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Companies have every right to choose which people to hire for their company, but firing employees may require legal and ethical steps to undertake. There are legal considerations in firing employees which when not addressed properly can put the company in trouble. Companies should strive to keep all their actions beyond legal question by observing the proper procedure.
Before any firing is to be done in relation to an employee’s performance, it has to be noted that management should take every effort to help the employee improve his or her work performance. There are legal and illegal reasons for firing an employee. When the company chooses to fire an employee for an illegal reason, it should expect that its decision will be highly contested .
Employees cannot and should not be fired by reason of discrimination, retaliation, complaining about working conditions, having an alien status, and refusal to take a lie detector test. It is also not legal to fire employees for their refusal to commit an illegal act such as falsification of documents to benefit the company, complaining about an illegal act of the employer, or the insistence to exercise legal right such as taking a leave. Most employers protect themselves by asking the terminated employee to sign an agreement that he or she will not sue.
In order for employers to alleviate the fears of unreasonable firing, there must be an existing protocol that will forewarn employees that firing might be a possibility. This merely requires employers to call the attention of employees who they believe are not working to the required standard. Directly relating poor work performance with sanctions will allow productive employees to continue working without fear.
Originally posted on December 2, 2012 @ 3:53 pm