Note to your male employees: Working for female supervisors doesn’t guarantee you a gender-bias claim if you get canned for poor performance. A recent federal appeals court ruling proves the point.

The case involved an employee of an investment firm. He appeared to struggle in his job from the beginning – in his first review, his supervisor, a woman, rated his overall performance as “needs improvement.”

And things seemed to go downhill from there. His second review, just six months later, was even more critical. He was issued a written warning for unexcused absences. Finally, after continued poor performance, he was fired.

He sued, alleging gender bias.

His supervisor had withheld essential training, he said, and he was subjected to a hostile work environment that included his manager’s undeserved “belittling and criticism.” He claimed his supervisor was “out to get him because he was male.”

But the judge wasn’t buying it. The key was the man’s own testimony that he was “subjected to hostility that other male and female employees did not receive.” So he couldn’t prove his treatment was connected to gender.

Cite: Hawks v. J.P.  Morgan