Archived comment by Wildfox:
Exactly, and quite some favour it is, too, eh? @|:-)

In Switzerland, an employee cannot leave their employer at an inconvenient time. (For example, a secretary cannot decide to leave the day after tomorrow if it's a busy time for the boss.)

But then again... Who knows. If she stays and doesn't do her job properly, there's a good excuse to fire them right?

Anyway. It's late, erm early I mean, and I'm off to sleep. (Like someone cares.)

Archived comment by nightfever:
That Swiss thing sounds fun. I am in Germany but I don't think that I have an "at-will" contract. As far as I remember, I just don't have a minimum time that I have to work here...but I do need to give a certain number of weeks notice when I am about to quit.

And as for that Ayn Rand stuff...dammit Jim! I'm an engineer! And as far as I can tell we have the biggest superiority complexes that I have ever come across...so yeah, I AM doing my employer a favour by working for them!

;-)

Archived comment by Luscious:
I've been both an employer and an employee, and the "at-will" phrase in the handbooks means that either party can terminate the relationship with no warning whatsoever. HOWEVER, when I trained my new employees, I told them that neither of us would really want such a situation to occur, so that I would communicate with them if there was any problems (work with them to identify the solution[s], have an open door policy for suggestions/complaints, etc.) and that they would give me a certain #/weeks notice if they were going to quit. I also had a regular employee evaluation system as well as an anonymous suggestion box set up, so things worked pretty well. I did specify that I reserved the right to fire them immediately if a crazy fucked-up situation came up (injuring clients, crashing company vehicles, etc.), and that otherwise I would try honestly to avoid invoking the "at-will" termination. I never had to go that route except when people injured clients or crashed vehicles or had an escalating written record of being negligent/uncaring employees.

Even though it cost me probably a ream of paper per month to document everything, I felt secure and my employees felt secure that the process was fair.

I've had incredibly crappy bosses, and I KNOW that employee labor protections are there because of bosses who suck. I did NOT want to be a boss I would hate.

I second the comment below about Ayn Rand's misunderstanding of corporations and corporate culture, her books in terms of business dogma are pretty anti-worker and in my opinion, wrong.

My employment lawyer always rolled his eyes when I wouldn't complain about the reasoning behind returning OT in California to 8+hrs/day, 40+hrs/week, although I did complain about the complicated legal hoops we had to jump through to stay compliant with the law. That's just a symptom of it being a legal issue, not specifically a labor issue.

Archived comment by Mike:
Those wacky Swiss.
Hey, I say fire the moron and take your chances. I mean, come on, what are the chances that someone stupid enough to think that the coffee beans are *spoiled* will be able to locate a competent lawyer? Keep an idiot like that on your workforce long enough and she'll scald someone, and then you'll have a REAL lawsuit on your hands.

Archived comment by Wildfox:
In Switzerland, employers can fire people (for incompetence, for isntance) but have to pay some sort of a compensation (which I suppose is more or less equivalent to damages a fired person can claim if they sue the company).

(Waving 'hello' from a faraway world.)

Archived comment by Kevin Fox:
My contracts (or at least the employee handbooks we had to sign) for recent jobs call it 'at-will employment'. The gist is that you work there at will, and they let you at will, but at any time either of you could stop doing so for whatever reason you feel like.

Archived comment by JP:
Passerby: well, yes, if an employer writes an illegal contract (and the way you describe yours, it's definitely illegal under employment law anywhere in the U.S. or Europe), anyone can sue.

tess: the problem with 'atlas shrugged' is that it presumes good employers - hank reardens rather than jim taggarts.

ayn rand doesn't seem to understand corporations at all - all her industrialists are individuals and when corporations exist they're thin fronts for individuals. and in terms of logical argument she spends most of her time setting up false positions for philosophies she disagrees with so she can knock them down.

still, it's a fun read and the central question ("by what right does any man proclaim his right to one cent of another man's labour?", NOT "who is John Galt?") is interesting

Archived comment by Passerby:
My employee handbook states that my employment can be terminated "with or without cause". It goes further stating the employee can quit with or without cause.

Of course anyone can sue for anything regardless of the contracts they sign.

Archived comment by tess:
since i'm currently reading ayn rand's "atlas shrugged" i thought i'd comment on the general incompetence of a society that punishes achievement and rewards those who do nothing... perhaps if people didn't believe that they were doing their employers a favor by working for them, but rather the reverse, then rampant incompetence would decrease... oooookay stopping now. :D

Archived comment by fair_n_hite_451:
That was way funnier in my had before I got to the part about it relating to a coffee shop. Imagining what sort of place would even have $600 worth of beans (and I was thinking the baked kind, I'm so not a Seattle latte Starbucks type of person) lying around for someone to think they were old and needed throwing away.

Once again, reality disappoints by not living up to my imagination. sigh!

Archived comment by Jane:
I just watched a show (Norm?). The company said to hire someone handicapped, so one guy got his dog hired (the application said he had short limbs and couldn't talk). When the boss found out it was a dog & said get rid of him, he was told that he could not fire him, he had to offer him more training and an opportunity to improve his performance. Unfortunately, this is not so far from the truth in some places. It's a strange world we live in folks!

Archived comment by Yuri:
At the coffeeshop I worked at, it was almost impossible to fire people. In fact, I only saw one person get fired in my whole two years of employment there - a middle-aged guy who came to work with the delirium tremens, reeking of alcohol, and after three months was still asking us things like: "Mocha... that has, uh, coffee in it, right?" In truth, even he wasn't really fired. He was a temp worker, and simply wasn't retained after the holiday season. Yeesh.

Archived comment by WendiWolf:
I guess in my earlier comment, I forgot to add that she was not a very good supervisor. She had been working in the main dinning hall, but due to incompetence, they farmed her out to the Delli. Although, i don't think it helped that her cousin worked the same shift. Both of them were lazy, rude, crude, mean and biased people themselves. I'll never forget the day that my supervisor decided to litteraly curse me out in front of customers because I was doing my assigned tasks in the order that _I_ thought they would be most easily accomplished... I told the boss, but he said all he could do was to try and talk to her and that it was my problem. *sigh* So much for going to higher authorities...
Enough rambling and remembering of a painfull semester....

Archived comment by Elizabeth:
Good point.

I am glad the laws are there, but sometimes it's so frustrating that you can't fire incompetent people. THAT is not legal. You have to offer them more training, and etc, and if that doesn't help, you have to offer them MORE training.

It's odd to me that lack of ability to do your job is not considered a "reason".

Please understand that this bitterness comes from years of having had to work with incompetent people. Or should I perhaps say, work *for* them....

Archived comment by Jane:
Maybe she was being bias against. Then again, if somebody really wants to fire you, they can usually find a reason.

Back to the coffee place though, if instead of firing her they charged her for the stuff she screwed up ($600 in beans), she would quit and they wouldn't have to worry

Archived comment by WendiWolf:
I know mine does. If I read the "employees' handbook right" they have 30 days in which to fire you for whatever reason they want. After that they have to have some kind of reason.

On another note, in college I worked in the Delli at the student center. The only reason that they didn't fire my supervisor is because they had tried before but because she was black she felt she was being biased against and tried to sue. *sigh* It really did make my life a living hell for that semester. Then I graduated.

Archived comment by JP:
I think mine does...