Ordinary Magic, Extraordinary Risk: The Feedback Loops Behind Hostile Work Claims

By the time you’re defending your company against an employment discrimination lawsuit, you may realize too late that what was invisible to your C-suite could wreak calamitous (and public) consequences for your company. In Ordinary Magic, psychologist Gregory Walton’s recent explainer on how small changes will cause big impacts, Walton describes how relationships can evolve (or devolve) through feedback loops. Simple interactions—Walton’s examples being a quick comment during a Zoom meeting, or an inside joke shared in a professional group chat—can place “a big question on the table—about identity, belonging, or adequacy…which looms, latent and inactive, but present.” That big question gets bigger, grows teeth, and becomes hungry. An employee or manager, trying to understand and answer the big question, might “read the room for answers, drawing negative inferences from ambiguous evidence. [They’re] distracted from the task at hand. [Their] pessimistic hypothesis becomes more entrenched.” Then they act on the pessimistic hypothesis, which only amplifies the situation. The feedback loop of drawing negative inferences and acting upon them (which begets more interactions that support negative inferences) Walton calls “spiraling down.” Spiraling down is influenced by construal—the way someone interprets the world, and how they pick up relevant themes while screening out perceived extraneous information.

What if an employee construes spiral down events differently than the company’s decisionmaker? What if that employee resigns and brings a claim for a hostile work environment or harassment—well after the employer’s chances for positive intervention or comprehensive investigation have disappeared? “[H]ostile work environment claims alleging pervasive harassment are designed to remedy ‘the cumulative effect of a thousand cuts,’ and acts ‘which are not individually actionable’ but ‘may be aggregated to make out a claim.’”¹ While “the Supreme Court’s cases in the arena have taken a middle path between making actionable conduct that is merely offensive and requiring conduct to cause a tangible psychological injury,”² courts must “view the record as a whole picture” because “a play cannot be understood on the basis of some of its scenes but only on its entire performance.”³

“Simple teasing, offhand comments, and isolated incidents” aren’t proof enough because they do not “amount to discriminatory changes in the terms and conditions of employment.”⁴ Take, for example, Judge McHugh’s October 30, 2025, decision in the matter of Williams v. Marriott/Hilton-Davidson Hosp., 2025 U.S. Dist. LEXIS 213862 (E.D. Pa. Oct. 30, 2025). Jaleesa Williams, pro se, asserted a hostile work environment claim against her former employer. Ms. Williams alleged that an interaction regarding a group holiday photo led to Ms. Williams being excluded, ostracized, and the subject of gossip, bullying, microaggressions, and other unwelcome conduct that impacted her ability to successfully develop in her role. Ms. Williams reported the situation to the general manager who allegedly directed Ms. Williams not to file a formal complaint with HR and promised the situation would be resolved without needing further action. She alleged that she felt forced to resign and was escorted out the same day despite requesting a two-week resignation transition period. She claimed that other colleagues of different racial background were not similarly treated.

Judge McHugh dismissed Ms. Williams’ hostile work environment without prejudice and with leave to amend. When constructive discharge based on a hostile work environment is alleged, plaintiffs must additionally prove that a reasonable person would have felt compelled to resign because the plaintiff’s working conditions were objectively intolerable. This requires proof that the employer “knowingly permitted objectively intolerable conditions.”⁵ Courts in the Third Circuit consider different factors in determining if an employee’s resignation was forced, including “whether she (1) was threatened with discharge; (2) was encouraged to resign; (3) was demoted or suffered a reduction in pay or benefits; (4) was involuntarily transferred to a less desirable position; (5) had job responsibilities altered or (6) began receiving unsatisfactory job evaluations.”⁶ While some of the alleged statements directed to Ms. Williams—that she should “stay in her place” and “be quiet”—may be race-neutral on their face, Judge McHugh warned that depending on their context, they may also support a claim of discrimination.⁷ Seeing the invisible spirals that employees and supervisors use to make inferences about the other is key to understanding the facts at issue in an employment discrimination lawsuit. Meeting the threshold for proving a hostile work environment claim based on statements may not be easy, but by the time you’re defending yourself in court, the cost to your business, tangible or otherwise, may be punishing.

But worry not, because “if our struggles arise, in part, from the inference we draw, we have an opportunity” for positive change. And so, Walton explains, “by learning what people see clearly, how they read situations, we can learn what questions guide their view.” Recognizing negative feedback loops or downward spirals in action can protect your company’s success now and in the future. The risk of an adverse judgment dangles over the head of all litigants, but is amplified where the decisionmakers are specifically being asked to look at context and perspective—which could be invisible, or superimposed after the fact. Businesses might consider consulting with an employment and labor litigator about feedback methods that can successfully foster clear communication between management and employees, or how to assure that important context isn’t missed before it’s too late.

1 Gurcak v. Ctr. For Victims, 2024 U.S. Dist. LEXIS 42567 at *13 (W.D. Pa. 2024)(citing O’Connor v. City of Newark, 440 F. 3d 125 (3d Cir. 2006).
2 Stallworth v. Weiblinger’s Residential Care, Inc., 2025 U.S. Dist. LEXIS 186495 * 14 (W.D. Pa. 2025) (citing Harris v. Forklift Sys., 510 U.S. 17, 21 (1993))
3 Id. at *15.
4 Stallworth, supra, at *14.
5 Id. at *8.
6 Id. at *9 (quoting Colwell v. Rite Aid Corp., 602 F.3d 49 (3d Cir. 2010)).
7 Id. at *10-11.