“It’s just not a good fit,” he chirped at me from across the desk.

My periphery began to close in, until all I could see was his smug face, and the marching band behind his eyes, celebrating his momentous win.

I’d like to say that I was shocked he was firing me. But his behavior had crushed my confidence so much that it was almost a relief that he was finally saying these words.

The final straw for him had occurred a few days before when he had embarrassed himself in front of our CEO — and I happened to be there to save the situation.

He couldn’t even look at me anymore. 

He had to get rid of me.

It’s not fitness. It’s life.

In my mid 20s, I took a job at Equinox — you know, the luxury fitness brand whose marketing resembles a mixture of Versace and Cirque de Soleil with a hint of orgy:

They hired me to run one of their clubs on the Upper East Side of Manhattan, and for the first 9 months of my tenure with the company, I was pretty damn happy.

My first boss at Equinox was sharp, friendly, and supportive. My colleagues brought bounds of energy to work every day, and were truly great at their jobs.

And it turned out, I was pretty great at my job, too—

Being a large corporation, Equinox conducted a structured series of “reviews” for managers in their first year. I smashed all of my reviews out of the park, with the most senior executives commenting that I would go really far with the company.

I felt lucky. 

It was a fun place to work. Tons of laughter and high-fives. And I had continuous validation that I was thriving there.

But then my boss got a promotion, and was on her way to Canada to expand our saucy brand into The Great White North. I was thrilled for her.

Until I met her replacement. Let’s call him Roger.

Roger had been with Equinox for about five years, and I soon learned, would do everything possible to avoid even being in the same room with me.

Overnight, the fun, friendly, and supportive Equinox culture flipped on its head.

Turns out, he hated women.

Anytime I approached Roger, he whipped out his Blackberry and began feverishly typing — pretending to be too busy to talk to me.

He cancelled all of our 1:1 meetings at the last minute, or sometimes just didn’t show up at all.

And he never said anything nice to me. Every comment was some nitpicky criticism, masked with “I’m just trying to help you get better.”

When he first arrived, he conducted a “360 Review”, where he asked the eight department managers who reported to me to bluntly review my performance.

They all gave me perfect scores, except one — who gave me a nearly perfect score.

I was beyond thrilled with those results, but he spent the entire meeting making me feel like shit about the one manager who only thought I was a “nearly perfect” boss. 🙄

And when I asked for a copy of the review, he said it was “company property”.

I knew in my gut that this guy was gunning for me, and I had to get out of there—

But I horribly miscalculated how this situation needed to be handled.

👉 I didn’t confront Roger about his behavior.

👉 I didn’t complain about my treatment to HR, or the gaggle of executives who had shown support for my career at Equinox.

👉 And I didn’t seek advice from mentors outside of the company.

Instead, I typed a gentle email to the VP of Operations asking for a transfer to a different club (outside of Rogers’s purview). 

The reason I gave was that I wanted to “experience a different operation to better position myself for upward mobility with the company.”

I didn’t mention anything about Roger’s baffling behavior, because at that time, I thought Roger’s beef was just with me— 

And it was important to not come across as a squeaky wheel who circumvents the chain of command to bitch about her boss.

But my request went unanswered, and the situation just got worse.

Female department managers began showing up to my office in tears because of the way Roger was treating them. Like me, they were scared for their jobs, despite their consistently high performance.

And some male colleagues even noticed that they were receiving preferential treatment, privately expressing their disgust of Roger’s behavior to me behind closed doors.

But my fear of complaining held me back from taking action — and it really screwed me.

It really screwed everyone.

The death tour

Every year, Equinox’s CEO, Harvey Spevak, would set out on a grand tour of every club in the brand’s portfolio. We received notice a few days in advance, and Roger downplayed it to me.

“You don’t really need to be here for it,” he said. “Sometimes he can be really late. You don’t need to wait around. I can handle it.”

F*ck that. I wasn’t going to miss my opportunity to meet the CEO and show off my club.

When Harvey arrived, he engaged me in more personal conversation than Roger ever had, asking about my background, and how I came to work for Equinox.

Then the discussion turned to business, and he began directing some questions to Roger.

Roger didn’t have the answers — but I did.

I stayed quiet as he stumbled through some vague responses that didn’t answer the questions that Harvey had asked, digging himself into an embarrassing hole.

Finally, I meekly offered Harvey the answers he was looking for.

That was the nail in my coffin.

A few days later, Roger fired me. 

No reasons were given other than “it’s just not a good fit,” and when I pushed back, he said that he had received a bunch of complaints about me, but couldn’t tell me who complained or what they complained about.

Wait — I’m the liability?

I physically felt my brain function plummet. My hands went numb. My stomach knotted tighter than Tyson’s fist.

I walked out of the building and immediately called one of Equinox’s senior executives (who I had just had dinner with the previous evening) to tell him I had been fired.

“WHAT?!” he shouted on the phone, “That’s insane!”.

Thus began a dizzying back-and-forth with HR people, execs, and colleagues, resulting in a very hard lesson—

The minute you’re no longer an “employee,” you’re a threat.

It doesn’t matter how beloved you were, how many metrics you crushed, or how many crying women had shown up to your office with stories to corroborate the discrimination you experienced— 

Once you’re out: 

And companies don’t protect liabilities — they manage them.

Which is why you should take this advice very seriously:

Document. F*cking. Everything.

👉 That abusive email from your boss? Screenshot it. 

👉 The canceled 1:1’s? Log them. 

👉 The inappropriate behavior? Promptly put it all in an email to yourself with both your personal and work email addresses copied.

👉 And depending on your local laws, consider privately recording your conversations.

Because when things go sideways — which will happen faster than you expect — your memory won’t be enough.

Documentation will.

And even though this next one is the hardest thing to do—

Speak up early. Not when the wheels are already coming off.

It’s dramatically easier to address discrimination when you’re still on the inside — not after you’ve been escorted out, sheepishly carrying a banker's box of your coffee mugs and desk plants. 

Throughout my whole experience with Roger, I thought I was protecting my reputation by being diplomatic. I wanted to figure out a way to get myself out of the situation without having to confront his behavior.

But I was actually allowing a toxic asshole to bully everyone. I wasn’t just silent — I was complicit. 

I let him win. 

If you’re ever in this situation, don’t repeat my mistake.

Cheers! 🍻

-Kristin :-)

P.S. — I’ve had great bosses, both male and female. And I’ve had terrible bosses, both male and female. But this is the only time I ever experienced true gender discrimination at work. It really sucked.