$11.5 million!
That’s the number a jury needed to send a very loud, very clear message to the Society for Human Resource Management — the self-proclaimed standard-bearer of HR “best practices.”
Last week’s verdict against SHRM — $1.5 million in compensatory damages and a staggering $10 million in punitive damages — is not just a legal loss. It’s an institutional indictment. When the organization that tells the rest of us how to run fair, lawful, ethical workplaces gets hit for racial discrimination and retaliation, the problem is bigger than one terminated instructional designer.
This case was always going to be about credibility. Rehab Mohamed told SHRM’s leadership — up to and including CEO Johnny Taylor — that she believed she was experiencing race discrimination and retaliation. According to testimony, the investigation that followed was conducted by someone who had taken exactly one training on HR investigations and couldn’t remember a single thing from it. That’s not “best practice.” That’s barely practice at all.
Johnny Taylor testified that he wasn’t involved in the termination. But leadership isn’t just about who signs the paperwork. It’s about the culture you create, the accountability you demand, and the seriousness with which you treat allegations of discrimination in your own house.
And that’s the part SHRM still hasn’t reckoned with. This verdict didn’t happen in a vacuum. Over the past few years we’ve seen headlines about draconian attendance rules, “conservative” dress codes banning sequins, and internal meetings where Taylor reportedly called staff “entitled,” “complacent,” and “sloppy.” Add in multiple discrimination complaints revealed during discovery, and a not-so-great picture starts to form.
SHRM’s statement after the verdict insists that it “acted with integrity, transparency, and in full alignment with our values.” The jury thought otherwise. So does the court of public opinion.
SHRM will of course appeal. But appeals don’t fix culture. Appeals don’t repair trust. And appeals don’t change the growing perception that the organization preaching workplace excellence isn’t even coming close to modeling it.
For the rest of the corporate world, there’s a bigger lesson here: If you hold yourself out as the expert, you don’t get to cut corners. You don’t get to ignore complaints. You don’t get to forget your training. And you don’t get to tell others to do things you won’t do yourself.
When you sell “best practices” but deliver “barely practices”, juries start adding commas to the consequences. Just ask SHRM.
