This HR executive spoke up against sexist work culture; the outcome was not what she expected

By Sara Yahia

The sun was already punishingly hot when I stepped out of the air-conditioned office, my abaya clinging to my arms, my head scarf pinned precisely in place. I could feel the sweat crawling down my spine, but the heat wasn’t what made me breathless. It was the weight of a decision I had quietly made.

It had taken four years to get to this moment. Four years of adapting to a system I wasn’t raised in, but still understood and respected. I moved from USA to Qatar alone, bringing experience, ambition, and a suitcase packed with resolve. I felt both familiar and foreign, connected by language and history, yet alienated by unspoken rules.

I quickly rose to become a senior HR operations director, a title that seemed powerful until it wasn’t. My direct supervisor was well-liked. Friendly. A respectful man, people said. But behind closed doors, the reality was suffocating.

He would call me into his office for no reason. Ask about my personal life, pushing his glasses up every few seconds with his index finger. Compliment my clothes, my smile, and the way I walk.

“You’re too elegant to be alone here,” he once said, smiling like he thought he was charming.

He offered to drive me home. He showed up uninvited at my office door, leaning in too closely, his scent heavy with too much cologne.

Worse than the inappropriate behaviour was the way he chipped away at my authority.

Like a snake sizing up its prey, he’d sideline my decisions, exclude me from meetings, and work with other department heads behind my back to undermine my role.

Projects I initiated would be handed off without my input. He made moves designed to disempower me, as if it were a game of dominance. I had more education, more experience, more international exposure, but none of that mattered next to his connections.

I began documenting everything: each message, each incident, each time he crossed the line. The lines weren’t blurry; they were clear and bold, drawn in red.

When I finally gathered the courage to report him, I wasn’t afraid. I was prepared. I believed in systems. In structure. In right and wrong. I brought the evidence to the vice-president of human resources, a man who walked on eggshells so delicately it was a wonder he ever got anywhere.

He nodded through our meeting, never meeting my eyes. “He’s a friend of the CEO,” he said with a shrug. “My hands are tied.”

Still, I pushed forward. I sent the same documentation to the CEO. He never replied.

As American scholar Catharine MacKinnon has long argued, legal systems often set a high burden of proof for victims while offering protection to perpetrators.

The CEO was slick, one of those men who could talk his way through a scandal while smiling for a camera. He had manoeuvred the previous CEO out of the role, surrounding himself with people who looked, thought, and spoke exactly like him. It was a cartel.

When I emailed the chairman, I was surprised to get a response. A meeting was scheduled. I arrived early and sat in the waiting area outside his office. That’s when I heard him yelling at his assistant, using the kind of tone you might reserve for a disobedient dog. When I was finally called in, he didn’t stand to greet me. He stayed seated, eyes glued to his screen. Then he looked up and scanned me slowly from my toes to my head. His smirk made my stomach turn.

Still, I gave him the benefit of the doubt. I laid out the evidence calmly and clearly. Everything (screenshots, emails, dates, times) was organised in a neat folder. He listened in silence.

“Who is your direct supervisor?” he asked. When I answered, he didn’t react. He turned his head slightly and gestured for the chief human resources officer (CHRO), who had been sitting quietly in the corner, to leave the room with me. No words were exchanged, just a flick of the head, like a silent command. The CHRO stood up, then, with a hand gesture, directed me to the door before leaving without a glance.

To my surprise, there was no investigation. No follow-up. Nothing changed.

I realised then that silence wasn’t an oversight; it was a choice they made.

Psychologist Jennifer Freyd calls this “institutional betrayal,” when the very system you trust to protect you ends up protecting the wrongdoers instead.

That same week, I began preparing for my exit, secretly applying for jobs, refining my resume, and searching for a new direction elsewhere. But even that journey was laced with the same poison. At interview after interview, men asked if I was married, if I wanted to go out. One asked if I liked romantic movies. Another invited me to dinner instead of offering a job.

And through it all, I continued to dress with respect, covered, polished, professional, in keeping with the local customs.

It’s important to clarify that the Qatari nationals I worked with were respectful, dignified and professional. The problem wasn’t the locals. It was the foreign Arab executive men who had built a toxic subculture within a culture not their own. They weren’t upholding local values; they were exploiting the system to protect each other.

Corporate America isn’t better. Harassment and misconduct absolutely happen in the US too, and victims or whistleblowers also suffer consequences for speaking up. The difference is that the pushback tends to be stronger, faster, louder and more visible. We saw it with the #MeToo movement, and it plays out daily on our screens even now.

The turning point came one weekday afternoon. I had just left another fruitless meeting where my report was dismissed. As I walked back to my office, I passed by my supervisor laughing with the VP of HR, as if nothing had happened. I paused mid-step. Something in me broke.

As novelist Alice Walker said, “The most common way people give up their power is by thinking they don’t have any.”

I walked into my office, closed the door, and opened my laptop. My resignation letter was short and direct. My heart was calm. My hands didn’t shake. It wasn’t fear I felt; it was a sense of freedom.

Leaving wasn’t easy. I had built a life in Qatar. I had tried so hard to make it work. But what is a life where your voice echoes unanswered? What is success when silence is the cost?

When I returned home to the USA, everything shifted with new opportunities coming my way. Work found me. My expertise was recognised. I was quoted in magazines. My words mattered.

The world wants us to believe the grass is greener elsewhere. But I’ve seen the other side. The shine fades quickly when the roots are rotten.

That day, I didn’t just leave a job; I left a place that thrived on silencing people like me. At the time, it didn’t feel brave. It felt like survival. I see it now… that experience was the best bad thing that ever happened to me. It was the day I took my voice back.

Sara Yahia is a globally awarded HR leader, author of four books and a DEI advocate who has worked in Spain, New York and Qatar before consulting in the US. Fluent in four languages, she’s also a cultural commentator, columnist and film/TV critic. Her hobbies include flying planes, skiing, horse riding and playing the piano, while recently adding learning the qanun to the mix.