Things that can get you Fired
In the current economic environment, most people understand and appreciate the value of being in work. It takes an alarming lack of self-awareness to fail to recognise the type of behaviour likely to get you fired. However, for whatever reason, many employees still choose to skate on thin ice, and continue to engage in the type of behaviors likely to lead to unemployment.
Here are ten classics.
Tardiness
It is disrespectful to your employer and to your co-workers to be consistently late for work without a valid reason. If you are sleeping-in or nursing a hangover, someone else at work is doing your job as well as their own.
Raiding the Supply Closet
Batteries, pens, envelopes and photocopier paper all cost money. Being employed does not give you the right to appropriate these for non-business use, or worse still, selling them on e-Bay for a tidy profit. This is theft and will leave you open to both disciplinary action and possible criminal sanctions.
Stealing Time
Taking an extra half hour for lunch every day, popping outside for ten minutes at a time to smoke, or spending large parts of your work day surfing the internet, making personal calls, sending personal e-mails of Face-booking is a theft of your employers time and resources. An employee is paid to work and is expected to be reasonably productive during contracted hours.
Insulting Your Employer
The media is reporting an increasing number of cases where employees use social media – outside of work hours – to insult or criticise their boss or organisation. Each employee is a representative of the organisation and are expected to act as such in the public – and that includes the internet.
Under-performance
In these cost-conscious times, employees who consistently under-perform, or are difficult to manage, will find themselves first in line when it comes to determining who gets fired when the organisation is down-sized.
Lack of Flexibility
Continually saying “no” to additional work will not endear you to your boss or colleagues. Employers look for “discretionary effort” – the extra bit that employees put in that is outside their job description or contracted hours. It’s what distinguishes the average worker from the high-performing one.
Dubious sickness
Taking sick days just before the start and end of vacation time is highly conspicuous and raises suspicions that you are simply extending your holiday at the expense of your employer. Be ready to document all of your sick leave, regardless of what your employer’s policy may say you are entitled to.
Harassment
There is a fine line between building social and collegiate relations with your colleagues and straying into the territory of harassment, especially with those of the opposite (or indeed same) sex. Your company’s fraternisation policy is there for a reason as broken work relationships often have very negative impacts on the performance of duties at work.
Discrimination
Discrimination on any basis is an absolute no-no. It has an impact on both employee and employer, as the employee will be disciplined, and an employer who fails to stop or correct discrimination will find itself liable for that failure.
Fiddling Expenses
Expenses are not a hidden bonus scheme. All allowable expenses should be legitimate and receipted (where possible). Those who submit fake expenses are fleecing their company and their colleagues and probably defrauding themselves out of a job and possible into a police car as well.
This is by no means an exhaustive list. There are many other ways to get yourself fired, but all of them require a pretty serious lapse of judgment and should be self-evident to any employee with even an ounce of self-preservation and common sense.
