Panda Express staff ‘made to strip at work team-building event’

23-year-old Panda Express cashier said she was filmed and that others stared at her body

Panda Express chain restaurant in Middletown, DE, on July 26, 2019. (AFP via Getty Images)

Panda Express employees allegedly had to strip down to their underwear during a work team-building event dubbed as a “self-improvement” seminar where they were told to talk about their weaknesses with colleagues and were berated by session leaders.

When a male co-worker started crying as he was asked to strip, a female cashier and the man were told to "hug it out" while still in their underwear. The 23-year-old woman said she was filmed and that others stared at her body.

She filed a lawsuit against the company last month. The four-day seminar which took place in 2019 “more and more resembled a cult initiation ritual as time went on,” according to the 13-page lawsuit filed in a Los Angeles court.

Her lawyer Oscar Ramirez told The Washington Post: “This was called a ‘trust-building’ exercise, but it was opposite of building trust. It required employees to subject themselves to dehumanizing activities in order to prove their loyalty to the company.”

In a statement to The Post, Panda Express say they're taking the allegations "very seriously" and that they're investigating what happened.

A spokesperson for the company added to the paper: “We do not condone the kind of behaviour described in the lawsuit, and it is deeply concerning to us. We are committed to providing a safe environment for all associates and stand behind our core values to treat each person with respect."

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Panda Express said they have no connections to the Alive Seminars and Coaching Academy who ran the events. They told The Orange County Register in a statement that their seminars are presented with respect and dignity.

The cashier had worked at the Panda Express location in Santa Clarita, California for less than three years when she learned of the training sessions, according to the lawsuit. Her manager said she would only be considered for promotion if she took part in the seminars.

Mr Ramirez told The Washington Post that the cashier had to attend the events in her own free time and that she had to borrow hundreds of dollars from relatives to pay for them.

She was making $11.35 an hour at the time.

On the first day of the sessions, her cellphone was taken from her, she was forced to strip and to go into a room with blacked-out windows. The leader of the seminar, attended only by Panda Express workers, shouted at them that they amounted to "nothing".

The lawsuit said that “the atmosphere resembled less a self-improvement seminar than a site for off-the-books interrogation of terrorist suspects".

During one of the days, they were asked to act as if they were on a sinking ship and only four of them would survive, the lawsuit said. On the following day, they were filmed as they were told to act as if a light was coming from above to remove their "negative energy".

Mr Ramirez argued that the forced stripping and hug constituted sexual battery and a hostile work environment.

Panda Express denied to The Post that employees had to take part in the seminars or that they were required to be promoted.

The lawsuit says briefing materials included the company logo and that workers had to supply session leaders with their company ID numbers.

Mr Ramirez added: “Panda Express is on the hook because they were fully aware of what was going on".

The Independent has reached out to Panda Express for comment.