my mind, but in the last year, it has come back with full force; it’s not quite #metoo in that I wasn’t personally abused, but I was targeted for standing up for those who were. I took a job in Invoice Finance, a specific type of business funding—the job came with a car so I thought it sounded okay!—and reported to the Operations Director, a man who sexually harassed the young girls in the office in the worst way. As a director, he targeted the girls who were afraid of his status. He was known to stop in laybys if he took anyone out on a business meeting and try it on there; often at industry events, he would try and get into colleagues’ rooms for one excuse or another; he regularly bragged about his affairs while married.

I was privy to conversations I now see were completely unacceptable, however at the time, I didn’t flinch because it was so normal—what I did flinch at was his behaviour with the girls in the office. I was very vocal about this. We had an uncomfortable working relationship: I remember travelling to Manchester on business with him—by the time we got to the hotel we were staying in he stormed off (thankfully—as it meant I didn’t need to spend the evening with him) because I refused to tell him I would be interested in him as a partner. The conversation went on so long with him pushing and pushing that the final statement from me was virtually shouting ‘even if you were the very last man on earth and I was the last woman there’s not a ******* chance I would be interested in you!’ I was a feisty 20-something and had been warned about his behaviour—as a result he wasn’t able to frighten me, however it wasn’t the same for the other girls in the office. 

As a result of my vocal disagreement of this man’s behaviour, I went very quickly from ‘golden girl’  in the first couple of years of working there to ‘targeted girl’, and there began a sustained attack on every aspect of my job until I had enough and resigned. Funnily enough, I then had a bizarre phone call from my boss who, after a sustained year of making my life hell, was now telling me the company I was going to was bust, it wouldn’t last and I could change my mind in my previous job: obviously I politely refused the offer! Why is this coming back to haunt me since the #metoo movement and the furore surrounding Weinstein and others like him?  Well, it was what happened afterwards.

I felt so strongly about the behaviour I had witnessed and been told about by colleagues that I wrote a five page letter to the CEO of the company’s parent company (a respected bank in London) and I had testimony from one of his victims freely given. I held onto this for a week and in the end I didn’t send it—I did nothing. Why didn’t you send it, I hear you cry! The same as I have heard said over and over again about the old cases being reported now: ‘if this was happening as these women say, why weren’t they reported then, why didn’t other people report it, why did no-one do anything?’ I am as ashamed now as I was then for not sending that letter. Why didn’t I? Because I had watched this man ruin careers—I had seen people hand their notice in and suddenly their new job offers were rescinded with rumours of him scuppering them with stories of the employee being a drunk or such like. I didn’t send it because of self-preservation; of the fear he would ruin my career which was on the up and going well. I am still ashamed of this and it has come back to haunt me; but at that time I was frightened and I bottled it, but it has never sat comfortably since. 

So, when people shout about why didn’t they report these things then, why didn’t people stop it then—it was a time when this behaviour was enabled (everyone including the MD was aware of this man’s behaviour) and it was a time when you probably wouldn’t be believed, when the big corporate legal machine would have crushed the young girls who were harassed. We were much more accepting of lewd behaviour and lewd comments as a generation, especially in this male-orientated sector and we felt it was just the way things were. There is a positive end to this story—this man was sacked on the spot at around 2am at an industry dinner for the same behaviour and has not been seen since in that sector, however this was at a different organisation and years later; in all the years he was at the previous company where we worked together his behaviour was enabled and swept under the carpet. The #metoo movement means that women now don’t have to just accept that this is just the way things are and that as far as I’m concerned is a huge move forward. ■