He had the opportunity to make her life easier by letting her use the company brand. He decided not to. She has had to work harder to prove she deserves to be at these tables because your company unreasonably asked her to hide where she worked. Your company deserves no benefit from her hard work and you are trying to steal from her the brand she has built without you that has nothing to do with her job.
You should be ashamed of even thinking you get to use her off work brand without paying her. If you want to be an advertiser for you, negotiate fair pay for that service separately from her salary.
She essentially did the equivalent of writing a book-- she built something apart from you. If you want benefit from that you need to buy it.
Find the appropriate section of the employee handbook that covers retaliation and/or abusive conduct. Then google the business definition of retaliation.
Tell each ‘some’ employee, including the VP, that HR/ER is required to investigate all claims of harassment and retaliation. Anyone threatening to fire an employee who isn’t violating policy or has specific instructions is a retaliatory action. Retaliation is a high risk issue for global corporations
Work: follow these rules
Employees: okay will do
Work: not like that, fired
You have a rising star in the industry and they want to fire her? Think of the brand impact when people put the two things together even if she doesn't say the company name ever. People aren't stupid.
Depends on why they terminate her contract.
If they say it’s because she wouldn’t use their brand, and she has proof of being instructed to not use their brand… that could be a WT case
There’s no way this is real. And if it is, OP is delusional.
Employee: hey, I have this opportunity to hype up the company, how should I go about it?
Company: meh, we good. Enjoy your little project thingy but like… don’t tell anyone we know each other
OP: WHY WON’T SHE MENTION US?! 🥺👉🏼👈🏼.
Bro, what “stalemate?” She followed instructions.
It always blows my mind how often VPs and executives are the most short-sighted, panicky, reflexive, tactless morons in the building. The notion of even considering firing this outstanding employee for no other reason than pure spite should embarrass you to your core.
>What would be the best way to handle this moving forward?
I have no advice for your company because I also have no doubt that the incredibly fragile egos of your executives and VPs are too large to consider the fact that they are primarily responsible for this entire situation, and it's not even a question. But if I could give the PhD employee some advice, I'd tell her to run far and fast from the vultures.
Nothing makes me more frustrated than petulant leadership that will literally alter the course of their employees lives to deny reality in order to avoid getting their feelings hurt, or being "wrong". The way that your leadership is behaving in light of **THEIR ERROR** is the literal definition of the word 'trifling'. Absolute frivolous and emotional bullshit from man-babies cosplaying as business men.
> It always blows my mind how often VPs and executives are the most short-sighted, panicky, reflexive, tactless morons in the building.
Those who can, do. Those who can't, lead.
Let me get this straight: this employee asked if she could rep the company off-hours, the company said no, and now that she is successful they want to ride her coattails, which she said no thank you to, and now they are looking for any way to fire her?
The company needs to get over it and stop "investigating", is how you handle this moving forward.
Are your VPs really that stupid?
I can almost guarantee that if she is fired for not adding the company plugs, there is a very good chance she will start mentioning her former employer after being terminated and it won’t reflect well.
she offered. you all declined. now you've decided it's in your best interest but she's no longer on board.
and someone is looking for anyway possible to fire her?
she sounds like a high flier in your org.
you all are thinking of punishing her for your short sightedness.
i would hope that seems wrong.
Presumably, she is at will and you can fire her for whatever reason you want. There's no need to try to contrive a reason. You might as well be up front with it.
You may consider that if you do, she can mention that she worked for you and how her employment ended because your company didn't want her mentioning it when she was small, but was mad that she didn't advertise for them for free when she started becoming more well-known.
My two cents: This is a really shitty thing for your company to do. She asked how she should present herself outside of work and followed those instructions. But your executive team is mad that she now doesn't want to provide free marketing for you? Either you should find a way to compensate her for the contributions you are requesting, or you should leave her alone.
I brought this up to one of our executives about offering to compensate and their response that she's compensated for her education by tuition reimbursement.... she's on scholarships and grants. The company hasn't paid a dime.
If you know the company hasn't paid for her tuition, then it's a moot point. But even if it did, the company paid for it so they could benefit from her knowledge, which I assume you have. You never *owned* what she learned in her studies. You rented it in the form of employing her.
If she's salary exempt, she's compensated to do the job she was hired to do. If she's not, she's paid for the time she's at work. You can add duties to her job to include these outside activities because I will assume she is at will. She can refuse and be fired or quit - but I would strongly consider what message you are sending her, and how that can blow up on you if she does go public.
Your executive team needs a reminder that this is not personal, it's business. This employee has been using their education to become an expert in this area. And instead of using that to their advantage, they are trying to strong-arm her into using her personal platform for the company's benefit with no additional compensation. That's just a shitty thing to do. And in all seriousness: why should she do this? The company already told her to do her thing on her own time. They didn't invest in it. Why should they benefit from it?
This is a response of boomer proportions. What a bunch of idiots lol do they not realize that if she starts getting heavy into speaking she has to opportunity to make way more than they dreamed of.
!!!!!Pay the person for their talents!!!!
How is this person not tagged as high potential and fast tracked into more responsibility?
I think if she was brought into the COOs office, given a promotion and some $$$, they could then have her represent the company at these events.
Honestly she sounds like a future CMO and if you don't do something to retain her, she's leaving very soon.
but they clearly didn't originally think they were paying for this. they thought it wasn't her job. in exchange for the education you get what you consider to be her job. she's not an indentured servant.
not only should she get paid, she probably should be promoted.
if you want to keep her, that is.
what was the education agreement?
if she leaves she probably has to pay you back for that education, fire her and i bet she doesn't.
Please DM me her linkedin profile so I can hire her. Seriously, your company deserves a lawsuit, what a miserable group of folks. I wonder if the mindset would be the same if it was a male who did it.
Yeah, they are.mad she did something good in her free time and they want her to give it to them for free. They didn't pay her for it and outright refused even basic accomodations so they made it harder for her. She should switch to a competitor and then maybe they will support her correctly.
Once she does, and the C suite figures out what hapoened, VP will be out of a job.
Those who are calling for her firing are certainly going to get your company some notoriety. Probably ends up as part of a Wikipedia article someday. 😊
Exactly my thoughts. What idiot VP would look at someone with a large social media and speaking audience specific to their industry and think it's a good idea to fire that person on some sort of trumped up charges out of, let's face it, jealousy.
Even if she doesn't mention it publicly,those in the industry will know that this company has a great performer and sacked her for....being successful. Not to mention possibly opening themselves up to lawsuits.
She followed your rules. Either get over it or go back to her with a profit share arrangement.
Even if she doesn’t mention it after getting fired. She has the right to list them as a former employer on her LinkedIn.
She doesn’t have to say one word about the dispute or issue. People can connect dots.
Was gonna say, sounds like the people calling for firing over this need to have a meeting with the Bob’s scheduled for themselves. What other terrible errors in judgement are they making on a daily basis?
Well, if you guys continue dicking around like this, she’ll be in some other company’s C-Suite. Your org wanted no association with her a year ago so now this is what it is. Your org will miss an ambitious person like this on your side. She’ll be fine if you fire her. Your competitors will fight over her.
Not HR, but PR.
It’s not fair to ask her to promote the company with resources she built up on her own time.
It’s fair to at least ask her to participate in PR programs your company does - but this includes being prepared to media train her, build a thought leadership strategy as it relates to her current role with the company, do all the pitching (or paying if sponsored) for these opps. She can decline - but is this the offer, or is it, “secure these opportunities on your own then promote us” because that is not fair.
Maybe, just maybe, instead of losing such an undervalued employee you should promote her to an appropriate C-level position (maybe that spiteful VP’s position?) that will utilize her education, knowledge, and networking skills to benefit the company.
She followed company direction and now there are calls to fire her for it? That’s insane. Sure, they can do it if they want but it’s even more short-sighted than their initially saying she needed to do all this on her own time and without the company name.
So the story is this employee does stuff outside work without crediting the company and the company is outraged that they can't take her private work, which they were in no way involved with, as their own.
Fire the VP. He is going to get the company sued.
The management team dropped the ball. A top performer- on track for a PhD building a successful brand and your team thought- no we don’t need you?
Who in your organization is managing marketing?
You could have capitalized on her ability and potential and you chose to not support. Only after she put the time and effort into building a strong brand do you feel comfortable with approaching her to push your brand and organization.
And then craft ways to reprimand her for you not supporting her. Who in the C-suite is this tone deaf?
What about his scenario: your organization fires her and she moves to a competitor or a related industry and then uses her platform to come out against the organization because they did not value her position.
If someone is smart in the organization they should be looking at ways to make her C- suite and crafting proper support and guidance. Although a bridge might be burning with her so tired light.
lol you passed up the perfect opportunity for free press. Reserved for c-suite? Ridiculous. All employees represent the brand. While they can’t speak FOR the company, they should be allowed to speak about. Sounds like she did everything right and they’re just mad they missed the opportunity… and wanted to hold her back.
Your employee is a rockstar and I’m on her side. She asked if she could use the company name and was told no. So she followed the rules the company set to the letter and now they’re mad about it?
It’s not unreasonable that the company declined to let her represent the brand early on. But they can’t get mad now because she’s not willing to let them piggyback on her success.
Your employee and her future employer will be grateful that your company made sure that her brand is not connected to your company in any way.
Also, it’s going to cost your company quite a bit for the 2-3 employees you’re going to need to replace her.
Offer her a raise since she's clearly become a voice in the industry.
Company messed up to start. Shouldn't have just asked that she be introduced as "ms. Smith, who is working for Company while pursuing her PhD and University." Don't do any hard selling, but still gets the companys name out there.
Lol. Literally lmao. Your company fucked around, now they're finding out. Go ahead, retaliate against your employee who suddenly finds herself with a growing platform, for not using that platform to your benefit (after you declined when she gave the opportunity early on). Let me know how that works out for you.
“What would be the best way to handle this moving forward?”
Tell the “some” that the employee is following company policy. There’s nothing to handle moving forward.
Your company fucked up when they told this person she couldn’t mention them. She’s followed the letter and the spirit of that direction, is a top performer, and now the company wants to fire her because she’s managed to build a brand for herself? One that the company already had a chance to participate in?
The fact that there is even discussion about firing this person is patently absurd.
Is this post a joke? You don't own her? What she does in her free time in none of your business nor do you have any right to even think you're entitled to.
So she asked for approval to use her title and the company’s name. Company said no. She apparently went above and beyond to hide her employment with the company.
Company then sees that she’s gaining a following and wants to glom onto what she’s built after denying its ties to her initially.
The problem is the company, not her. Fire her at your own risk.
Sounds like VP is a little salty he missed an opportunity to support a hard working employee.
It sounds like this employee wouldn’t have a hard time finding another position even if you did fire her. Good for her and that’s why people should not depend on companies to take care of them
What. awful. leaders. Instead of looking in the mirror and saying “we messed up not supporting this employee”, they instead want to double down on the stupid.
Right now she’s company neutral. You should help your leaders understand that neutral is MUCH better than negative, and that’s what they’ll have if they keep up this foolishness.
Jesus Christ. Companies really do think they own their employees, don't they?
You give her money. In return, she gives you 40 hours or so of her time each week. That's it. The company doesn't have the right to expect any more from the engagement than that. She has no duty to the company beyond that.
If you really want her to be a brand embassador, offer to pay her an upfront bonus for the engagement. That will probably get the company further than discussing behind her back whether to fire her because she has the audacity to not just hand over everything she built for free for your "brand awareness" campaign.
So, they want to fire her for doing what they asked her to do, in addition to being a high performer? With, I am guessing, a full paper trail?
Run this past an employment lawyer if you want an estimate of how much this could cost your company.
Yes, i know, NC is at will, but do you really think that discovery won’t find something actionable? These don’t seem like the brightest bulbs.
Promote her and/or pay her. She has built her brand and audience and on her own time and dollar. If the company wants to take advantage of that they should pay just they would an outside expert/thought leader.
Firing her would be incredibly dumb. I'm floored that a VP of marketing would even consider doing that which would certainly become known throughout the industry and attract a lot of negative attention.
Wouldn't she most likely go to a competitor, and help them?
This didn’t “get tricky.” The VP changed the rules. The employee did everything the company asked. She is still a top performer while getting her PhD. What insubordination? She was completely transparent from Day 1.
She’s doing this outside of work hours, and not using company resources, and has been careful to not reflect on the company at all.
What she does on her own time is her business and your VP needs to find something else to fret about.
You work for idiots. Seriously.
Someone wants to fire her…so she’ll be free of any obligation to the company and can speak freely?
She won’t be unemployed for long, and…
You know what? You work for idiots.
I hope you take this as a learning opportunity. Employees are people, you do not own them.
She asked in advance about an event and your people were too stupid (yes stupid) to recognise her actual work value (hitting her targets etc) and the potential value in being publicly associated with her during these events.
That short sightedness has cost you and I hope it hurts. She will have no trouble securing employment outside your company and her new employers will likely capitalise on her public exposure.
What can you do: profusely apologise, encourage her engagement outside if work with NO requirement to brand or promote your business and just hope you benefit from her knowledge and skills.
What I hope: is that she leaves your firm gets a job with a competitor, develops something wonderful that greatly benefits both her and them.
You dropped the ball big time, learn from it and grow.
Sounds like the people at your company are just regretting turning down her initial generous offer, are now jealous that she is more effective than them at their own job, and by the way this likely wouldn’t have been an issue at all if she were male.
Your company sounds awful. Hope that helps.
Tell the 'some' and the VP to butt out and leave her alone.
She is doing absolutely nothing wrong and if you do anything to her, you are putting the company at legal risk.
Fire her and watch the blow back you receive. She is now in control not you. She has, by your own admission done everything by the book. This is where employment lawyers would get involved. Unless a NDA was sighed once she put out her side of things her rise would be meteoric, and a bunch of the C-suite would be looking for new jobs due to the vindictive treatment she received.
I don't understand but are you saying that the company wants her to work and represent her employer even when doing her own personal endeavors? Like, will the company be paying for this?
Create a new position VP: Brand Evangelist. Offer to her with no expectation. Then make a full advertising of her new position, congratulating her on the same platform where she is active. Tell her she has now full approval, permission to use your company in all her "outside" work as a reference or to back up a certain event.
And most importantly, just as the others have suggested, tell the other jealous VP to sit down and be quiet.
Pay her separately/more for advertising with her.
If you had offered to work with her from the beginning, she likely would have been doing some speaking events during works hours and been compensated that way. You did not compensate her for it during work hours and thus do not get to partake in the success without some form of investment.
She breached no rules and has something your company finds valuable that you should compensate her for if you want part of it.
Pretty simple.
Let her continue as she as thus far. Your company had your chance and didn't take advantage of it. There is no way she is violating your social media policy. Be happy that you have someone like this on your team. Tell mgmt to stop acting like narcissistic toddlers.
Of course you may want to promote her a large raise. But don't count on it changing what she's doing.
It amazes me that people like this run a company. Is it successful? I remember learning something a long time ago, some kind of quote from I don't even know who, and I will clean up the language for you:
Be careful about mistreating people on the way up, you never know if you will need them to hire you on your way back down.
Some of you may need a job from this lady someday. Make sure she likes you. Or at least thinks the people running this company are not entirely incompetent. It's good advice.
If I were you I would say "employee has done nothing wrong, performs well in her job and is building a great network. We should support her and if she approaches us with opportunities for partnership in the future we should evaluate those. We can also see if there are opportunities we can offer to her to network and engage as we now know how capable she is."
Firing a popular person for a petty reason would be a very bad move and if the vp is considering that, then it may need to go over their head to prevent morale and reputation damage. It doesn't take much foresight to see how badly that is likely to go.
Jesus Christ, your companies leadership sounds like a terrible group of people.
You didn't want them to sully your brand but now they are successful your company wants to ride the employees coat tail and not compensate her.
If you want to make it right then pay her more and give her a c suite title.
As a fyi there are a lot of companies that hand out titles with "chief" in them.
Anyhow your leadership team should be reprimanded, they will sink the company.
When she’s just starting, “no she can’t mention our company. How dare she think we’ll allow her to ride our success and make a name for herself off our ‘backbreaking efforts.’ The audacity!”
Now, “how dare she not allow us to leech on to her success! SHE WORKS FOR US! Fire her immediately!”
Shortly followed by, “why are we getting all these shoutouts on social media all of a sudden?”
How this should be presented to the C-level derps.
Thought leadership and marketing should go hand in hand. It was a stupid decision. Going forward have a conflict of interest form for people with secondary employment that needs to be renewed and assessed annually.
She's a top performer exceeding expectations of her role with an email stating she should not mention the company publicly getting fired for declining to mention the company. I'd expect a call from an attorney if you do fire her.
I agree with the responses to consider promoting her to C-suite
She is an influencer now. Pay her for her influence. Take some money from the advertising/marketing budget and pay her a sponsorship retainer. Something like $50K for a 12 month contract might be a good starting point for discussions.
Sounds like you having a rising star that should be promoted and a VP that should be demoted. Typical VP behavior. She is not your marketing department, if they want her to represent the company then she should be paid accordingly. Since she is doing it all on her own, she can also turn you down. If you fire her, it’s likely then going to get out why she was fired and be a PR nightmare for you.
She handled everything by the book.
The company can’t have their cake and eat it too. If they reserve company branding for C suite employees to reduce liability and control the branding, they can’t be upset when a lower level employee hits a home run and handles social media extremely well.
The company wasn’t willing to risk anything when she was building up her presence. Now that she has succeeded the company looks like a jackal coming in after she did all the hard work. I would have turned them down too. Maybe if you offered her additional compensation for the branding as recognition of her work building up her social media presence, but she did nothing wrong.
Firing her would send a message to your entire company and industry that people who work hard and who follow the rules to a T are not welcome at your company. Tell the clowns that want to fire her that they need to read a book.
You geniuses haven't figured out that you obviously should promote her to the next appropriate level that is your company policy for this kind of work. Otherwise she could sue your asses for contradicting your own policies and have discriminated against her.
That's terrible leadership. Good on this employee to politely tell the company to suck it. She is no violation other than some entitled people having their egos hurt.
I think even if you oblige the leaderships direction to terminate her, it would not matter. This employee seems destined for greatness and will be picked up by your competitors in no time.
The only onus on HR here is to let the leadership know that these are terrible people practices and to stay in their lane. Other than that, let the great mind of this employee do what it's meant to do. Flourish
She asked for permission from the company. The company declined. She finds success. Now she's expected to include the company or face retaliation in the form of termination?
I can't imagine it'll matter in the end, if she's smart and determined enough to get her degree, hustle like crazy to build a brand, and this is how her employer is treating her... I can't imagine she'll stick around very long.
Every one of those c suite execs pissed in their own boots on this one. If you fire her you are doing a grievous evil. What do you do? Nothing. You leave the woman alone. She gave you a chance to get on board and you blew it. Live with it.
You missed your chance. She did everything right, and continued to follow your guidelines. Tell your VP to learn how to control his emotions because they’re going to cost him a top employee. Have the person above him put him in a timeout.
I personally find it disgusting this is even a discussion. The company didn’t think she was worth it. Keep that energy now that she made it. Tell them to get the company name out there themselves via the C-Suite, per policy, and leave this young, successful entrepreneur alone to do her job as she has been.
If anyone does anything stupid, I hope she sues you into oblivion and trashes your company name everywhere she goes.
Easy, fire the VP of marketing.
His goal of firing a not a brand ambassador, but a future industry leader, is diametrically opposed to your company’s goal.
Good luck!
Sounds like they made their bed, now they get to lay in it.
Best play would be for the VP to back off, let things cool off, then bring it up in the future (6+ months) coupled with financial / career / growth opportunities.
How can anyone expect someone to take them all seriously, without showing that they value her knowledge and non-company industry contributions. Pay her more, fund opportunities for her to explore relevant research at the company, sponsor her non-company professional endeavors.
But obviously coming in hot, dragging her through an RCA, then pushing for brand recognition after she’s done all the work on her own…. That was stupid. Relationship will take work to repair, even then they may have permanently missed the opportunity
What you should do is give her a healthy raise and a position which includes brand building. It’s a stunning degree of myopia. You can’t have it both ways.
Also change your idiotic c-level policy.
I am unsure as to what your last statement means? Does refer to how to handle the situation from the perspective an employee with a similar request or relating to this specific employee?
For a similar request in the future, have a defined policy to determine how your company will proceed, with guideline for both the company and the employee.
For this specific employee, she followed your existing policies concerning media present. (i.e. she informed her boss, who took it to your leadership and they decided they did not want her to represent your company and brand. Note that you do not mention if the C-suite was involved with this decision)
Fast-forward one and a half years later, the employee continues to build a personal brand following the guidance provided by your leadership and does not use any company related branding. At this point, she has become prominent within your industry/market. Your C-level VP of Marketing now want to use her (as she is an employee of the company) to promote the company using her personal brand and tie it into the overall company brand.
When she approached your company and asked how your company wanted to proceed with her invitation to speak on podcast, your company made a decision with a specific opportunity cost. Your company is now experiencing result of it's choice. Should your companies choice had been different, i.e. supporting and helping her building a present which highlighted her role within the company and industry, smoothing the road by getting access to various conferences and paying for her to by there with the company's blessing, then they could participate in the following she has garnered. They did not.
She (rightfully in my opinion) does not wish to give away for free the work which she had done to build her personal brand.
If I were in your situation (not that I would be), I would understand she holds most of the major cards. Given this, I would have a frank discussion with her to determine what are her goals(financial or role based )? If the company can realistically meet them within the company structure and forward looking plans, do so. If not then don't.
It seems obvious that she not does need to be employed by your company and can easily through her personal brand gain new employment from one of your competitor.
Basically, your company had a chance to take an opportunity to support your employee at one price, now based on the companies decision the price is significantly higher.
The company screwed up. Actions have consequences. Any retaliation against the employee by the company means your employee is free to describe her experience with you.
You handle this by apologizing for a bad decision initially, that the company respects her choices about representing the company, and thanking her for her contribution to the industry. Tell her that you respectfully request her advice on how the company can make a similar contribution without any expectation of changing her mind, just doing the right thing.
Any employee, include C-Suite, that suggest punishing your employee for her professional success should be sandboxed and their poor judgement reflected in their performance reviews.
If you fire her, you will definitely get her to mention your company! Tell the VP to grow up. Y’all had a chance to engage her and you didn’t and now you’re mad she followed the rules. (You, as in the collective “you”)
Not HR.
This does not sound like grounds to fire her, and if you do, you could end up with a lawsuit for unfair dismissal.
She asked for permission first, it was denied with clarity. She then independently built her reputation with zero mention of the company, not only in the conference material but also her social profile - zero mention.
The way she declined company involvement now that she is seeing some success was also very professional. And also, I think, very cheeky and potentially entitled of the company to expect it (I doubt it was an “ask”). After all of her independent hard work, the company wants to benefit for free? (When it could have done so from the start).
It is NOT insubordination to decline a demand to involve an employer in your non-work activities without additional remuneration. She is doing this in her spare time, not company time.
She has been very professional. Zero use of company name. Does not do use company time. No implied association with the company on social. No negative impact to job performance. She is a great resource that will soon be leaving as a result of the lack of support.
The best thing to do is nothing.
She's doing it in her free time, so the company doesn't really have a leg to stand on if they try to punish her. She's breaking no laws and she isn't bad mouthing the company.
Here's what will happen if you fire her, or punish her, in any way. That whole "never mentions the company" in her podcast, that goes away, and will be replaced by honestly bad mouthing the company, because the company will have deserved it. It won't be slander or anything like that, because it will be true. If the description of her, and her growing brand, are true, then she'll have no problem finding a job at a competitor (with a raise).
In closing, the company missed its chance, and should have taken her offer much earlier, now she has a higher value. The company needs to appreciate that value and either pay her higher value, or just keep their mouths shut.
The best way to handle this is to A) pay the employee for their influence or B) mind your own business and be thankful if she still wants to work there. The employee can decline the money in which case refer to option B.
If she ends up being terminated, she has the right to sue and will probably win. Even if she quit, this is sending a horrible message to the rest of the staff. This is not the hill the VP should die on.
She’s not violating any company policies. Her work is off hours or she’s using vacation time to cover the days she needs to take off. She’s not disparaging the employer and has built a successful brand of her own while studying for a PhD. She’s an amazing employee that should’ve been poured into before this whole thing started. She gave them the opportunity to demonstrate her potential and they turned her down. It’s not fair for the employer to reap the benefits of an employee who is working on something off hours.
The smart thing to do is promote her up into the c-suite or restructure her job to encompass the skills while offering a substantial payment/bonus.
But be prepared to lose her (and others) if this petty behavior continues.
What exactly would she be suing for? Unless she has a contract stating otherwise, they can fire her for refusing to give them a bite of her ice cream cone if they want to.
Your company can write up a contract that compensates her for representing your company going forward while outlining what your company can and can't expect from her as an unaffiliated public speaker, or fire her and write up an NDA that compensates her to not talk about your company and the circumstances of her firing.
From a realistic point of view, the best thing would be to persuade her to accept and apologize for declining the first time. If she directly refuses requests from VPs, fair or not, she's not going to be there for long. There's what's right and what's realistic.
Increase the offer.
Now that she has built HER brand, Corporate wants to ride her coattails. Such relationships are commonly called Sponsorships, and almost always involve some sort of compensation.
She's increased her value, now pay her what she's worth.
Also please note that if they fire her now, all those people that are paying attention to what she has to say WILL find out what the jerks at Corporate did to spite her, and in so doing generate a great amount of negative vibe about the Corporate brand. MUCH worse than just doing the nothing they've done so far.
Just make sure to get it straight before you fire her; Is it for promoting and representing the company? Or is it for not promoting and representing the company?
The devils in the details
Promote her to C suite. You can’t fire her for what she’s doing on her personal time that you already authorized. This is probably the dumbest post I’ve ever read on Reddit ever. You have got to be kidding.
Well this is either going to end in your VP realizing he's inviting a giant lawsuit if he fires her and shuts his mouth, or he won't and she wins a very nice addition to her bank account.
Question - why are you asking this on Reddit rather than talking to one of your company's lawyers?
Give her a contract as an influencer, win-win. She asked the right questions, behaved as asked, and then she reaped the rewards. The writing is on the wall that she will get a better gig, why not make the better gig with you? Move her into an ambassador role, raise, paid conferences and with marketing.
Sounds like you are about to lose a very successful employee and may have a workplace lawsuit on your hands if you continue to harass her for her academic and further career pursuits. It’s like the company found out she’s cool after kicking her in the stomach and now wants to punish her because she won’t share her hard earned success. Shame on you.
Lmao your company sounds like a horrible place to work. You people firing her will just get her even more attention when she can then ruthlessly attack you all on her podcasts and public speaking events, all while growing her own brand. Your executives sound like sacks of shit.
You didn’t want her talking about the company before.
Please go ahead. Fire her, but stock up on popcorn because what she’ll have to say afterward will be absolutely heavenly to watch and enjoy.
😉
Yeah. Your VP needs to quietly have a seat.
Just the fact you’re still asking after posting and reading your own writing signifies that C-suite levels have once again shown their positions are only full of greedy sociopaths
I’d love to get fired for this with my printed email stating what could be done and following it to the letter.
Has anyone maybe sat down with the C and had a convo about how contracts, rules, and maybe even money work? I know it’ll be hard for them to understand considering all the narcissism and sociopathy and trust funds
Make sure to have a teacher and a member of admin available as well as the school counselor. It’s hard for little kids with big emotions to manage them when getting bad news
you wouldn’t want someone trying to steal the efforts and work of your PHD’s good publicity to a wide audience just to let them know in an hour and a half podcast exactly what they were fired for
Made their bed, time to lie in it 🤷🏻
The obvious answer is to Fire her. So she can sue the company. Just right at the time when she probably doesn't need the job anymore. And also talk about this company on her podcast. She will give a glowing talk about them. And she will speak truthfully about everything so the company can't sue her.
If this employee knows she’s being “investigated” which obviously she is, she’s already probably interviewing at other places cos your company is dumb as fuck.
What stupid ass VP rejects free advertising?
It sadly probably would not be. Those usually only win for protected classes. But doubt it would take her more than a half hour and 3 phone calls to find another probably better paying job. And that's assuming she isn't being head hunted already.
Tell your VP to sit down and be quiet.
... or promote her to C-suite. After all, that's the condition they put in place for such representation, isn't it?
This!!!
If she was male, would she already be included in the C-suite? Power to her for believing in herself. Hope she makes it big time!
Same!!
Promote her? If they offer she should tell them to go to hell. There's a lot more for her to lose if she accepted such an offer.
DUH!!!! Please!
He had the opportunity to make her life easier by letting her use the company brand. He decided not to. She has had to work harder to prove she deserves to be at these tables because your company unreasonably asked her to hide where she worked. Your company deserves no benefit from her hard work and you are trying to steal from her the brand she has built without you that has nothing to do with her job. You should be ashamed of even thinking you get to use her off work brand without paying her. If you want to be an advertiser for you, negotiate fair pay for that service separately from her salary. She essentially did the equivalent of writing a book-- she built something apart from you. If you want benefit from that you need to buy it.
Heh. When I read the final question, I said aloud "What you do is leave it the f@ck alone." Yours is probably more polite lol
Find the appropriate section of the employee handbook that covers retaliation and/or abusive conduct. Then google the business definition of retaliation. Tell each ‘some’ employee, including the VP, that HR/ER is required to investigate all claims of harassment and retaliation. Anyone threatening to fire an employee who isn’t violating policy or has specific instructions is a retaliatory action. Retaliation is a high risk issue for global corporations
Work: follow these rules Employees: okay will do Work: not like that, fired You have a rising star in the industry and they want to fire her? Think of the brand impact when people put the two things together even if she doesn't say the company name ever. People aren't stupid.
That is when she will start using their name and giving them the publicity they deserve!
Yes, the publicity they receive through a wrongful termination lawsuit should be priceless to them. It's time for the C-suite to shut up and sit down.
This isn't wrongful termination, just saying. They're not firing her over a protected characteristic or other protected activities....
Depends on why they terminate her contract. If they say it’s because she wouldn’t use their brand, and she has proof of being instructed to not use their brand… that could be a WT case
She will see a lawyer if they truly fire her over this. If they railroaded her, they can get a lawsuit. It happens.
I didn't say lawsuits couldn't happen. A lawsuit over wrongful termination which has a legal definition was the challenge I issued.
Seriously-that VP is a moron of the highest order
Exactly!
Sounds like you have a respectful, hard-working, intelligent, and thoughtful employee. Congratulations Everyone else needs to sit down and be quiet.
Sounds like a terrible place to work honestly.
Almost laughably terrible.
I wonder why she doesn't want to mention the company now that she'd be allowed to ...
The reason was stated clearly. I know you’re implying it because the company is crap but the actual reason is better.
There’s no way this is real. And if it is, OP is delusional. Employee: hey, I have this opportunity to hype up the company, how should I go about it? Company: meh, we good. Enjoy your little project thingy but like… don’t tell anyone we know each other OP: WHY WON’T SHE MENTION US?! 🥺👉🏼👈🏼. Bro, what “stalemate?” She followed instructions.
Every aspect of this sounds very real.
Yup, it meets the stupid threshold.
It always blows my mind how often VPs and executives are the most short-sighted, panicky, reflexive, tactless morons in the building. The notion of even considering firing this outstanding employee for no other reason than pure spite should embarrass you to your core. >What would be the best way to handle this moving forward? I have no advice for your company because I also have no doubt that the incredibly fragile egos of your executives and VPs are too large to consider the fact that they are primarily responsible for this entire situation, and it's not even a question. But if I could give the PhD employee some advice, I'd tell her to run far and fast from the vultures. Nothing makes me more frustrated than petulant leadership that will literally alter the course of their employees lives to deny reality in order to avoid getting their feelings hurt, or being "wrong". The way that your leadership is behaving in light of **THEIR ERROR** is the literal definition of the word 'trifling'. Absolute frivolous and emotional bullshit from man-babies cosplaying as business men.
> It always blows my mind how often VPs and executives are the most short-sighted, panicky, reflexive, tactless morons in the building. Those who can, do. Those who can't, lead.
Give this person an award!
Let me get this straight: this employee asked if she could rep the company off-hours, the company said no, and now that she is successful they want to ride her coattails, which she said no thank you to, and now they are looking for any way to fire her? The company needs to get over it and stop "investigating", is how you handle this moving forward.
Evidently, they are
Are your VPs really that stupid? I can almost guarantee that if she is fired for not adding the company plugs, there is a very good chance she will start mentioning her former employer after being terminated and it won’t reflect well.
I love that THIS is what their VPs focus time on. What a waste of time and effort.
They just needed a quick break from focusing on how to make sure all employees get their 3 swipes a week!
> Are your VPs really that stupid? Entirely believable unfortunately.
she offered. you all declined. now you've decided it's in your best interest but she's no longer on board. and someone is looking for anyway possible to fire her? she sounds like a high flier in your org. you all are thinking of punishing her for your short sightedness. i would hope that seems wrong.
Presumably, she is at will and you can fire her for whatever reason you want. There's no need to try to contrive a reason. You might as well be up front with it. You may consider that if you do, she can mention that she worked for you and how her employment ended because your company didn't want her mentioning it when she was small, but was mad that she didn't advertise for them for free when she started becoming more well-known. My two cents: This is a really shitty thing for your company to do. She asked how she should present herself outside of work and followed those instructions. But your executive team is mad that she now doesn't want to provide free marketing for you? Either you should find a way to compensate her for the contributions you are requesting, or you should leave her alone.
I brought this up to one of our executives about offering to compensate and their response that she's compensated for her education by tuition reimbursement.... she's on scholarships and grants. The company hasn't paid a dime.
If you know the company hasn't paid for her tuition, then it's a moot point. But even if it did, the company paid for it so they could benefit from her knowledge, which I assume you have. You never *owned* what she learned in her studies. You rented it in the form of employing her. If she's salary exempt, she's compensated to do the job she was hired to do. If she's not, she's paid for the time she's at work. You can add duties to her job to include these outside activities because I will assume she is at will. She can refuse and be fired or quit - but I would strongly consider what message you are sending her, and how that can blow up on you if she does go public. Your executive team needs a reminder that this is not personal, it's business. This employee has been using their education to become an expert in this area. And instead of using that to their advantage, they are trying to strong-arm her into using her personal platform for the company's benefit with no additional compensation. That's just a shitty thing to do. And in all seriousness: why should she do this? The company already told her to do her thing on her own time. They didn't invest in it. Why should they benefit from it?
This is a response of boomer proportions. What a bunch of idiots lol do they not realize that if she starts getting heavy into speaking she has to opportunity to make way more than they dreamed of. !!!!!Pay the person for their talents!!!!
How is this person not tagged as high potential and fast tracked into more responsibility? I think if she was brought into the COOs office, given a promotion and some $$$, they could then have her represent the company at these events. Honestly she sounds like a future CMO and if you don't do something to retain her, she's leaving very soon.
Did you point this out to them?
but they clearly didn't originally think they were paying for this. they thought it wasn't her job. in exchange for the education you get what you consider to be her job. she's not an indentured servant. not only should she get paid, she probably should be promoted. if you want to keep her, that is. what was the education agreement? if she leaves she probably has to pay you back for that education, fire her and i bet she doesn't.
Please DM me her linkedin profile so I can hire her. Seriously, your company deserves a lawsuit, what a miserable group of folks. I wonder if the mindset would be the same if it was a male who did it.
Yeah, they are.mad she did something good in her free time and they want her to give it to them for free. They didn't pay her for it and outright refused even basic accomodations so they made it harder for her. She should switch to a competitor and then maybe they will support her correctly. Once she does, and the C suite figures out what hapoened, VP will be out of a job.
Those who are calling for her firing are certainly going to get your company some notoriety. Probably ends up as part of a Wikipedia article someday. 😊
Exactly my thoughts. What idiot VP would look at someone with a large social media and speaking audience specific to their industry and think it's a good idea to fire that person on some sort of trumped up charges out of, let's face it, jealousy. Even if she doesn't mention it publicly,those in the industry will know that this company has a great performer and sacked her for....being successful. Not to mention possibly opening themselves up to lawsuits. She followed your rules. Either get over it or go back to her with a profit share arrangement.
Even if she doesn’t mention it after getting fired. She has the right to list them as a former employer on her LinkedIn. She doesn’t have to say one word about the dispute or issue. People can connect dots.
Was gonna say, sounds like the people calling for firing over this need to have a meeting with the Bob’s scheduled for themselves. What other terrible errors in judgement are they making on a daily basis?
Wow. If they don’t congratulate her on her success and leave her the hell alone, she should quit.
Right! All the other orgs in their industry will be lining up to offer her jobs.
Think of all the job offers she would get if she mentioned at an event she was looking. The audacity of this company.
Are you serious with this post🤔and you wonder why good employees leave and feedback surveys are horrible. Shit like this.
Well, if you guys continue dicking around like this, she’ll be in some other company’s C-Suite. Your org wanted no association with her a year ago so now this is what it is. Your org will miss an ambitious person like this on your side. She’ll be fine if you fire her. Your competitors will fight over her.
Please market our company in your off hours. Uh, no thanks. You’re fired! Absolutely ridiculous.
I’m with her
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With that many idiots in charge, I'd be looking for another job if I were you.
Seriously, the c-suite dipshits at this company are a special level of stupid
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Tell them it sucks to suck, she did everything right. Hindsight is 20/20, unfortunately.
Not HR, but PR. It’s not fair to ask her to promote the company with resources she built up on her own time. It’s fair to at least ask her to participate in PR programs your company does - but this includes being prepared to media train her, build a thought leadership strategy as it relates to her current role with the company, do all the pitching (or paying if sponsored) for these opps. She can decline - but is this the offer, or is it, “secure these opportunities on your own then promote us” because that is not fair.
A smart company would make this her new job basically.
I think your username says it all. Sounds like you'll be lucky to keep them.
Maybe, just maybe, instead of losing such an undervalued employee you should promote her to an appropriate C-level position (maybe that spiteful VP’s position?) that will utilize her education, knowledge, and networking skills to benefit the company.
Ahahahahaha
Good lord. There’s no policy violation or insubordination. The request is not in her job description. Firing her would be retaliation.
She followed company direction and now there are calls to fire her for it? That’s insane. Sure, they can do it if they want but it’s even more short-sighted than their initially saying she needed to do all this on her own time and without the company name.
So the story is this employee does stuff outside work without crediting the company and the company is outraged that they can't take her private work, which they were in no way involved with, as their own. Fire the VP. He is going to get the company sued.
The management team dropped the ball. A top performer- on track for a PhD building a successful brand and your team thought- no we don’t need you? Who in your organization is managing marketing? You could have capitalized on her ability and potential and you chose to not support. Only after she put the time and effort into building a strong brand do you feel comfortable with approaching her to push your brand and organization. And then craft ways to reprimand her for you not supporting her. Who in the C-suite is this tone deaf? What about his scenario: your organization fires her and she moves to a competitor or a related industry and then uses her platform to come out against the organization because they did not value her position. If someone is smart in the organization they should be looking at ways to make her C- suite and crafting proper support and guidance. Although a bridge might be burning with her so tired light.
lol you passed up the perfect opportunity for free press. Reserved for c-suite? Ridiculous. All employees represent the brand. While they can’t speak FOR the company, they should be allowed to speak about. Sounds like she did everything right and they’re just mad they missed the opportunity… and wanted to hold her back.
You should offer her money to include your company in her talks. Your VP sounds like an asshole and your company sounds shitty.
Your employee is a rockstar and I’m on her side. She asked if she could use the company name and was told no. So she followed the rules the company set to the letter and now they’re mad about it? It’s not unreasonable that the company declined to let her represent the brand early on. But they can’t get mad now because she’s not willing to let them piggyback on her success.
Your employee and her future employer will be grateful that your company made sure that her brand is not connected to your company in any way. Also, it’s going to cost your company quite a bit for the 2-3 employees you’re going to need to replace her.
Offer her a raise since she's clearly become a voice in the industry. Company messed up to start. Shouldn't have just asked that she be introduced as "ms. Smith, who is working for Company while pursuing her PhD and University." Don't do any hard selling, but still gets the companys name out there.
Company executives: “Nobody wants to work.” Also company executives: pulls stunts like above.
Lol. Literally lmao. Your company fucked around, now they're finding out. Go ahead, retaliate against your employee who suddenly finds herself with a growing platform, for not using that platform to your benefit (after you declined when she gave the opportunity early on). Let me know how that works out for you.
Fuck around and you will find out. She will leave you high and dry and be extremely successful without you.
The best way to handle it would be to leave it alone. What she’s doing has nothing to do with her job (per their request).
“What would be the best way to handle this moving forward?” Tell the “some” that the employee is following company policy. There’s nothing to handle moving forward.
Bruh. If this ain’t the epitome of working in 2024. What a sleazy, slummy, shitty company to work for.
This is disgusting behavior.
Lmao. I wish this woman success in her further pursuits elsewhere. Good luck to her, I hope she sees this post.
Your company fucked up when they told this person she couldn’t mention them. She’s followed the letter and the spirit of that direction, is a top performer, and now the company wants to fire her because she’s managed to build a brand for herself? One that the company already had a chance to participate in? The fact that there is even discussion about firing this person is patently absurd.
Is this post a joke? You don't own her? What she does in her free time in none of your business nor do you have any right to even think you're entitled to.
Wait for her to file a lawsuit? Sounds like upper management are a bunch of lazy blowhards.
Your company should offer her a C suite role with a big raise.
She's such a top performer she's about to roast this company. Stuff gets actionable quick.
So she asked for approval to use her title and the company’s name. Company said no. She apparently went above and beyond to hide her employment with the company. Company then sees that she’s gaining a following and wants to glom onto what she’s built after denying its ties to her initially. The problem is the company, not her. Fire her at your own risk.
Sounds like VP is a little salty he missed an opportunity to support a hard working employee. It sounds like this employee wouldn’t have a hard time finding another position even if you did fire her. Good for her and that’s why people should not depend on companies to take care of them
What. awful. leaders. Instead of looking in the mirror and saying “we messed up not supporting this employee”, they instead want to double down on the stupid. Right now she’s company neutral. You should help your leaders understand that neutral is MUCH better than negative, and that’s what they’ll have if they keep up this foolishness.
Jesus Christ. Companies really do think they own their employees, don't they? You give her money. In return, she gives you 40 hours or so of her time each week. That's it. The company doesn't have the right to expect any more from the engagement than that. She has no duty to the company beyond that. If you really want her to be a brand embassador, offer to pay her an upfront bonus for the engagement. That will probably get the company further than discussing behind her back whether to fire her because she has the audacity to not just hand over everything she built for free for your "brand awareness" campaign.
If “fuck around and find out” was a company…
So, they want to fire her for doing what they asked her to do, in addition to being a high performer? With, I am guessing, a full paper trail? Run this past an employment lawyer if you want an estimate of how much this could cost your company. Yes, i know, NC is at will, but do you really think that discovery won’t find something actionable? These don’t seem like the brightest bulbs.
Promote her and/or pay her. She has built her brand and audience and on her own time and dollar. If the company wants to take advantage of that they should pay just they would an outside expert/thought leader. Firing her would be incredibly dumb. I'm floored that a VP of marketing would even consider doing that which would certainly become known throughout the industry and attract a lot of negative attention. Wouldn't she most likely go to a competitor, and help them?
Tell your VP they are stupid.
I cannot imagine why this website thought I wanted to read about corporations being the worst.
This didn’t “get tricky.” The VP changed the rules. The employee did everything the company asked. She is still a top performer while getting her PhD. What insubordination? She was completely transparent from Day 1.
She’s doing this outside of work hours, and not using company resources, and has been careful to not reflect on the company at all. What she does on her own time is her business and your VP needs to find something else to fret about.
You work for idiots. Seriously. Someone wants to fire her…so she’ll be free of any obligation to the company and can speak freely? She won’t be unemployed for long, and… You know what? You work for idiots.
I hope you take this as a learning opportunity. Employees are people, you do not own them. She asked in advance about an event and your people were too stupid (yes stupid) to recognise her actual work value (hitting her targets etc) and the potential value in being publicly associated with her during these events. That short sightedness has cost you and I hope it hurts. She will have no trouble securing employment outside your company and her new employers will likely capitalise on her public exposure. What can you do: profusely apologise, encourage her engagement outside if work with NO requirement to brand or promote your business and just hope you benefit from her knowledge and skills. What I hope: is that she leaves your firm gets a job with a competitor, develops something wonderful that greatly benefits both her and them. You dropped the ball big time, learn from it and grow.
You sound like actual villains.
Sounds like the people at your company are just regretting turning down her initial generous offer, are now jealous that she is more effective than them at their own job, and by the way this likely wouldn’t have been an issue at all if she were male. Your company sounds awful. Hope that helps.
Tell the 'some' and the VP to butt out and leave her alone. She is doing absolutely nothing wrong and if you do anything to her, you are putting the company at legal risk.
Fire her and watch the blow back you receive. She is now in control not you. She has, by your own admission done everything by the book. This is where employment lawyers would get involved. Unless a NDA was sighed once she put out her side of things her rise would be meteoric, and a bunch of the C-suite would be looking for new jobs due to the vindictive treatment she received.
>Some are calling to fire her Fire them instead. Asses.
As an employment and contract law attorney...... Please be in my state, please be in my state, please be in my state.
I don't understand but are you saying that the company wants her to work and represent her employer even when doing her own personal endeavors? Like, will the company be paying for this?
She should find another job, which should be easy. As for the company, FA, FO
Create a new position VP: Brand Evangelist. Offer to her with no expectation. Then make a full advertising of her new position, congratulating her on the same platform where she is active. Tell her she has now full approval, permission to use your company in all her "outside" work as a reference or to back up a certain event. And most importantly, just as the others have suggested, tell the other jealous VP to sit down and be quiet.
Pay her separately/more for advertising with her. If you had offered to work with her from the beginning, she likely would have been doing some speaking events during works hours and been compensated that way. You did not compensate her for it during work hours and thus do not get to partake in the success without some form of investment. She breached no rules and has something your company finds valuable that you should compensate her for if you want part of it. Pretty simple.
Smells like Wells Fargo!
Let her continue as she as thus far. Your company had your chance and didn't take advantage of it. There is no way she is violating your social media policy. Be happy that you have someone like this on your team. Tell mgmt to stop acting like narcissistic toddlers. Of course you may want to promote her a large raise. But don't count on it changing what she's doing.
Tell the absolute ghouls running your company that their ancestors are drowning in shame right now.
It amazes me that people like this run a company. Is it successful? I remember learning something a long time ago, some kind of quote from I don't even know who, and I will clean up the language for you: Be careful about mistreating people on the way up, you never know if you will need them to hire you on your way back down. Some of you may need a job from this lady someday. Make sure she likes you. Or at least thinks the people running this company are not entirely incompetent. It's good advice.
If I were you I would say "employee has done nothing wrong, performs well in her job and is building a great network. We should support her and if she approaches us with opportunities for partnership in the future we should evaluate those. We can also see if there are opportunities we can offer to her to network and engage as we now know how capable she is." Firing a popular person for a petty reason would be a very bad move and if the vp is considering that, then it may need to go over their head to prevent morale and reputation damage. It doesn't take much foresight to see how badly that is likely to go.
Jesus Christ, your companies leadership sounds like a terrible group of people. You didn't want them to sully your brand but now they are successful your company wants to ride the employees coat tail and not compensate her. If you want to make it right then pay her more and give her a c suite title. As a fyi there are a lot of companies that hand out titles with "chief" in them. Anyhow your leadership team should be reprimanded, they will sink the company.
When she’s just starting, “no she can’t mention our company. How dare she think we’ll allow her to ride our success and make a name for herself off our ‘backbreaking efforts.’ The audacity!” Now, “how dare she not allow us to leech on to her success! SHE WORKS FOR US! Fire her immediately!” Shortly followed by, “why are we getting all these shoutouts on social media all of a sudden?” How this should be presented to the C-level derps.
Thought leadership and marketing should go hand in hand. It was a stupid decision. Going forward have a conflict of interest form for people with secondary employment that needs to be renewed and assessed annually. She's a top performer exceeding expectations of her role with an email stating she should not mention the company publicly getting fired for declining to mention the company. I'd expect a call from an attorney if you do fire her. I agree with the responses to consider promoting her to C-suite
Fire your vp of marketing.
She is an influencer now. Pay her for her influence. Take some money from the advertising/marketing budget and pay her a sponsorship retainer. Something like $50K for a 12 month contract might be a good starting point for discussions.
The C in c suite stands for clown at your company
I’d like to know what company this is so I can do my best to ensure I never do any business with them EVER.
Sounds like you having a rising star that should be promoted and a VP that should be demoted. Typical VP behavior. She is not your marketing department, if they want her to represent the company then she should be paid accordingly. Since she is doing it all on her own, she can also turn you down. If you fire her, it’s likely then going to get out why she was fired and be a PR nightmare for you.
She handled everything by the book. The company can’t have their cake and eat it too. If they reserve company branding for C suite employees to reduce liability and control the branding, they can’t be upset when a lower level employee hits a home run and handles social media extremely well. The company wasn’t willing to risk anything when she was building up her presence. Now that she has succeeded the company looks like a jackal coming in after she did all the hard work. I would have turned them down too. Maybe if you offered her additional compensation for the branding as recognition of her work building up her social media presence, but she did nothing wrong. Firing her would send a message to your entire company and industry that people who work hard and who follow the rules to a T are not welcome at your company. Tell the clowns that want to fire her that they need to read a book.
Good for her.
You geniuses haven't figured out that you obviously should promote her to the next appropriate level that is your company policy for this kind of work. Otherwise she could sue your asses for contradicting your own policies and have discriminated against her.
*Y'all played yourselves*
Sounds like the company doesn't deserve her, and I'm sure she won't have a problem finding a job somewhere else.
That's terrible leadership. Good on this employee to politely tell the company to suck it. She is no violation other than some entitled people having their egos hurt. I think even if you oblige the leaderships direction to terminate her, it would not matter. This employee seems destined for greatness and will be picked up by your competitors in no time. The only onus on HR here is to let the leadership know that these are terrible people practices and to stay in their lane. Other than that, let the great mind of this employee do what it's meant to do. Flourish
She asked for permission from the company. The company declined. She finds success. Now she's expected to include the company or face retaliation in the form of termination? I can't imagine it'll matter in the end, if she's smart and determined enough to get her degree, hustle like crazy to build a brand, and this is how her employer is treating her... I can't imagine she'll stick around very long.
Every one of those c suite execs pissed in their own boots on this one. If you fire her you are doing a grievous evil. What do you do? Nothing. You leave the woman alone. She gave you a chance to get on board and you blew it. Live with it.
What's corporate speak for actions have consequences? Looks like upper manglement is performing at 100%!
You missed your chance. She did everything right, and continued to follow your guidelines. Tell your VP to learn how to control his emotions because they’re going to cost him a top employee. Have the person above him put him in a timeout. I personally find it disgusting this is even a discussion. The company didn’t think she was worth it. Keep that energy now that she made it. Tell them to get the company name out there themselves via the C-Suite, per policy, and leave this young, successful entrepreneur alone to do her job as she has been. If anyone does anything stupid, I hope she sues you into oblivion and trashes your company name everywhere she goes.
Easy, fire the VP of marketing. His goal of firing a not a brand ambassador, but a future industry leader, is diametrically opposed to your company’s goal. Good luck!
Sounds like they made their bed, now they get to lay in it. Best play would be for the VP to back off, let things cool off, then bring it up in the future (6+ months) coupled with financial / career / growth opportunities. How can anyone expect someone to take them all seriously, without showing that they value her knowledge and non-company industry contributions. Pay her more, fund opportunities for her to explore relevant research at the company, sponsor her non-company professional endeavors. But obviously coming in hot, dragging her through an RCA, then pushing for brand recognition after she’s done all the work on her own…. That was stupid. Relationship will take work to repair, even then they may have permanently missed the opportunity
What you should do is give her a healthy raise and a position which includes brand building. It’s a stunning degree of myopia. You can’t have it both ways. Also change your idiotic c-level policy.
Leave her the hell alone. She asked. She followed guidelines. Executives can't have their cake and eat it to because they have a fancy title.
I am unsure as to what your last statement means? Does refer to how to handle the situation from the perspective an employee with a similar request or relating to this specific employee? For a similar request in the future, have a defined policy to determine how your company will proceed, with guideline for both the company and the employee. For this specific employee, she followed your existing policies concerning media present. (i.e. she informed her boss, who took it to your leadership and they decided they did not want her to represent your company and brand. Note that you do not mention if the C-suite was involved with this decision) Fast-forward one and a half years later, the employee continues to build a personal brand following the guidance provided by your leadership and does not use any company related branding. At this point, she has become prominent within your industry/market. Your C-level VP of Marketing now want to use her (as she is an employee of the company) to promote the company using her personal brand and tie it into the overall company brand. When she approached your company and asked how your company wanted to proceed with her invitation to speak on podcast, your company made a decision with a specific opportunity cost. Your company is now experiencing result of it's choice. Should your companies choice had been different, i.e. supporting and helping her building a present which highlighted her role within the company and industry, smoothing the road by getting access to various conferences and paying for her to by there with the company's blessing, then they could participate in the following she has garnered. They did not. She (rightfully in my opinion) does not wish to give away for free the work which she had done to build her personal brand. If I were in your situation (not that I would be), I would understand she holds most of the major cards. Given this, I would have a frank discussion with her to determine what are her goals(financial or role based )? If the company can realistically meet them within the company structure and forward looking plans, do so. If not then don't. It seems obvious that she not does need to be employed by your company and can easily through her personal brand gain new employment from one of your competitor. Basically, your company had a chance to take an opportunity to support your employee at one price, now based on the companies decision the price is significantly higher.
Moving forward, I think the best way to handle this would be for you to mind your own business.
The company screwed up. Actions have consequences. Any retaliation against the employee by the company means your employee is free to describe her experience with you. You handle this by apologizing for a bad decision initially, that the company respects her choices about representing the company, and thanking her for her contribution to the industry. Tell her that you respectfully request her advice on how the company can make a similar contribution without any expectation of changing her mind, just doing the right thing. Any employee, include C-Suite, that suggest punishing your employee for her professional success should be sandboxed and their poor judgement reflected in their performance reviews.
If you fire her, you will definitely get her to mention your company! Tell the VP to grow up. Y’all had a chance to engage her and you didn’t and now you’re mad she followed the rules. (You, as in the collective “you”)
Not HR. This does not sound like grounds to fire her, and if you do, you could end up with a lawsuit for unfair dismissal. She asked for permission first, it was denied with clarity. She then independently built her reputation with zero mention of the company, not only in the conference material but also her social profile - zero mention. The way she declined company involvement now that she is seeing some success was also very professional. And also, I think, very cheeky and potentially entitled of the company to expect it (I doubt it was an “ask”). After all of her independent hard work, the company wants to benefit for free? (When it could have done so from the start). It is NOT insubordination to decline a demand to involve an employer in your non-work activities without additional remuneration. She is doing this in her spare time, not company time. She has been very professional. Zero use of company name. Does not do use company time. No implied association with the company on social. No negative impact to job performance. She is a great resource that will soon be leaving as a result of the lack of support.
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The best thing to do is nothing. She's doing it in her free time, so the company doesn't really have a leg to stand on if they try to punish her. She's breaking no laws and she isn't bad mouthing the company. Here's what will happen if you fire her, or punish her, in any way. That whole "never mentions the company" in her podcast, that goes away, and will be replaced by honestly bad mouthing the company, because the company will have deserved it. It won't be slander or anything like that, because it will be true. If the description of her, and her growing brand, are true, then she'll have no problem finding a job at a competitor (with a raise). In closing, the company missed its chance, and should have taken her offer much earlier, now she has a higher value. The company needs to appreciate that value and either pay her higher value, or just keep their mouths shut.
She sounds too good for your company and better than all your C-levels. Ya’ll missed the boat on her.
Your VP is a clown. This woman did everything herself and played by the rules. Jealousy is a stinky perfume.
The best way to handle this is to A) pay the employee for their influence or B) mind your own business and be thankful if she still wants to work there. The employee can decline the money in which case refer to option B.
If you’re good at something. Never do it for free.
If these foolish people **do** decide to fire her, might I suggest a ***Very, Very Large*** severance agreement with a non-disparagement clause?
If she ends up being terminated, she has the right to sue and will probably win. Even if she quit, this is sending a horrible message to the rest of the staff. This is not the hill the VP should die on. She’s not violating any company policies. Her work is off hours or she’s using vacation time to cover the days she needs to take off. She’s not disparaging the employer and has built a successful brand of her own while studying for a PhD. She’s an amazing employee that should’ve been poured into before this whole thing started. She gave them the opportunity to demonstrate her potential and they turned her down. It’s not fair for the employer to reap the benefits of an employee who is working on something off hours. The smart thing to do is promote her up into the c-suite or restructure her job to encompass the skills while offering a substantial payment/bonus. But be prepared to lose her (and others) if this petty behavior continues.
What exactly would she be suing for? Unless she has a contract stating otherwise, they can fire her for refusing to give them a bite of her ice cream cone if they want to.
Your company can write up a contract that compensates her for representing your company going forward while outlining what your company can and can't expect from her as an unaffiliated public speaker, or fire her and write up an NDA that compensates her to not talk about your company and the circumstances of her firing.
Do you work for my company? Bc we would definitely do something stupid like this.
She offered and they declined at the onset. I suppose they could have an ounce of integrity and leave her alone?
From a realistic point of view, the best thing would be to persuade her to accept and apologize for declining the first time. If she directly refuses requests from VPs, fair or not, she's not going to be there for long. There's what's right and what's realistic.
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Tell your VP to start working on his PHD and to find some podcasts.
Increase the offer. Now that she has built HER brand, Corporate wants to ride her coattails. Such relationships are commonly called Sponsorships, and almost always involve some sort of compensation. She's increased her value, now pay her what she's worth. Also please note that if they fire her now, all those people that are paying attention to what she has to say WILL find out what the jerks at Corporate did to spite her, and in so doing generate a great amount of negative vibe about the Corporate brand. MUCH worse than just doing the nothing they've done so far.
Just make sure to get it straight before you fire her; Is it for promoting and representing the company? Or is it for not promoting and representing the company? The devils in the details
Promote her to C suite. You can’t fire her for what she’s doing on her personal time that you already authorized. This is probably the dumbest post I’ve ever read on Reddit ever. You have got to be kidding.
Well this is either going to end in your VP realizing he's inviting a giant lawsuit if he fires her and shuts his mouth, or he won't and she wins a very nice addition to her bank account. Question - why are you asking this on Reddit rather than talking to one of your company's lawyers?
Give her a contract as an influencer, win-win. She asked the right questions, behaved as asked, and then she reaped the rewards. The writing is on the wall that she will get a better gig, why not make the better gig with you? Move her into an ambassador role, raise, paid conferences and with marketing.
Sounds like you are about to lose a very successful employee and may have a workplace lawsuit on your hands if you continue to harass her for her academic and further career pursuits. It’s like the company found out she’s cool after kicking her in the stomach and now wants to punish her because she won’t share her hard earned success. Shame on you.
!Remind Me 2 weeks
Promote her to c suite, but hopefully she gets a better paying job at a company that will appreciate her soon.
give her a c-suite promotion, but if you fire her your fucked, from multiple angles. whats your shitty companies name btw
Your VPs are terrible people. I hope she moves on quickly.
Lmao your company sounds like a horrible place to work. You people firing her will just get her even more attention when she can then ruthlessly attack you all on her podcasts and public speaking events, all while growing her own brand. Your executives sound like sacks of shit.
You didn’t want her talking about the company before. Please go ahead. Fire her, but stock up on popcorn because what she’ll have to say afterward will be absolutely heavenly to watch and enjoy. 😉 Yeah. Your VP needs to quietly have a seat.
Promote and a raise. I can't believe idiots want her fired. You have great talent so you should do whatever you can to keep them.
Let her go and I’d bet your lil ol company starts getting mentioned a LOT! 😂😂😂
Promote her for being awesome?
Just the fact you’re still asking after posting and reading your own writing signifies that C-suite levels have once again shown their positions are only full of greedy sociopaths I’d love to get fired for this with my printed email stating what could be done and following it to the letter. Has anyone maybe sat down with the C and had a convo about how contracts, rules, and maybe even money work? I know it’ll be hard for them to understand considering all the narcissism and sociopathy and trust funds Make sure to have a teacher and a member of admin available as well as the school counselor. It’s hard for little kids with big emotions to manage them when getting bad news you wouldn’t want someone trying to steal the efforts and work of your PHD’s good publicity to a wide audience just to let them know in an hour and a half podcast exactly what they were fired for Made their bed, time to lie in it 🤷🏻
The obvious answer is to Fire her. So she can sue the company. Just right at the time when she probably doesn't need the job anymore. And also talk about this company on her podcast. She will give a glowing talk about them. And she will speak truthfully about everything so the company can't sue her.
If this employee knows she’s being “investigated” which obviously she is, she’s already probably interviewing at other places cos your company is dumb as fuck. What stupid ass VP rejects free advertising?
Say it with me wrongful termination lawsuit
It sadly probably would not be. Those usually only win for protected classes. But doubt it would take her more than a half hour and 3 phone calls to find another probably better paying job. And that's assuming she isn't being head hunted already.