The bad news is you're not being laid off

[turbo]

I think if anyone does get fired and files a wrongful ternmination suit that they might win since the amount of work required was decided without any justification other than, "we keep raising the bar and most of you keep meeting it". Well, that's because some people are working 80 plus hours a week and others have found less than kosher ways to report their results. Not to mention that some are doing a lot of really shoddy work that's bound to hit the fan sooner or later.

Ross Perot made a fortune by hooking up with customers that would make large orders when his compensation was at its highest, with NO penalty for cancellation. Guess what? He called in a lot of favors, got highly compensated, and left his employer in the lurch after the contracts that those bonuses were based on were canceled en-mass.

I'm not suggesting this as a business model, but putting it out as a cautionary tale. Businesses can promise a lot during boom-times, and they can run into problems when the time to pay comes due. In my case, I was pulling in less than $200K/yr in incentive pay, but the owner's greed led him to try to cut that unilaterally, while the net profits of my tiny division were running well over $1.25M/year. The state and federal court systems should have slapped that creep down with fines and penalties, yet they let him slide off. I guess a tiny piece of all those millions can buy a judge or two.

Evo is in a really hard place! Even when I was not "on the clock" I had clients in Europe, Asia, NZ, and other time zones that had to be kept up with. There is absolutely no way that I would have bothered to log each and every call I made or received when I was working at home, after putting in 8-10 hours per day (and many more during crunch times), but my legal team thought that such protestations would "confuse" a judge or jury. Duh! If a billionaire heir of a candy-fortune calls you at midnight from Switzerland, you take the call. If you have to call a client in another time-zone whose schedule is far offset from your own, you make the call. I have taken bids on significant items of US militaria from countries in Africa, NZ/OZ, SE asia, etc. I gave big bidders my home number so that they could get in touch with me any time. Few abused it. Most international businessmen are acutely aware of time-differences.

One time, I had an interesting twist. A highly-placed offiicer of a defense contractor called me after he touched down in Chad. I had Fed-Exed him a catalog and he got it in MD before his flight. During the flight, an Ireland-based contractor had been eying his catalog, and wanted to bid on some Confederate items. I got a call from my client, asking me to place progressive bids for him some items, then he handed his cell phone to his new-found buddy, who also placed bids on the CS items. I got CC #s from the new customer, but relied on the personal recommendation of the older client to over-ride the company's guidelines on bid-limits for new customers. Personal trust and "gut-feeling" evaluation is missing in today's business climate. Over 10 years ago, I got a call from an investment consultant/specialist in Confederate items. He invoked the names of friends of mine in CW militaria and asked me to talk to them, and then asked if I would allow him a multi-million-dollar credit limit in future auctions because he was representing some BIG buyers. I checked with his references, approved his auction limits, and he has done quite well, using my acceptance to leverage his way into other auction houses. These days, you will see him prominently featured as a "Confederate" expert on the Antiques Road Show. He is a lot smarter than that, but the producers of that show prefer to highlight furniture, art, etc.

 

[Sorry!]

turbo I like you and all but your posts recently seem to be kinda rambling. I don't see how anything you said will help or support Evo in anyway lol. You seem to like to talk about yourself and things to do with you a lot hmmm. Guess I just didn't notice it before?

 

[edward]

Sorry to hear about this Evo. I have a nephew in Ohio going through about the same thing. He is working 12 hrs per day 6 days per week. He can't get overtime pay because he is a salaried employee.

Workloads and associated stress are increasing in the workplace while employee morale, motivation and endurance are declining, according to a survey of business leaders and work-life experts conducted by WFD Consulting.

http://content.opportunityknocks.org/2009/04/21/increased-workload-workplace-pressure-and-stress-taking-toll-on-workers/

If that isn't bad enough, most large employers carry life insurance policies on their workers.

 

[turbo]

turbo I like you and all but your posts recently seem to be kinda rambling. I don't see how anything you said will help or support Evo in anyway lol. You seem to like to talk about yourself and things to do with you a lot hmmm. Guess I just didn't notice it before?

Employment law does not protect employees. Get that? I have shown how in my case (at a minimum) the legal system does not protect the rights of the individuals. Evo is up **** creek without a paddle. I had legal agreements (supposedly) that were defensible should one party or another violate such agreement. I was absolutely helpless in the state and federal legal systems.

Evo is even worse-off, if that is possible. Workers in our society (even high-skilled workers such as Evo who can evaluate, redesign, re-task digital resources) are all at risk.

 

[fuzzyfelt]

That is nasty. Sorry to hear it, Evo.

 

[Redbelly98]

Good luck Evo. Will you be looking around for another job?

 

[Moonbear]

No contracts, as was stated, most states in the US are "employmjent at will" which means a company can terminate an employee without or without cause and an employee can quit at any time for any reason.

I think if anyone does get fired and files a wrongful ternmination suit that they might win since the amount of work required was decided without any justification other than, "we keep raising the bar and most of you keep meeting it". Well, that's because some people are working 80 plus hours a week and others have found less than kosher ways to report their results. Not to mention that some are doing a lot of really shoddy work that's bound to hit the fan sooner or later.

Right now I'm one of those exceeding the amount of work required, but I am killing myself. I think this just typifies the direction more companies seem to be taking to dig themselves out of financial trouble.

Without a contract specifying it, you're not entitled to any sort of severance pay. Severance pay is a courtesy, not a requirement, and even if it were in a contract, they could wiggle out of it when they need to make the layoffs because they have no money rather than because they're restructuring or being bought out or some such. So, the company wouldn't need to play games like this to get out of paying severance packages if they needed to resort to layoffs.

The reason it's worth fighting has nothing to do with any hope you'd get that severance package, it's the difference between having "laid off" and "fired for not meeting quotas" on your work history both for getting a new job and for any unemployment benefits you'd normally be entitled to. Nobody can protect workers from a company getting ready to go belly-up in terms of trying to keep your job, it's more about what the file says when you do lose it.

And, if their only justification for raising quotas is that everyone met the previous quota, but are restricting you from working extra hours to see if the new quota can be met in reasonable work hours (doubling your work load without allowing you to double your work hours is unreasonable) I think you can challenge if they try to fire you based on that.

That's why you all need to track your hours. Everyone in that office needs to pool together your efforts, because you're all in the same situation, and anyone of you could be the one they fire...or they might decide to fire all of you. So, it's in everyone's best interest to work together and compile the evidence that would need to be shared.

If there is a lawsuit, I'm pretty sure that anyone still left behind would be protected if they helped provide evidence or testify on behalf of fired employees. I think that should fall under the whistle blower laws. But, that would be a major question to ask an attorney. Obviously, you'll have a hard time making a case if everyone who doesn't get fired clams up and pretends nothing strange happened out of fear of losing their job next.

 

[turbo]

That's why you all need to track your hours. Everyone in that office needs to pool together your efforts, because you're all in the same situation, and anyone of you could be the one they fire...or they might decide to fire all of you. So, it's in everyone's best interest to work together and compile the evidence that would need to be shared.

In an ideal world, that would be a good move, and it would make sense for all workers to buy in. In the real world, it would be disastrous for the worker(s) organizing such an effort, because they will be ratted out by coworker(s) and will be fired out-of-hand. I'm sorry to be so cynical, but there are people in every organization who will sacrifice their co-workers to keep their own jobs, especially if they can throw high-performing co-workers under the bus.