Market research company Nielsen Holdings, widely known for its TV and radio ratings, has settled a discrimination lawsuit brought by a former Chicago senior vice president who alleged she was bypassed for advancement because she was Black.
Cheryl Grace filed the lawsuit against Nielsen in October alleging she was denied a promotion to executive vice president and “significantly marginalized” as she raised concerns over alleged racial discrimination.
A longtime executive who founded Nielsen’s Diverse Intelligence Series reports on multicultural consumers, Grace submitted a proposal to the company in 2019 seeking an expanded role and a promotion to executive vice president, the lawsuit alleged.
Instead, the company hired people from the outside and retaliated against her for “speaking out and reporting discrimination” by diminishing her role and offering her a buyout package, the lawsuit alleged.
The lawsuit, filed in Chicago federal court, was dismissed on March 12, according to court filings. Terms of the settlement were not disclosed.
“The matter has been amicably and satisfactorily resolved,” Nielsen spokeswoman Meg Chari said in an email Monday.
Linda Friedman, a Chicago attorney representing Grace, confirmed the settlement but declined to comment.
Nielsen hired Grace in 2004 as vice president of communication and community affairs “to rebuild its tarnished relationships” with Blacks and Hispanics, “taking advantage” of her connections to Chicago civil rights leaders and elected officials, the lawsuit alleged. She was promoted to senior vice president of communications for the company’s packaged goods division in 2007.
Grace spearheaded the Diverse Intelligence Series at Nielsen, an annual report examining Black consumer behavior, which launched in 2011.
But Grace hit a glass ceiling on the climb up the corporate ladder, the lawsuit alleged, when Nielsen bypassed her for an expanded role within a Chicago-based spinoff of the company’s consumer goods division, which was announced in 2019.
In February 2020, Grace submitted a proposed organization structure for the spinoff’s marketing team, according to the lawsuit. In response, she was told to justify her team’s work amid “noise around reductions,” the complaint alleged, shifting responsibilities away from Grace and reducing her team and budget.
The Atlanta-based Southern Christian Leadership Conference took up Grace’s cause after she filed her discrimination lawsuit, as part of a broader campaign to combat institutional racism in corporate America.
“We’re going through the court of public opinion, we’re going to expose this to the public,” Charles Steele, CEO of the SCLC, said Monday. “Racism is a virus, no different than COVID-19. And it’s very contagious.”
Steele said he talked with board members and top executives at Nielsen to make the case that Grace was being treated unfairly. He flew to Chicago in February to conduct a protest in front of Nielsen’s Chicago office, but the event was canceled by a blizzard.
Founded in Chicago’s Rogers Park neighborhood in 1923, Nielsen is best known for its television ratings service. Once based in Northbrook, the company’s U.S. headquarters are in New York, under a British parent company.
In November, Nielsen sold its consumer packaged goods division to Advent International, a Boston-based private equity firm, for $2.7 billion. Advent closed on the deal March 8 and NielsenIQ, the former consumer goods division, spun off as a private, Chicago-based company.
