Comment by jayliew | Hacker News Reader

Comment by jayliew | Hacker News Reader

Having been through a few conflicts myself, as an independent observer and as one of the parties in the conflict .. I'm not taking sides, but just wanting to note that although the employer definitely could have handled it better, I have a feeling we're only scratching the tip of the surface and we don't know much what really happened between the employer-employee.

The "pack and get out now" is actually very standard upon resignation, but more so for sales people, less engineers, unless .. there's something going on (which obviously we don't know).

Btw, as the employee: resigning via email is also not very classy, and could be done better: e.g. handing an official resignation letter in person to your direct superior face to face.

Just a suggestion. Also, if you want to air your dirty laundry, come forth with the stuff that you didn't tell us about. There's 2 kinds of lies:

(1) commission: you explicitly fabricate non-facts

(2) omission: where you fail to mention details that matter

Both are still lies. I think the employee knows how snowball started, but is refraining from telling the public. Which if that was the case, perhaps it shouldn't have been brought to light in the first place - because that'd mean the employee wants public to make a decision street-justice-style based on incomplete information.

Who's to say that Evan only resigned via this communication to the team? Presumably, as an honorable individual he resigned to management privately, and then in addition sent a mail to the team stating the facts of his resignation, thanking them and wishing them well. That's the classy way to go about it.

If that was the first communication he had with Mahalo about his resignation, bad on him. Given my perception of Jason (as a douche-nozzle leach/blight on the internet), it wouldn't surprise me at all if he tried to portray it as if that was the first and only communication from Evan to Mahalo and that Evan was somehow the bad guy here. Employees quit. Get the F over it, and don't extend your reputation as a petulant out-for-number-one dickhead.

Frankly even quitting via email would only be a minor count against him to me. Having difficult conversations face to face is a skill not everyone possesses, that was a polite and professional resignation letter no matter the delivery (or whether he was lying through his teeth) and the proper response in a business context is "We're sorry to hear that, good luck at Yahoo!." especially if you mean what Jason wrote.

Is 2 weeks notice common in the USA? Here in Europe it's 1 month or 3 months, depending on what contract you have.

2 weeks is courtesy, and standard. In California, it's "at will" employment .. meaning, the employee can quit with or without notice, but the employee can also fire, with or without notice. That said, there's a lot of labor laws to comply with, so companies in practice don't just fire people at will (they can be sued by the now ex-employee). But yeah, in this part of the world, 2 weeks is courtesy. No courtesy is rude, and you're "burning the bridge".

Actually, it's the opposite.

The moment you give the employee a reason, you open the door to a lawsuit. The best way to let someone go is simply say "your services are no longer required" and leave it at that.

It's a common courtesy, but not required unless you have a contract that says so.

Most workers in the US do not have contracts and can quit at any time, just as they can be let go from their jobs without reason.

Yes, two weeks is the norm. In Canada too.

In Spain (last I checked we're in Europe) the most usual are two weeks by default. Contracts can extend it or you can leave at once while in the "test period", fair because during this period the employer can fire you at once too without cause.

You can leave immediately even subjected to this clauses, but then you suffer a penalization (one day of pay each two days you cut). Most times, the company owes you money at any given time (holidays, extra pays), so it's wise to stay unless the new salary nulls the difference. Also it's always good to keep good will with former employers, you never know.

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