Favoritism in a workplace can be frustrating and confusing. It can leave you feeling like your boss just doesn't like you, or at least that they don’t like you as much as they like other people, but without a clear explanation as to why.

If you're a top performer who is used to having bosses who appreciate and reward your hard work, this can be especially distressing. Especially if this favoritism transforms a career that was rapidly rising into one that suddenly stalls.

And unfortunately if favoritism is happening there are situations where there’s nothing you can do about it. For example: a manager might dislike you because you went to a rival college of their own or they may just favor others who share a similar interest in a hobby like painting. That kind of bias may still be toxic and demoralizing, but as we covered in our guide on Understanding Your Rights, it’s not explicitly illegal if the cause of the disparity in treatment is not tied to you being a member of a specific protected class.

So in this post, we’ll cover the difference between favoritism and discrimination and real-world examples for how you can recognize discrimination in:

Then once you know what to look for, we’ll walk through how to protect yourself and the role documentation can play in helping you do that.

Discrimination often shows up as a series of subtle unfair, decisions or actions that result in preferential treatment for one group, while putting the other at a disadvantage. Because of this most people are unable to conclude a person is discriminating based on a single act of favoritism. That’s why documenting what’s happening as soon as something feels off — even if you’re not certain it’s discrimination yet — is so important.