A WOMAN who says her IBM supervisor told her to show her "boobies" to get more sales claims colleagues sat and watched while her life was ruined.

Susan Spiteri says she has turned into a "different person", and tried several times to take her own life, after being sexually harassed and bullied for almost two years by her former boss, the Herald Sun reported.

She is claiming sexual discrimination and suing for $1.1 million from IBM and some of its managers, including Joe Arcuri, who was her manager from 2007.

In a document lodged with the Federal Court, Ms Spiteri claimed her ordeal with Mr Arcuri started at a work dinner, when he ran his hand up her dress several times.

He had invited her to sit next to him and asked her to lower her dress so he could see her breasts.

She alleges she was embarrassed and pushed him away.

Ms Spiteri claims that in the ensuing months, Mr Arcuri said: "Susan, we're down orders this week, go on and show that pretty face of yours.

"Get those boobies out and get sales."

According to court documents, in the time that Mr Arcuri was her boss, Ms Spiteri's sales performance dropped.

She claims she would cry at her desk almost daily and that she alerted managers to his alleged behaviour.

He would allegedly scream abuse at her, tell her she was stupid, say embarrassing things about her to customers and workmates, and repeatedly call her on her mobile phone after hours.

Ms Spiteri claimed one of her managers told her to return to work and never mention the allegations again, after she said she was too scared to make a formal complaint.

Managers told her not to resign because she was "one of the best" and Mr Arcuri would soon leave the company.

"People would resign, rather than take him on," Ms Spiteri told the Herald Sun.

In June 2009, Ms Spiteri found a job in another IBM department and made a formal complaint about Mr Arcuri, who did not respond to allegations. He resigned in August 2009.

Ms Spiteri said he moved to another firm, which was based in the same building as IBM and was a client of her company.

"I couldn't deal with him. I had suffered a mental breakdown," she said.

"I was petrified of bumping into him downstairs.

" I was brought up to believe if you take your job seriously and work hard, you got respect, you know, and not treated like s---," she said.

Maurice Blackburn's Siobhan Keating - Ms Spiteri's legal counsel - said the case highlighted the failure of companies to implement their own good policies, describing it as a "gap in corporate Australia".

"IBM's failure to act had a catastrophic effect on Susan's health," Ms Keating said.

IBM is yet to file a response to the claim that Ms Spiteri has made in the Federal Court.

An IBM spokesman said the company did not tolerate harassment of any type and would "vigorously defend" the allegations in court.

Mr Arcuri, who now works in Sydney for US-based company IT Xirrus, would not comment.

He referred questions to IBM.

