A Black former employee of Accenture, the global consulting firm, alleges in a discrimination lawsuit filed in federal court in Manhattan that he was terminated after repeatedly being chastised for wearing dreadlocks.
Joseph M. Nelzy, 30, of Bushwick, Brooklyn, claims his professional ascent at Accenture, which he joined straight out of Cornell University in 2018, was rapid until he began to grow dreadlocks, a feature of his Rastafarian faith, during the pandemic.
Joseph M. Nelzy, 30, of Brooklyn, in an undated photo.
He was instructed to turn off his video during virtual meetings and, in a recorded conversation with his senior manager and career counselor, was told his dreadlocks would be a major barrier to advancement, according to the claim, filed in U.S. District Court.
“If you show up on a call with a senior manager or manager, they’re not gonna think about anything but your hair … they’re gonna be like uh-uh, we can’t put him in front of a client,” the senior manager, Shirley Blankson, said in a recorded statement, according to the lawsuit.
Accenture did not respond to a request for comment about the lawsuit, which seeks monetary damages. It claims violations of federal civil rights laws, New York City’s Human Rights Law and New York state’s CROWN Act, which prohibits discrimination based on natural hair and hairstyles related to race.
The complaint arises at a pivot point of sorts for Accenture, a global professional services and technology consulting company that employs more than 780,000 workers in 120 countries, according to the company’s website.
The company discarded its global diversity and inclusion goals after President Donald Trump’s return to the White House last year. The shift, followed by corporate leaders across the country, was stated by CEO Julie Sweet in February 2025 in an internal memo obtained by Reuters, in which Sweet referred to changing policies amid the “evolving landscape in the United States, including recent executive orders [objecting to race- and gender based initiatives] with which we must comply."
Nelzy told Gothamist in an interview that he attended Abraham Lincoln High School on Coney Island and got his Bachelor’s of Science in Human Development at Cornell University, with a minor in equality studies and business, before landing a job as a consulting analyst at Accenture.
He was drawn to the company in part, he said, because of its 2017 commitment to gender balance in its workforce, saying it made the company look “forward thinking.” He said he was raised in a multi-generational Rastafarian household of Haitian descent.
During his seven-year tenure, the lawsuit stated, Nelzy had an “exemplary performance record,” with no formal write-ups, warnings or disciplinary actions. He was promoted to senior analyst in 2019 and to consultant in 2021-22, according to the lawsuit. Over the course of his tenure, his pay increased by 77%, his attorney, John Meehan said.
During the COVID-19 pandemic, Nelzy claimed that both he and his roommate lost friends and relatives to the disease, at which point he “began growing his hair into dreadlocks to represent these personal losses and honor the deceased,” according to the lawsuit.
The wearing of dreadlocks, the lawsuit stated, is not a matter of personal style but “a core religious observance and sacred practice rooted in a religious vow to God that is fundamental to the practice of the faith.”
In 2024, Nelzy was told he was up for a promotion but did not receive it, the lawsuit alleges, and learned later that Blankson, director of strategy and consulting, had told the hiring manager Nelzy’s appearance made clients uncomfortable.
In February 2025, the complaint alleges, Blankson was recorded stating in a meeting that Nelzy was “absolutely amazing” at his job but hindered by his appearance and identity expression.
“When [Accenture] says bring your whole self to work or any corporate person says bring your whole self to work, I’ve been saying this to my mentees for a very long time, it’s always a lie,” Blankson stated, according to the lawsuit. “It’s always been.”
The complaint states Nelzy's job was terminated on April 10, 2025, less than two months after he raised formal discrimination complaints, under the pretext of a company downsizing.
The lawsuit calls the remarks “direct evidence” of intentional racial and religious discrimination based on Nelzy’s appearance, “which is inseparable from his Rastafarian faith and race.” Further, the company “took no corrective action whatsoever to stop the discrimination, discipline Blankson, or remedy the harm” to Nelzy despite his formal complaints.
Nelzy said in an interview that the experience had left an emotional impact.
“It feels like you're being forced to choose between your professional advancement and your authentic identity,” he said. “ I always believed that my work spoke for itself and, you know, as long as I kept working hard, that those things wouldn't matter.”
