Miki Agrawal, the co-founder founder and CEO (although she calls herself She-EO) of Thinx, a company that makes period-proof underwear, has been accused of sexually harassing her co-workers.
The latest accusation comes from a former co-worker, who headed the company’s Public Relations who filed a complaint to the City of New York Commission on Human Rights. The employee has alleged that Agrawal ‘groped her employees’ breasts, talked at length about her sex life, changed frequently in front of her employees and Face Timed them from the toilet and while apparently naked in bed.’
The complaints also describe Thinx, as a place that thrives on a culture of fear and a pattern of ageism. In addition to Agrawal, who recently stepped down as CEO (a story originally published by Jezebel, the CFO and COO have also been named for failing to address repeated complaints about Agrawal’s behaviour.
In an article written in US-based magazine Racked, several employees have also alleged that despite the company’s feminist branding and mission, the women who worked there felt exploited by low pay and substandard benefits. The complaint notes that the only two employees who had evidently successfully negotiated higher salaries were men.
According to the Racked article, 10 of the company’s 35 employees have left since January (a Thinx spokesperson says the number is lower but declined to specify); several others departed either voluntarily or were fired last year by Agrawal, whom staffers described as erratic, retaliatory, and extraordinarily difficult to work for.
However, in an article written in Medium, Agrawal , while addressing her stepping down as CEO of the company, said that her biggest mistake was not focusing on human resources. “We grew so quickly and I didn’t hire an HR person (it was hard to rationalise hiring an HR person at the time with only 15 employees and then all of a sudden we were 30 people). All of a sudden, health insurance, vacation days, benefits and maternity leave were brought up and when you’re a start-up and you’re growing and moving so fast, to sit down and get an HR person and think about those things were left to the bottom of the pile of things to get done,” she said, adding that she was one of the three women in the company who got pregnant during this period.
After the post, Agrawal was also contacted by New York magazine to address the allegations of sexual harassment, which she denied. Agrawal also denied the breast-touching and other alleged misbehavior to Malone, saying that Thinx is an open and free-ranging workplace and that conversations were being taken out of context.
