Slashdot Mirror
Can You Be Sued for Quitting?
An anonymous reader asks: "I work at a large hosting company in Texas, and recently decided to go work for a smaller competitor. I had a great relationship with my employer and wanted to leave on good terms, and I hadn't signed any non-compete or employment agreements . I felt my old company had just gotten too large and I didn't like working there anymore, so I gave them two weeks notice in writing. They were really upset when I insisted on leaving and one week into my last two weeks the V.P. of Sales told me the company was suing me for leaving, and they were also suing my new employer for hiring me. I was shocked, and they then escorted me out of the building. Has anybody ever heard of this happening? Do they have any legal basis for suing me?" It shouldn't have to be said that seeking professional legal representation, in such a situation, is the first thing one should do.
I'd strongly suggest you go over any paperwork that you might have, and make sure that you didn't inadvertently, through lack of knowledge, sign something that can be construed as a non-compete, or other type of non-disclosure agreement. As the old saying goes, cover your butt with paper.
Good luck on this.
Ignorance is blissful, to the ignorant.
At my old company I gave them two weeks notice and then served as a contract employee for around four months just to help them close out the projects I was working on. I think anything else would have been kind of ass-ish of me. My goal is to avoid losing money for my employer, though it's not the primary goal. If they haven't been asses to you, don't be an ass to them. It's almost like it's as simple as living life.
-knewter
Seriously, did anyone check that this anonymous guy actually worked where he claimed to?
That seems ridiculous. Of course without any evidence to back this story up, Slashdot could probably now be sued by ThePlanet for libel.
My wife had a former employer threaten to sue her if she took a local job in her industry. She went to a lawyer, and showed him the letter. The lawyer basically laughed at it, sent his own letter back and that was that.
Having said the above, not all lawyers are created equal. Get one who knows what he's doing about employment law. Our local bar association has a lawyer referral service and will give you the names of lawyers with the correct specialization. Call your local bar association and see if they have a similar service.
As the CP says, two weeks is the norm in the US, and even that is only a matter of tradition and courtesy, not a matter of law. If you decide one day to quit your job, you can just say "I quit" and walk out and that's that.
Microsoft did sue Google, but they settled out of court, and Lee works for Google today.
Even if the guy being sued did sign a non-compete without realizing, they still can only sue to block him from working for a competitor. They can't sue him just for quitting. And depending on what Texas courts think of non-competes, they might still be on thin ice. Here in California, courts have generally held non-competes to unenforceable. I have a non-compete, like most other tech workers, and the major reason courts have generally held them unenforceable is that (especially in a narrow specialty like mine), a two-year non-compete clause would be tantamount to forcing me to leave my chosen career completely and work for a lot less money in some other industry.
Add to that the fact that the standard employment agreement states that you have an at-will relationship with your employer. They can terminate your employment at any time, for any reason, or for none. Likewise, you can quit at any time, for any reason, or for none. If an employee is going to be at-will (yes, you can still sue for wrongful termination in some circumstances, I know), companies can't expect to have it both ways. If they can do whatever they want with respect to their employees' employment, employees likewise should be able to do so.
I agree with that idea, both because I'm an employee, and because I have fairly libertarian principles regarding the free market for goods and services. My job skills, like my house, stocks, car, or any other assets, should be worth whatever the market will bear, to offer to any bidder, without restriction. If a company can keeps its employees happy (and that takes a lot more than salary; salary may not even be the top thing; I'd rather make a medium salary at a great place to work than a top-of-market salary at a bad place to work), they'll stay there and work. If it can't, they'll go elsewhere. Maybe to a competitor. That's fair. Employees should have the same relationship with a company that customers do: make them unhappy and you'll lose them.
The company management is clearly poor. The lawsuit is a good indication of this.
Bad management is probably why the work environment is crap. Which is why people are choosing to leave.
Chicken and egg.
If you are fired, you are not entitled to severence, and if you went to apply for unemployment, they can contest it. However, in this case, it appears he has a wrongful termination suit he could file. Getting fired after giving your 2 weeks notice, if you did nothing wrong, is illegal. That being said, a company can always find some reason to terminate the employment agreement, but you usually end up with severance at that point.
I came, I conquered, I coredumped
Of course anyone can sue anybody at anytime for anything. Actually winning a judgement is another matter.
But that's usuaully used as a scare tactic. At least with what we've seen in public news. Its a scare tactic to keep people from doing something like making a parody of strawberry shortcake (Eh hem).
Suing someone for their livelyhood when you have no legal ground to do so is just plain stupid. Anyone who needed to work and was being tried to prevent that would surely challenge the plaintiff. Who wouldn't challenge that? What was The Planet thinking? Actually, don't answer that.
I hope this makes people think twice before hosting with The Planet or one of their resellers or one of their resellers or one of their resellers or one of their resellers........
sig removed
Maybe their threat of a lawsuit is a form of coercive message to other workers that they had better stay... or else!!
If this actually happened the way OP described I would guess the VP of Sales (which in my experience isn't all that high of a position in management, and certainly not one to initiate a lawsuit on behalf of the company, but I could be wrong) was just being an ass. Threats of lawsuit are pretty common in this country, and most remain just that-- idle threats. Perhaps the VP of Sales heard the CEO say "I ought to sue him for leaving" in the heat of the moment and took it literally; that kind of thing happens all the time.
Except...
The "anonymous reader" was thoughtful enough to name his former employer in the link, in effect smearing the company's name on a website read by hundreds of thousands of people (many in their industry) daily. Assuming this wasn't made up to begin with, the identity of the "anonymous reader" should be easy for the company to discover. If they weren't going to sue before, this may make them angry enough to do so now-- and they might have a better case.
This is an international forum, being used to discuss a state-specific legal issue. People from all over the world, and from all different states will discuss what the "law" is without realizing that they may not be discussing the same thing. Thankfully, this post had the decency to mention the jurisdiction, but what percentage of the people reading *and posting responses* are from Texas?!?
Next, this post would be 100x more interesting if we learned the outcome of the situation. So what if somebody's ex-employer was a dick and said some shit about suing? Like that won't happen again. If this individual was telling us about an actual outcome based on real law, then this might actually be worth reading about.
Finally, the "editor" should be fired *and* sued for posting this kind of clueless "get a frickin' lawyer when and if it happens" crap.
-- http://thegirlorthecar.com funny dating game for guys
There is also the possibility that he lives in an 'At Will' state, with a company that has a 'At Will' working agreement. In both cases without notice you can be terminated for anything or even nothing. This is supposed to be useful for an employee (so you can leave employment at any time without needing to give prior notice), but mostly is just a big axe over your head for whatever company you work for...
My state and employer are both that way, so I'm quite aware of how that works...
Now the problem if he is in such a situation... Is that he won't be able to counter sue for wrongful termination (it doesn't exist in states like that).
we are all invisible unless we choose otherwise
The place I work at is great. My boss is the kind of guy you can go and have a beer with every now and again. My coworkers are the nicest people in the world. If someone from another company started talking about my department or boss or coworkers, there would probably be physical violence to right the wrongs.
We are a tight group and we get things done.
However, if you make a wrong step, it can all turn sour in a minute.
Don't ever mistake the place you work for anything other than a symbiotic relationship. Don't ever mistake the people in the next cubicle for your friends. If you start something that devalues their stock or makes them work harder to pick up your slack, then you'll be out in the cold.
It pays to keep ammunition for those times. It might just literally save your life.
And, if it's never needed, then it's no blood no foul.
I'd rather you do it wrong, than for me to have to do it at all.
My understanding is that we all had a little brawl back in the 1860's which was based, in part, as to whether one man could FORCE another to work for him.
The result, I believe, was a rather empathic NO!
A witty saying proves nothing. Voltaire (1694-1778)
Am I the only one who thinks there has to be more to the story? I know there are a lot of silly lawsuits out there, but c'mon...
Since the company escorted him out of the building they are not trying to leverage him to stay, so they must be trying to recover some damages. I'm not saying the company is right, I'm just saying that a large company with a legal department wouldn't waste their money on a lawsuit unless they had at least a CHANCE to get some money.
For example.......
Did he recently get a promotion that included relocation, which carried with it a minumum commitment? Something else? What's the rest of the story OP?
Am I the only one that finds it a LITTLE suspicious that this article links to two wikipedia articles, the "evil" hosting company, and is posted by an AC? Can we say smear campaign or disgruntle employee? People, this is a completely transparent ploy to smear the poor bastards who are being accused. It is a travesty that this crap was even posted in the first place. It would have been one thing if the hosting company hand not been named, or if the accuser had named themselves. The fact that only the 'evil' hosting company in question is named and there is absolutely zero evidence that they did anything wrong, not even an angry blog, should be causing all of your bullshit detectors to go off.
Personally, I am deeply disappointed that this blatant smear was even posted in the first place.
I dont give notice when I quit because if I was fired my employer wouldnt give me two weeks notice that I was out of a job in two weeks.
I had that discussion with one of my managers about people giving notice, and I asked him how much notice I would get from him if I were to be fired or laid off. He went into a long explanation of how telling an employee he's getting canned causes all sorts of security problems and low productivity etc etc, to which I pointed out I would give him as much notice as I thought he would give me.
I don't think he liked that, but he understood where I was coming from. Companies expect generosity and loyalty from their employees, but have absolutely no intention of being generous or loyal to their employees. Generous and loyal employees increase company proffit. Generous and loyal companies lower company proffit. That can only lead to this sort of behavior.
I hope this fellow gets a nice settlement from a countersuit, he deserves it.
I work for the Department of Redundancy Department.
If you say so, man.
I always try to leave a place on a somewhat positive note, not bitching and moaning the whole way out. I don't tend to join places where they're completely incompetent or assholes, so I show the colleagues I leave behind the respect that I think they deserve.
What goes around comes around, too. I've never had someone just walk out on me and leave their projects hanging. People who work for me and feel they need to go work elsewhere almost universally have done so without just ditching me. They usually give me a couple weeks to a month.
Treat people with respect and you tend to get respect. Treat people like shit and they tend to treat you like shit.
Why are you letting these clowns ruin our country?
There are things called friendship and trust.
If you are secretly storing up a list of 'ammunition' against people, then you are betraying that friendship and trust. (The only time I would consider it OK is if there is no trust to begin with.) It is wrong to think that such a secret list will have no deleterious effect unless you actually decide to deploy it.
This is the same myth that 'private life' and 'public life' are separable entities. They are not. What you do secretly affects the way you think, which affects they way you act, which affects how you treat others. It just isn't possible to do something in private without it subtly (or not so subtly) affecting the public aspects of your life.
"Where's my "funny" mod points when I need them?"
Better still, where's the "ironic" mod points? Aside from that, this is terrible advice. Why burn your bridges? Put in your two weeks notice, then during that time do your best for your current employer. That way if your current job does not work out, or you find yourself desiring to return, it would make it much easier for you, as your employer will remember what you did for them in your final days.
Taking guns away from the 99% gives the 1% 100% of the power.
There are indeed. Just don't expect to find them in relationships with your employers.
Tom Swiss | the infamous tms | my blog
You cannot wash away blood with blood
No, your goal is to not lose money from your employer while they are still your employer. :)
Being a professional and finishing up your projects is a good way to encourage goodwill should you choose to come back, and also to get good references.
I've been struggling to find ways to be effective where I currently work and, in an effort to do so, I've struck up relationships with people who seem to be doing well and started keeping a journal of observations. The only rule is "be honest, but don't whine".
It's been helpful, mostly because it has enabled me to thread together events in time that I might not have otherwise seen if I wasn't keeping track. My effectiveness has been improving...but it is also becoming more and more apparant that this is one of the most disfuntional organization I've ever worked for.
On the plus side, I've picked up some useful skills on how to function in a dis-organized environment and learned some new FEA software along the way. All very useful things to bring to my next gig.
Keeping an objective journal (not a "shit-list") is a good idea.
A goal is a dream with a deadline
Look at your original offer of employment or the employee handbook. Most will explicitly state the terms of your employment being "At Will" which protects them from being sued by their employees on the grounds that they had some sort of contract for employment for any specific length of time. This means they can fire you at the drop of a hat--it also means you can quit anytime you want.
If you see that phrase, they have no case and this is purely for the purpose of intimidation.
Why, I can't guess. Do they really think you're going to want to come back at this point? What can they hope to accomplish?
I had that discussion with one of my managers about people giving notice, and I asked him how much notice I would get from him if I were to be fired or laid off.
For security purposes, I understand why a company would not want to give you notice of a lay off and instead say thanks for your service. However, a reputable company would give you at least two weeks severance pay... which is kind of like a two weeks notice, but better: You don't have to work for the company, they are paying you not to work, and you have two weeks (or more) pay to hunt down a new job.
It is not the strongest of the species that survive, nor the most intelligent, but the one most responsive to change.
As movie producer Sam Goldwyn (and many others) said: "An oral contract isn't worth the paper it's printed on."
I am not a crackpot.
Frankly, if someone gives notice, you want them gone as soon as is possible. They've cut the relationship, and your work is no longer their top priority.
And frankly, even from a moral point of view do you want someone walking around talking about how much better a job they are moving too?
A policy that requires people to stay 3 months is idiotic and self-defeating. Granted their may be extenuating circumstances (hard to fill position, very arcane knowledge, etc) but a blanket rule like that isn't a great idea.
People in cars cause accidents....accidents in cars cause people
Suing someone for their livelyhood when you have no legal ground to do so is just plain stupid. Anyone who needed to work and was being tried to prevent that would surely challenge the plaintiff. Who wouldn't challenge that? What was The Planet thinking? Actually, don't answer that.
It happens often enough. An old obscure band I referended before called Dumptruck was with Big Time records, an indy label. After their contract expired they decided to move up in the world to another label, Big Time sued them for breach of (non existant) contract for the sum of 5 million. Not like they bothered to show up in court or anything, but also it's not like anyone would pick them up given the pending 5 million dollar law suit, something that took years to resolve.
Managers are alot like children, they do things out of spite.
There is no sanctuary. There is no sanctuary. SHUT UP! There is no shut up. There is no shut up.
So, just because you don't have any work ethics, no one else should have any ?
What about temps ? Do you want them gone asap after hiring because they may be looking for their next job already ?
IANAL, but I believe Texas is an "employment at will" state. This means that there is very little regulation of the employer / employee legal relationship outside of a contract / employment agreement. This means that an employer can terminate without cause and no notice, and an employee can leave without notice, without any negative *legal* ramifications.
However, that doesn't mean they can't sue you... this will force you to spend money on legal representation and make your life a little miserable even if the suit is ruled to be baseless. If it is and you've got a halfway decent lawyer, you might be able to get it dismissed with prejudice and your legal fees covered.
So why are they suing? Clearly they are burning any bridges with you, and aren't expecting to try to get you back. Unless you are independently wealthy, it's unlikely even if they succeeded that they would be able to collect enough in damages to make this worthwhile. This leaves two explanations I can think of: petty revenge, or to intimidate the rest of the employees. I'm betting on a combination of both, with a heavy dose of intimidation.
-R
Just out of curiosity, and assuming of course that everything he wrote is true, what exactly would that better case be? "Your honor, he told the truth about events that he personally witnessed, and in a public forum to boot!"? Or maybe "He directed more traffic to our web site and potentially posted our Google page rank, with malice aforethought!"?
--MarkusQ
May be if would not be such a cynic if you read some of the articles by Robert Axelrod of Univ of Michigen on "Evolution of Cooperation", "Complexity of Cooperation", and BBC shows like "Nice Guys Finish First" by Richard Dawkins.
sed -e 's/Chuck Norris/Rajnikant/g' joke > fact
Neither defamation nor libel can be used as a complaint if what he says is true. Further, they have to be able to prove that he had an intent to defame them by posting what he did, which is difficult. The burden of proof is on the plaintiff in these situations.
In most states, the labor laws clearly state that employment is at-will. He can leave whenever he wants and they can fire him any time they want and, barring employment or non-competition contracts, they have no means of precluding him from working at a competitor, provided that he's not bringing any trade secrets with him.
I think it really depends on the person and how professional they are. As one of the senior guys in the group I was in, I gave notice months in advance. I then worked really hard to finish up the projects that I was working on, and transition as much of my knowledge as possible over to other employees. Even over a year later, I still do contract work for them. I'm an engineer, and I expect engineers to behave like the professionals that they are supposed to be. If you work at Taco Bell, then yeah, notice probably isn't in anyone's best interest.
Even if I were purely motivated by self-interest, wouldn't I want a source of good references for the future? Why burn bridges?
W..w..W - Willy Waterloo washes Warren Wiggins who is washing Waldo Woo.
Laws affecting technology will always be bad until enough techies become lawyers.
Much of the time, these aren't contracts per se, but are requirements for at-will employment to keep your references, cash out your excess vacation days, etc. If you leave w/o sufficient notice at many places, you forfeit the PTO. That IS perfectly legal, an employer can basically do what they want with their leave policy.
I've quit three times, and given three weeks notice each time. Each time I spent the first week tying up loose ends, and the second week not doing much. (In fact, on monday of the last week at a big office, my boss told me "Don't do anything important".)
Now, each time I've moved to a new job that was in a substantially different field than the one before, so there was little danger of either taking secrets or other employees with me. I feel like it worked out pretty well both for me (I got a chance to say goodbye to everyone I wanted to personally) and the company (they knew I wasn't leaving anything unfinished).
Coincidentally, we've got a guy here who's last day is today (he gave notice weeks and weeks ago, he's rather senior). He's still working, which makes me very nervous, because it shows it's going to be a big scramble when he goes. I feel a week's salary is a small price to pay for the assurance the transition is going to be smooth.
It's not wasting time, I'm educating myself.
Why not ? The ones who will slack off before leaving would be dumb if they told you about it.
and I certainly don't want them hanging around telling all my customers and employees about their great new job.
In that case, you better hire a good hit man instead. Or how else do you want to keep them from talking to their colleagues outside of work ? Maybe they have their cellphone numbers, maybe they're even friends, maybe they even go out for a drink after work. Heck. Maybe they'll even us the internet in one form or another. Also, see above. The ones who do want really want to badmouth your company would be dumb if they gave any notice. They'll do what they want to do and then quit without notice.
And the company is doing them a favor by giving them 100% of their time with pay. How is this anything other than a positive solution to both sides?
There are always individual cases, but if it's just a random person turning in notice, you don't want the risk that they will do something bad (even accidentally) when you have no more recourse over them.
People in cars cause accidents....accidents in cars cause people
I left a job once that I hated, and though I wanted to burn the bridges and give them a big middle finger, I took the mature route. I did my two weeks, and helped to close out some of my projects and give some training on specific knowledge I had.
Two years later I found myself unemployed with a low bank account and a couple of mouths to feed. The job market was crappier then than it is right now. They took me back in. I have no doubt about what would have happened if I had acted like an asshole.
William of Ockham had no beard. The most likely explanation is that it was chewed off by squirrels every morning.
If you leave w/o sufficient notice at many places, you forfeit the PTO. That IS perfectly legal, an employer can basically do what they want with their leave policy.
Um, no.
If you have that as part of a contract, then yes, they can do (almost) anything you signed off on.
If "at will" and you have vacation hours (and sometimes even sick time) as part of your compensation, they damned well better pony up for it when you leave. And no, you don't need to give notice, sign anything at the exit interview, or the like. "At will" means "at will" - Either party can break off the relationship whenever the hell they want, but that doesn't excuse either side from fulfilling obligations that predate the parting of ways (though conveniently, such obligations almost always fall on the employer).
In that case you should agree that "anti-abortion" is a more accurate term than "pro-life", right?
Actually, the correct labels are "pro-abortion" and "anti-abortion", imo. "Life" and "Choice" are of course much broader values than that which they fight over.
XML causes global warming.
It isn't because someone is not professional that you should act professional.
I hated the guts of my ex-boss when I left a job a year and a half ago. It was for a big company, I was a Manager there. It was toward the end of a project for which I was managing the infrastructure part, I gave 6 weeks notice so I could make sure the project was done on my side and everybody trained to take over from me.
I left with a great reputation. Reputation and work ethic is one of your best asset if you want to build a name and career for yourself. Business world is a small world, your reputation preceeds you and you often run into the same people even in different jobs.
oh, and I left that job with pride AND a smile! Because my part of the project even though I left was the ONLY part that was finished ON TIME and under budget. My boss' part was late and his ass got fired! My reputation is intact & great, his, well...
You were fired, you did not quit. Giving two weeks notice is saying, "I am going to quit in two weeks." You can apply for unemployement for the 2 weeks, unless you can start early at the new job.
They can sue, but it is not likely they would win. The new employer may not like it.
Fight Spammers!
How the heck the previous comment got modded "insightful" is beyond me. "Petty" or "small minded" would be better choices.
What was once true, is no longer so
For every 100 "I'm going to sue you" lines, I would be surprised if three resulted in an actual lawsuit. It seems to be the first thing that oh-so-many people say, but when the reality of (a) having to pay a lawyer, (b) having to invest their time, and (c) having to prove an actual case kicks in, they tend to just sort of go back to their regular lives.
steve
Oh, you're not stuck, you're just unable to let go of the onion rings.
When I left my previous employer and started a business with other former co-workers, we were afraid of being sued. It does happen, and is generally baseless but an effective means of tying up capital for a small company.
Here in California, non-competes are not enforceable-- you can't prevent an employee from making a living. However, two interesting things do crop up: 1. You can't steal employees from your former employer; and 2. If you have stock/options in the company (and signed a stock agreement) you are held to a higher standard.
What's odd about the situation the OP described is that only an idiot would sue before you actually started the new job. Scare tactics like "Our lawyers are looking into this" are common; I even got a letter from a lawyer hired by the previous company about suspending buyback of my stock. We hired two lawyers to send letters back to the company, and everything was restored to normalcy pretty quickly.
After the experience, I now think that it is a good idea to be cautious of lawsuits, and to operate in an ethical way towards any former employers. This is especially true if you are starting up your own business.
It depends on the business and the individual. It's about managing costs (risks) and benefits. If the business can get by fine without the employee, you might be better off letting them go home after they give their notice. If you need to continue to use them for a few days, or a week, or the full two weeks, and it's worth the risks, then it's perfectly appropriate to do so.
Some large companies make it a policy to release people as soon as they give notice, maybe because large companies are less personal and are at a greater risk of having people leave on bad terms. Others may not. It depends on how you want to run your business. There are good reasons in either direction and a good manager balances those with the needs of the business.
If the position is so hard to fill, then maybe they should try to actually KEEP people. Or maybe they should hire enough people to cross train, so they aren't screwed, and so employees aren't as pressured that they're the only ones who know this.
Nah. Then it wouldn't be an esoteric lesson in "free markets" that allow employers to enslave employees.
I'm surprised you'd offer that advice with no knowledge of the details of the case. On its face, this guy's story sounds unbelievable, but that's often because there's more to the story. It could be that they're "legally clueless", but we don't know that.
Being a professional and finishing up your projects is a good way to encourage goodwill should you choose to come back, and also to get good references. It would be nice if things really worked like that. I have been dropped into somebody else's half finished project plenty of times after that person left for another job at short notice. I suspect that in this case the guy would not have been sued if he hadn't gone to a direct competitor. I don't live in the USA but over here companies have also used lawsuits like this, or threatened to do so, to intimidate their employees into not switching jobs. Of course they reserved the right to fire the employee at a moments notice, after all, what could be more natural than expecting complete loyalty from the employee but at the same time reserving the right to treat him/her like a commodity? When this issue was finally tested in court in this country the employee was backed by lawyers form his trade-association/union and the case was shot down in court even though the employer had put a clause into the guy's contract. The clause apparently violated laws about freedom of employment. The former employer had to pay the costs of the proceedings so this threat has lost a lot of it's terror value on this side of the Atlantic. Of course laws may differ in the USA.... Personally I will treat an employer with no more respect I get from him. The better the employer the nicer I will be about quitting...
Only to idiots, are orders laws.
-- Henning von Tresckow
When someone gives me notice, I send them home that day and usually pay out the rest of the week.
I take it you don't have anyone with specialized knowledge...
I'm planning on leaving my job in about a year (starting school), and I know that the amount of specialized knowledge I have would make me nearly impossible to replace within a short time frame. As a result, I'm going to give a month notice for them, and also start pouring out every bit of relevant knowledge into a comprehensive handbook for my eventual successor. It will probably take most of that month to write, but it will buy them years of productivity.
If you feel you can't trust them after they give notice, how can you trust them the day before? The only thing that's changed is that the you no longer have the threat of termination to use against them. If that's the only basis you have for "trusting" them, you've got bigger problems with your business management than employees who've given notice.
http://alternatives.rzero.com/
To be a smear campaign, it must be libel. In the U.S., if it's true, it's not libel.
Contribute to civilization: ari.aynrand.org/donate
Personally, I think the cloak of silence around companies that do evil things to their employees is awful. They should be named. It should be out in the open, and people should know. Maybe employers would work harder to find managers who were worth the salaries they were paid if their management's screwups became public knowledge. Especially for something like this.
If what this anonymous reader says is true, I can't see how the company could win any kind of lawsuit. Sure, it might make them more likely to try. And if they did I'm sure a judge would be happy to award the defendents significant damages for the company trying to waste their time and the courts time with a frivolous intimidation lawsuit.
Need a Python, C++, Unix, Linux develop
When someone gives me notice, I send them home that day and usually pay out the rest of the week.
When I fire someone, I usually pay out the rest of the week; if they get paid the week after they work, I'll get them their last check as early as possible.
But once someone says "I'm leaving in two weeks", I cannot expect them to put 100% into their work -- and I certainly don't want them hanging around telling all my customers and employees about their great new job.
Well, I don't know what industry you work in, or what kind of workers you're hiring, but that seems like a particularly cynical view to take. I am a professional, and I work with and for professionals. And usually when you're dealing with professionals you don't have to worry as much about those sorts of issues.
For example, I just put in my notice this past Tuesday. I gave my employer about 2.5 weeks notice that I was leaving. It wasn't a situation where I hate the company that I work for, or the people that I work with, I was just looking for a new challenge (I joined this place in when it was a startup, now it's a mature company). Everyone that I work with respects that, and I'll be working out my notice.
During those two and a half weeks I will be wrapping up the projects that I can complete, and transitioning the ones that I can't complete to other team members. I'll be doing a lot of knowledge transfer as well. But I doubt that I'll be taking on any new projects. So technically you're right in saying that I won't be working at 100%, but the work that I will be doing will be key to making sure that my department continues to operate smoothly after I'm gone. And of course I will be available for the occasional call or email after I'm gone if they have a question about something that I had been working on. It's just good business not to burn bridges.
Now if my employer had shown me the door the minute I turned in my notice, they would be fairly screwed. The projects that I was working on would grind to a crawl (if not an outright stop) while someone else tries to figure out where we were when I was escorted out. Any specific or specialized knowledge would be lost. No knowledge transfer would take place. I would probably be somewhat resentful about the way I was treated and therefore be unwilling to help them out with any of the mess.
And what would that get you? Sure, I wouldn't be walking around your office talking to coworkers about my great new job, but if you think that coworkers don't talk to each other from time to time outside of work then you're mistaken. So that word would still get around. I'd also be likely to tell my future coworkers about how you treated me when I turned in my notice. I would be extremely unlikely to want to work for or with you again, and my friends and future coworkers would know why. This could potentially impact your ability to find future employees. Not having the knowledge transfer or a smooth transition also runs up costs associated with employee turnover. If I can offer some measure of training to the people who will be replacing me then I can save you money.
Running a company is a matter of managing liabilities: hey, if you do great work then I want you here. If I can no longer count on you to do great work, why would I keep you around?
I disagree. Running a company includes managing liabilities, but it's about far more than that. You also have to manage people and relationships (and lots of other things that aren't necessarily relevant here). If your people aren't happy, or you have a negative relationship towards your workers then your business will suffer. Not just in reduced productivity, but also in reduced reputation. Both of those will cost you money.
And I also think that it's ridiculous to think that just because someone is leaving the company that you can no longer count on them to do great work. If someone is a professional and you are paying them for work then I see no reason
First, if you didn't sign a non-compete or other contract then YOU are not contractually obligated to anything. Texas, like most states, is an work-at-will state. So you can come and go as you please. Now, if you have knowledge of sensitive company information that your new employer can use against your current employer, then Company A (current) can sue Company B (new). For example, Wal-Mart was able to block some key people leaving them to go to work for a competitor. The issue was that the employees had inside knowledge of price contracts Wal-Mart had with certain vendors. The federal court deemed this sensitive company information and blocked it. Microsoft was able to do the same. However, if they sue you, then you have a strong countersuit. It is illegal to attempt to block a person's employment without being able to prove that the move will be detrimental to the company. You could make out well with pain and suffering. I would contact the EEOC and talk to someone.
Just because you didn't sign anything doesn't mean there are no terms under which you are employed - it is just that they have not been reduced to a written form.
Uh, you're a lawyer? And, this is your statement?
IANAL, but at least I know that in the lack of written contract, the courts have nothing more to rely on than laws and previous case history; in this case, the AT WILL laws. If the terms weren't given in written form and signed by the employee, there is absolutely no other terms than what has been established by the government.
That's not to say the guy shouldn't seek council, however his stance should be, "My previous employer never submitted any terms or conditions for my employment and therefore my employment contract was AT WILL."
The employer doesn't have anything on the guy. He's free to go, without any previously signed contract stating otherwise. He has to be careful about not sharing proprietary information, but other than that, he's set.
Beware of geeks bearing formulas.
OK, normally I don't get involved in this argument, but your arguments seem to be from the gut, and not from the head, and this level of insensitivity pisses me off.
... etc.
.. EVEN MORE FUN, if there is an unwanted pregnancy in a underage child, they'll have to go get parental concent for the drugs in most places (if not all places now) in the US for a large class of the morning-after pills. This is especially fun when they've been raped by their dad, or uncle, etc.
> The 'liberty' here involves ending the life of another person.
Define 'person', and when a mass of cells becomes a 'person'.
For instance: Is a sperm a person? What about the egg? What about a newly fertilized egg which hasn't yet been attached to a uterous?
How about when it is 32 cells?
I find your statement to be ill-founded. Come up with a better foundation. I'll be absolutely shocked if you can come up with a defintion of 'person' that most people agree with here.
> There is a reason the founding fathers put life ahead of liberty. When the act of excersising a liberty causes the death of another person, the government must protect the life of the person.
> Thus, my point still stands.
Youre being somewhat incoherent. What I believe you want to say is something to the effect of:
Your right to liberty ends when it would infringe on someone else's right to life. Since gov't exists to protect these rights, it must protect people's lives so that they may exercise their liberty.
> Also, saying that your forcing someone to have an unwanted child is bs anyway.
No, actually it isn't. Please make a sensible argument about how the gov't wouldn't be forcing someone to have an unwanted child assuming that people have sex, and don't always want the child.
Saying "Well, they shouldn't have gotten themselves into that situation in the first place" doesn't change the fact that they do, and are then prevented from dealing with the pregnancy before an unwanted child is born.
> There seems to be this direct link between having sex and getting pregnant that people don't seem to get. The best way to keep from having a child is to not have sex.
You're right. But arguing that people should do without is simply unrealistic.
Sex is a perfectly natural thing. It is ingrained and instinctual, and we're built to enjoy it, ostensibly so that we will procreate.
Since, as we're using too much of the planet's resources, that procreation may be a bad thing now (though catholics may disagree), there is a strong impetus (often economic) that people shouldn't have children.
> There is no god given right to sex in the constitution and no where does the constitution say that you have the right to the pursuit of happiness without concequences.
I love this line of reasoning.. You shouldn't be able to have sex (assuming that you cannot have an abortion) unless you're willing and able to deal with the consequences. This is fun! Eventually, when you take this line of reasoning to the extreme, what you're saying is that only rich people can have sex because only they are equipped to deal with the consequences.
Fun!
> And before you bring up rape and incest, in those cases the woman will ussually get the morning after pill.
Incorrect. This can be labeled 'abortion', and some pharmicists DON'T DISPENSE THESE PRESCRIPTIONS.
Some pharmicists won't even SELL THESE DRUGS if they're OTC.
Even more fun, you get assholes who will not fill the prescription, and who will hold onto it so that no other pharmacist may fill it.
> And in cases where the woman hides it till its too late to get a legal abortion (assuming that the state she lives in allows abortions up until a certain point) then they should be able to go to a judge and get due process of law to authorize the abortion.
You're making no sense. You're saying that a woman will go to a judge to get a dispensation to have an illegal abortion?
That's odd, when I was unemployed a few years ago, the Census Bureau called me every couple months to ask my status, even after I stopped getting unemployment.
You can get accurate unemployment figures from the US government.