Fired! Civil Duty: two different ends of the spectrum

One fired because he was “too intimidating” (is that a real reason?) and the second because he went over his bosses head. The difference? One received a severance package that will ensure a clean separation, while the other is let loose after nearly three decades of service and is now suing to get his job back.

Keep your employment away from termination

A small Florida town has fired Bill Vance, its Town Manager, because he was too intimidating. The town’s Library Director has told the the town commissioners during a special meeting that she along with other staff members “are being intimidated, being ambushed.” Vance’s firing comes as a result of  “such an amount of adverse comments.”  Vance was terminated with a six-month severance package.

In New York, a Health and Hospitals Corporation employee has been fired for what he claims to be “unjust reasons”. According to Naren Gupta, his problems began when while serving as a senior management consultant for HHC, he discovered more than $1,000,000 in payments being made to Chase Manhattan Bank without a contract or board of director approval present. His report made its way to the desk of the CFO, who according to Gupta, immediately put a chip on her shoulder against him.  Since then, the CFO kept tabs on Gupta, looking for any faults in his work, he said. Finally, Gupta was fired for insubordination, lack of communication and bad performance.

Whether you’re the bully, or the one being bullied, it’s obvious that neither one of these individuals placed enough emphasis on the game of office politics. It’s important to remember that keeping good relationships at work will more often keep your job a lot safer than your actual performance. Unless you come to work to sleep, that is. So, as the old saying goes, keep your friends close, and your enemies closer, and remember – it’s always good to have friends in high places…