Slashdot is running a discussion entitled How Were You Fired? It's full of personal stories, some with happy endings, many of them horrible, some totally disgusting, others compelling.
Yet another reason to be really, truly, grateful for tenure.
Someone somewhere, must write manuals about How To Fire Employees, and those manuals must be full of stuff about turning off computer IDs, escorting people of the premises under guard as if they were felons, and not letting them have their personal possessions from their desks.
I know, from talking to victims in places I've worked after they were RIF'd, that these things happen even in work environments where they are utterly unnecessary. It can only be due to mindless automatons in Human Resources reading from a one-size-fits-all playbook.
Since Slashdot is more focused on IT and this blog is somewhat legal, I’ll share my story here.
[Note from Michael: At the request of the poster of the item that used to be here, I have deleted the remainder of the text of this item. See the main part of the blog for further discussion.]
I remember a story in the Economist entitled “U R Sakd” that talked about some of the more inappropriate firings. including via text messaging and by segregation at a company retreat (people were told to go to one of two rooms; one room contained the “You are terminated” part of the program). It was in the June 7, 2003 edition.