And why can't I sue for this being an unfair labor practice? There should be more risk on this side of it than the other.
Corporations that have this policy always tell you that when you check on a prospective employee. “ Our policy is only to give dates of employment and X worked here from…”
It is not a negative when you check on somebody and hear that. I’ve heard it many times. I can hardly take it as a sign of a bad employee when their company simply has a policy not to give references
It some countries they do. A friend sued his former employer because the letter of recommendation he got was not good enough. Strange thing is they agreed and also contacted him to come back working for them. But it depends on the country, in some countries letters of recommendation are very rare, I wrote a couple in more than 20 years, basically every time someone that worked for or with me asked for one.
Companies at least used to ask for references on resumes in the US but I'm not sure how common that is at this point and it was usually co-workers/clients/etc, and not sure how often it was even checked.
Letters of recommendations, or even reference phone calls, are something that are widespread in academia and in entry-level service jobs. Like if you want to be a server or bartender, they want to make sure you were actually showing up at your last job and didn't steal money from the register.
They're not really a thing in the corporate world. Your technical expertise, certifications, and dates of employment pretty much speak for themselves. At least in the US.
It is absolutely harder finding a job without references than with references. You also have less leverage for negotiating salary.
"Your technical expertise, certifications, and dates of employment pretty much speak for themselves."
This isn't true at all. Why do interviews if you just make the decision off the resume? Why do code screens or LeetCode?
I have tons of experience and a long tenure, a masters degree, multiple certs, etc yet I'm a low performer with a disability who struggles to even get interviews. But you wouldn't know that by looking at my resume. At one point I was a high performer and a letter of recommendation could have really helped me.
I've never even been asked for references at any technical job in my life. HR departments generally do make some attempt at verifying employment, doing a background check, etc.
So no, in these cases it's not harder. There's no leverage either way.
Because what do reference letters even mean? How do you know the person writing the letter is even telling the truth? This is somebody you've never met and don't know at all. How do you know they don't unfairly hold a grudge against this ex-employee because they took it personally when they quit? Or how do you know they don't just write glowing references for everyone because they know "it's tough out there" and "everyone deserves a second chance"?
I always assumed this is why I've never been asked for references in my professional career, because the companies I applied to knew that references aren't worth the paper they're written on.
The easy fix here is banning requests for references.
Also, no sane employer would be like "well this guy worked at a corporation that doesn't give references, guess I can't hire him." If you think that's how people who hire think, you must not hire. It isn't.
It would be a problem if a corporation gave references to some people and then declined to other times, because then it could be construed as negative, which is exactly why they have that policy.
Lol ok. You realize I can say the exact same thing to you...
You've offered no facts to support what little you've said. You "suspect" some things and have been told some other things by your manager. I too have been told things by managers and suspect things myself. But I guess because it's your opinion, everyone else's opinion must be wrong.