Woman Fired Because She Didn't Tell Her Boss Another Coworker Was Looking For A New Job

In most states, employment is ‘at-will,’ meaning either the employee or employer can terminate the relationship for any reason at any time, barring, of course, discrimination on the employer’s part.

That doesn’t mean that leaving a company or firing an employee won’t be a tense situation. One woman was stunned when she became collateral damage after one of the workers that reported to her decision to leave the company.

In a video she uploaded to TikTok, Andi Balli shared the surprising reason she had recently lost her job as a manager.

The video started with Ballin saying, “Tell me one of the craziest reasons you’ve ever been fired from a job. I’ll go first.” She then tells viewers that she was recently fired from her job because she neglected to let her bosses know her employee had interviewed with a different organization.

RELATED: Woman Shares Her Boss's Reaction To Her 'I Quit' Resignation Letter After She Was Told To 'Put It In Writing'

After her boss learned the employee was job-seeking, Ballin was fired.

On the Thursday prior to sharing her story, a worker reporting to Ballin told her that she had two interviews lined up and both had gone “extremely well.” The woman who was looking to depart the company asked Ballin to keep her job search between them until she was certain she had secured the new role.

Photo: TikTok

Just before her shift the following Monday, the employee received the good news that she had been offered one of the roles.

Once Ballin’s bosses got wind of the woman leaving the company, they started to believe that if they had known of the woman’s intentions the preceding Friday, the business could have convinced her to stay.

RELATED: Boss Who Promised Employee A Raise After 6 Months Is Annoyed That They Hit Goals — 'Why Isn't This Your Baseline Standard?'

According to Ballin, the funny part of that assumption is that the employee was quitting because of the exact person who thought they might have a shot at making her stay put. The woman had previously expressed to her manager, the manager’s boss, and even the CEO of the company that the only way she would consider staying is if the manager’s boss left the agency.

The employee’s desire to leave is understandable because the TikToker said, “My employee is getting significantly more money per year with better benefits”. In her opinion, there was no way the company could have compelled her not to go while keeping the person she had a problem with on payroll.

Nevertheless, the business decided to take their frustrations out on the supportive manager and fired her under the pretense that she had withheld pertinent information from them.

The situation begs the question of whether or not the manager had a duty to inform her boss about her employee’s intention to exit the company. The answer is a little complex, especially due to the time lapse between Ballin finding out and the employee receiving an offer.

The best part is that the worker trusted her manager enough to share her job search. But the information put that manager between a rock and a hard place. Violating the woman’s trust could have made her leave the organization whether or not she had a new role.

It seems that the company was well aware of the exiting employee’s dissatisfaction with leadership but chose to ignore it until it was too late. They should be asking themselves what the underlying issue is and working to address it. Because they didn’t, any chance of retaining the worker has been lost.

But terminating the manager in haste was definitely another bad decision. Now the business has to absorb the cost of finding and hiring a replacement while fumbling their way through training that person since there will be no transition between the outgoing and incoming employee.

In addition, they may be subjected to some legal risk since they are seemingly overlooking some upper management problems and targeting Ballin. Businesses should always listen to employee feedback and act on it accordingly. Where there’s smoke there is fire, and when ignored, that fire will eventually turn into an inferno, possibly sending the company up in smoke.

RELATED: Boss Shuts Intern Into An Office When She Tried To Quit After Being Asked To Do 3 People's Jobs—'Was I Too Aggressive?'

NyRee Ausler is a writer and author from Seattle. She covers issues navigating the workplace using the experience garnered over two decades of working in Human Resources & Diversity, Equity, and Inclusion.