FWD: An ugly job incident (long)

["Eric J. Ray" <ejray -at- RAYCOMM -dot- COM>]

Name withheld upon request. Please reply on list.
This posting is a little marginal (legal issues of
hiring and firing aren't necessarily technical
communication-related, although some aspects
mentioned are pretty central to our profession),
so please make a real effort to keep the discussion
on-topic for this list.

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Thanks!

*************************************************

Techwhirlers:

This happened to me last week, and I'm still stunned. Before I get to the
question, there's some history.

History:

I've been in technical writing for seven years and I have project management
and supervisory experience.

Until last week, I worked for a small startup company with about fifty
employees. Last April, we hired an instruction designer to take over
training. However, I didn't realize that this instructional designer was
actually not one. She had changed careers and only had four year's
instructor-led training experience. Then about a month ago, she became my
manager during a reorganization in spite of the fact I was told by a vice
president that I would be the manager of documentation and training. I was
told by another VP that she was in her late forties and appeared as an
authority figure in a company run by twenty-somethings.

I had several run-ins with her that I will not go into, but it was obvious
to me that she was not qualified as an instructional designer. We also had a
huge personality conflict. I did not want her to be my manager because I did
not want her to have salary and fire power over me. I went through proper
channels and told the right managers and HR people I was not comfortable
with her as my boss. I even had a meeting with her and told her directly how
I felt. She told me to look at the half-full glass and shut up.

Two weeks after the reorganization, layoff rumors started. I immediately
went to one of the company's vice presidents who confirmed the rumors as
true. I figured if they'd pick her for management over me, they would let me
go before her. I have a wife and baby at home and I knew I had to begin
looking for other jobs just in case.

The next day after the rumors began flying, I went through my file cabinet
and threw away old hand-written notes, which were on the file server in
electronic form. I also deleted all of my personal files from the file
server. If I was to be laid off, then I didn't want somebody standing there
while I sorted through personal things.

Last Wednesday night, I got a call from a friend of mine who worked there
and told me that she had the IT manager in my office looking through my
network drive and my local hard drives. She had later searched my office
with somebody from HR. I called the same VP who had confirmed the rumors. He
told me that he was told I maliciously deleted my hard drive. I couldn't
believe it.

The next day I went into work and asked somebody from HR to sit in while I
met with my manager. The manager accused me of walking off with company
documents and stealing several items that I did not (like software and
books). I was told that I can't throw anything away without permission; I
answered by saying that they shouldn't put trash cans and white paper
recycling bins everywhere then. Each individual accusation was clearly
answered and proven wrong. But I was let go anyway under the excuse of
corporate restructuring. Eleven of my coworkers were let go a couple of
hours later.

They told me my severance pay depends on my manager determining that I
didn't steal anything. I won't know if I get my severance pay until the end
of this month when it will be deposited in my account.

Questions:

Do you think I was wrong to throw away notes and old edited documents?
Have any of you had something similar happen, like being accused of
stealing?
Do you think I have legal recourse if I don't receive my severance?
Is this a clear case of defamation of character?

 From ??? -at- ??? Sun Jan 00 00:00:00 0000=