Wow, the Radio Shack thing really got people thinking about other really bad ways to term employees. This article lists a few. Some of these would be amusing but for the fact that these situations really happened and real people were involved.
Some “ideas” include firing someone by voicemail, leaving a new org chart on the copy machine for someone to find and group terminations.
No one likes terminating employees (I’ve always said once I start enjoying terms, it’s time for me to leave HR) but I truly feel that a company owes it to all of their employees to treat the person being terminated with kindness and respect, particularly when the term is due to no fault of the employee. A private face to face discussion should always be the first course of action unless (and despite the article) the termination is due to an egregious event (i.e. violence) or the employee cannot be found, then a letter should be an acceptable alternative.
Barring those events, don’t ya think that if the company makes the decision to lay off employees or eliminate jobs, the company can stand by their decision and communicate in a manner that allows their employees to leave with their dignity intact?
Just a thought.
Addendum: Some more interesting terminations can be found here .
here is another new way of layoff notice via short message of cellphone in my hometown.
and i quite agree with the idea that before any possible big hurt action to your employees, you’d better think on the way of him and give him a step to walk off ,so as to minimum the negative impact to him and to the employer too.
Why do companies have to be so impersonal? They all say that their employees are their most valuable asset, and this is how they are treated. I don’t get it. Why can’t they tell someone the bad news face-to-face?