Microsoft shareholders back protest vote over sexual harassment claims

Enlarge / The shareholder revolt comes in the shadow of recent cases and the revelation that co-founder Bill Gates had a relationship with a company employee. (credit: Jeff Pachoud | Getty Images)

Microsoft's shareholders have backed a protest vote calling on the company to reveal more about its handling of sexual harassment claims, in the shadow of recent cases and the revelation that co-founder Bill Gates had a relationship with a company employee.

The call amounted to a rare vote against management at the company's annual shareholder meeting and brought an immediate promise from Microsoft of more transparency. However, the company stopped short of saying it would reveal details about individual cases, and it did not make any commitment to reopen its handling of cases from previous years.

The shareholder revolt followed years of complaints from some workers that the company had brushed pervasive claims of harassment under the carpet. Arjuna Capital, which submitted the shareholder proposal challenging management, said Microsoft's human resources department upheld only one claim against the group out of a total of 238 that were included in a class-action lawsuit alleging discrimination and harassment in 2012.

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