How much would you help your boss/company out if you got fired?
 

I have a ton of stuff in the pipeline at work and a lot of my best clients I consider personal friends. While I survived the latest round of layoffs this week, there's a very high chance I'll be canned next week when March's numbers come out. I'm expecting it to not be on good terms if it happens and not called a layoff. I know no one is irreplaceable, but I also know they're gonna have a hell of a time sorting out my accounts and territory without my help, maybe causing some clients to bolt to competitors. If I get canned with no severance, should I help out when they call to ask about accounts and deals in the works? Or just tell them to pound sand until they agree to pay me on a consultant basis?

Personally, if my employer doesn't even give me the courtesy of me having the chance of filing for unemployment, they can kiss my ass...

I don't understant that at all. You can't file for unemployment until you've been let go. Besides, I can make more flipping burgers than unemployment pays in AZ. I'll not be unemployed for one day, underemployed maybe, but not unemployed.

How do you know they'll call you? How do you know they'll want you back on a consultant basis? If they're going to fire you over the accounts, what makes you think they want to hire you back on a contractual basis for those same accounts?

I don't know that they would. But I know my boss has called former co-workers for months after they left, asking them for help with their accounts. Since I am the only person they have in this vast territory, they are gonna have a very hard time picking things up if I'm gone. Sure, they can hire someone else. But it will take six mos. to get them ramped up and in that time competitors will have eaten up every neglected account. In fact, part of the reason I'm not doing so well is that my territory was unmanned for years before I took it over and I've only been out west for a year.

Once you get fired, it's no longer your problem. If it was, you should be getting paid for your troubles. IMO.

Wait, they fire you, then expect you to "help them out" afterwards? At what rate? I'd certainly want at least 2X what I was making on salary if they are hiring you as a independent consultant.

If they expect you to help sort out things for free...I'd suggest any number of places they could go pound sand (should be easy in AZ). If your services are needed by them then they should pay for them.

I'll take a burger with cheese, no onions, and fries. Thanks. What is the best shake in your opinion? Chocolate, vanilla, or Strawb?

This (what you just wrote) should tell you a lot about your situation.

1) Don't count on them calling you back. Don't even think about it. If you're the goat now, you'll be the goat when they call you back. Start looking for a new job tonight.

2) If the competitors will eat up neglected accounts, maybe the competitors will also eat up neglected employees who oversaw those accounts.

Think it over. You might be in a better position than you first imagined. ;)

Hey, In-N-Out Burger starts at $10 per hr. and I can walk there from my house. Their shakes rock and they have some pretty hot teenie bopper ladies working there.

It's kinda weird at this company. I've never heard of anyone being fired for performance. It was either for egregious behavior or a layoff. I've heard they treat layoffs very well. Folks fired for cause are walked out the door. I'm hoping to be able to go to a competitor and get out of the non-compete if they can me. But if I have nowhere to go after getting canned, I'll not lift a finger to help them without an iron-clad compensation agreement. When I left a few yrs. ago to work in subprime, my boss called me all the time for help with accounts and I spent the last few weeks of that job writing reports on what all I had in the pipeline and training the girl they'd hired to replace me. Seeing an ad on Careerbuilder for my job based in Phoenix yesterday leads me to believe they're serious.

Believe me, I've been flooding the world with resumes since I got the ultimatum in early March. And I also just found a guy on our local Porsche BBS who hires for a competitor, though I don't believe they have field sales folks. Anyway, I'm not worried about ending up better off. I always land on my feet and every tight spot I've ever been in has always turned into a better situation. I'm just worried about the painful interim and uncertainty.

The best of luck & wishes to you, Rick...above all, cover yer ass...

In n Out puts everyone who works there on a fast track to management. Good people. Closed all holidays. Believe deeply in God and family which means the company has morals - a rarity in America, I'm afraid.

And speaking of morals - Rick - remember our discussion about the AE industry. I bet they're hiring in droves, particularly with this crappy economy. SmileWavy

What do you sell? What's the company produce? Is there a link?

that's what I learned when I first got here, and was like wtf? Better off flipping burgers (or workin' that potato slicer/dicer/chopper contraption) then working at a lot of the places here. Too bad for me it's hard work being always so happy go lucky like the people who work there :D

Recently our lead engineer left the company. We had also just endured a severe layoff months earlier. 5 guys gone, now the lead - we're down to 4 and we lost a lot of knowledge. This lead was one of the best if not the best engineer I've ever worked with and the dork thought of me as an 'equal'. He was very knowledgeable in Voice - I am not nor is anyone who was left on our team.

A few weeks go by and the conference calling system goes down hard. O_o - boss calls him up and he walks me through some stuff graciously. He's a great guy but I would have to be at a death's door situation to call him. I know he'd help - it isn't that - it's that the company should not be putting him in that spot unless they are willing to pay him. I'm certainly not going to ask him to spend his valuable time on someone who he doesn't work for anymore.

I've done it myself, mainly for the sake of the people left behind (keep them thinking you're a good guy and all) but there has to be a limit.

If I were fired and someone called me who I had a good relationship with I would spell it out for them plainly - "I can't help you. I want to because I like and respect you but the company you work for fired me. I can't help you with this, I hope you understand."


If your old boss calls you - I would put his number in your phone with a silent ring tone. All you'll see is the missed calls - don't listen to the voice mails he leaves.

Mark his email address in your email program as 'junk' and don't look back.

I wouldn't give my former employer the time of day. We parted ways amicably and professionally but that's where it ends. I owe them nothing the instant they stop paying me. I'm a free agent - as is everyone else.

Having a good work ethic is a generally good thing, but beware of the manipulative jerks that would seek to take advantage of that. Value yourself.

I'd have no guilty conscience whatsoever about telling him/them to pound sand. But I'd be happy to collect some more checks if I could get them to pay me for it. However, I will always help out my former customers. I truly do like them and they should not suffer because of our company's internal BS. And they could be great networking sources in the future too. Many of them are Facebook friends.

If you're fired, tell 'em to pound sand.

Laid off with references is different.

'They've got their problems, now you've got yours'; off you go.

That being said, I wish you the best of luck Rick, hopefully things will settle down for you job-wise?

I would give him this much help:
Help begins >







< help ends