KNOW, the Magazine for Paralegals Spring 2014 | Page 6

In fact, according to one source,
there is a proposal in the UK that
puts forth that obese claimants
could see their benefits reduced
or increased according to how
often they attempt to work out.

KNOW Business
Weight! Weight! Are you
sabotaging your career?

By Chere Estrin

H

ave you ever considered that those extra
pounds that sneaked
up when you were just
“having an extra bite”
might be holding your career
back?
Some years ago when I worked
for a major Los Angeles law firm,
the Director of Administration
asked me to lunch. Since this was
rarely done for non-attorneys in
those days, I was delighted. He
took me to the Yorkshire Grill
where he insisted that I have the
pastrami sandwich piled high on
rye bread along with a generous
helping of potato salad. Who can
refuse their boss? Career buster
for sure.

After lunch, he hit me with
“You’re doing a great job here.”
Wow. I liked that. “However,” he
proceeded, “if you’re going to succeed, you’ll have to lose weight.”
To this day, I could tell you exactly
where we were standing, what
I was wearing and the time he
gave me the news.
What many employees fail to
recognize is that this is a new
workplace. We are, rightly or
wrongly, visually judged everywhere: Facebook, Instagram,
LinkedIn. Then there are the
constant pictures from iphones,
iPads, emails, websites, videos
and more. We’re no longer a
society floating in a world of the
anonymous. We are judged not
only by who we are but unfortunately, how we look.
6

Robin Thompson, Chairperson
of the Association of Litigation
Support Professionals, knows first
-hand about weight discrimination. She’s lost 200 pounds. “As
a thin person,” she says, “I am
greeted with much more friendliness and taken more seriously. I
have even had people c