Former Microsoft manager made €13m in shares

A former senior manager with computer giant Microsoft's Irish operation, who claims she was constructively dismissed, has agreed before the High Court that she made some €13 million profit on stock options in the company during her 13 years' employment.

Breda Pickering also agreed yesterday that she had essentially turned down an offer of promotion with the company. She further agreed she had proposed working for a period in early 2001 from Spain, where she has a holiday home. However, she did not pursue that idea after her superior sought details about the value of that proposal to the company and queried how she would manage a division of some 350 people in Ireland from there.

Ms Pickering, who joined the company in 1988 and whose employment was terminated in summer 2001, was being cross-examined by Paul Sreenan SC, for Microsoft Ireland Operations Ltd, in the continuing hearing of her action before Mr Justice Esmond Smyth.

She is seeking damages for alleged negligence, breach of contract, failure to get her redundancy entitlements and stock options, and personal injuries allegedly sustained as a result of having a "nervous breakdown" after being "frozen out" by the company from late 2000.

Yesterday, Mr Justice Smyth rejected an application by lawyers for Ms Pickering to strike out Microsoft's defence arising from a delay in discovery of relevant documents. Earlier, Mr Sreenan had apologised for the deficiencies in the discovery process.

While he was satisfied certain e-mails should have been disclosed sooner and that the discovery was inadequate, the judge said he was not satisfied there was any wilful refusal by Microsoft to comply with the discovery order. The supplemental discovery came about at the instance of Microsoft.

Mr Sreenan then cross-examined Ms Pickering about her counsel's claim that June 1999 marked the beginning of Ms Pickering being "frozen out" of the company, when she was told the US-based and Ireland-based localisation divisions of Microsoft were being amalgamated. She was then director of the Dublin-based localisation division.

Ms Pickering said her direct superior had told her in June 1999 he wanted a unified localisation structure and had asked her if she would be interested in carrying out the role of worldwide localisation manager. She agreed he told her the job would be based in Redmond, USA. She regarded that as a firm job offer.

She had spent six weeks in the US, spending time in Redmond and doing a road trip. When she returned, she had told her superior she would like to have the job but be based in Ireland instead. She was concerned she had nothing concrete. She believed the matter was then put on hold and the location of the post was open to discussion.

She did not recollect saying she would not move to Redmond. If she had been firmly offered the job in 1999 or 2000 and told it had to be Redmond-based, she would have taken it if pushed.

She was later told by her superior in autumn 2000 that he had appointed another woman to the post and she accepted that decision. She agreed that, in effect, she had turned down the position because she had not moved to Redmond.

She said she felt "out of the loop", "undermined" and "isolated" because of the management style of the new worldwide localisation manager.

When the new manager had reviewed Ms Pickering's position in February 2001, that manager remarked Ms Pickering was "losing visibility" in the group, but it was the manager who was taking her visibility away, Ms Pickering said. She had raised concerns with the manager, who had said she would address them.

She agreed she had proposed to her manager to be based in Spain, where she had a holiday home, for a period in 2001. She proposed using Spain as a base to visit Microsoft operations in Europe, in light of her expanded responsibilities regarding Europe. She did not see it as a "vacation period".

Her manager had asked her to outline her goals regarding the Spanish proposal and what would happen to her team in Ireland if she was in Spain. She had answered her manager but did not pursue the proposal. It was "not a big deal".