Moral Issues Associated With Employee Termination

• Getting terminated can come as a shock. Sharon Dominick/Photodisc/Getty Images

  Many managers find the termination of employees to be the worst part of their jobs. In addition to being unpleasant, firing people carries serious moral overtones that need to be addressed. Questions of personal compatibility can become intertwined with questions of job suitability and create gray areas where the motives of the firing are unclear.

Responsibility for Employee Welfare

• Years ago, it was common for an employee to expect to work for a single company for his or her entire career. While the 21st-century workforce is far more mobile than in previous eras, there is still a certain amount of responsibility involved on both sides when a person is given a position in a company. If your firm is letting a long-term employee go, particularly if it is through no fault of the employee, consideration needs to be given to what might be owed this person for his or her years of hard work. Many companies address this through generous severance pay when they are forced to lay someone off for economic reasons.

Wrongful Dismissal

• Terminating a person's employment is not something that should be taken lightly. Many workers live from paycheck to paycheck, and the loss of a job can quickly lead to real financial hardship. Employers need to consider this fact and take steps to avoid dismissing someone without adequate cause. Wrongful dismissal is illegal, but just as importantly it is unethical to disrupt someone's life in this way unless absolutely unavoidable. If a company is floundering financially, or if an employee is disruptive or truly incompetent, sometimes firing is unavoidable, but it should be done as a last resort.

Methods of Termination

• Even when a termination is inevitable, it should be done with as much tact and grace as possible. Avoid being unnecessarily abrupt or rude with a terminated employee, even if the firing is for poor performance. Before firing someone, management should pursue other methods of improving performance such as changing duties or providing further training. Unavoidable dismissals should be handled in private, allowing an employee to decide his or her preferred method of departure. Unless it is a case of intentional sabotage or rule-breaking, the terminated person should be given as much time as possible to get his affairs in order and leave the company in an organized way.