Termination without cause

What is the name of your state (only U.S. law)? CA

A friend of mine was terminated recently from a very large corporation. She received her bonus which was a part of her 1 month severance and it was 1/4 of what she was entitled to. When she called H.R. to find out why, they said she didn't receive her full bonus because of a poor performance review.

She never saw this review or even knew it was done. She wasn't even told why she was terminated at the time she was let go but was led to believe it was due to restructuring. It seems pretty convenient that she was performing poorly when the bonus was at stake.

Here's my question:

1) Are employers required to share an employee's performance review with them? Are they required to give specific reasons / examples for termination especially when it was due to poor performance?

How are they supposed to know they are not doing well if they are never approached by management? How are they supposed to improve?

Thank you so much for any advice anyone can share.

FTMom said:

1) Are they required to give specific reasons / examples for termination especially when it was due to poor performance?

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No.

FTMom said:

How are they supposed to know they are not doing well if they are never approached by management? How are they supposed to improve?

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I don't know about you, but I would certainly know it if I wasn't doing as well at work without having to be approached by management, based on the projects I get assigned and my ability to meet my deadlines and supply deliverables.

Absent this, they may have just wanted her out of there. They did it at my company this time last year - figured out who the bottom 7% were, gave them "below average" reviews, and then RIFed them all. To be honest, it was a good thing for the company - even though people say they had no clue, it was pretty obvious to a lot of us who was probably going to get the axe if/when it happened. It's not to say they were "bad" necessarily, just not stellar performers.

In your case, it was pretty irrelevent to give you feedback so you could improve, since you were being laid off anyway.

There are no laws in any state directly addressing performance appraisals. In any way.

ecmst12 said:

In your case, it was pretty irrelevent to give you feedback so you could improve, since you were being laid off anyway.

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Yea. I guess that's what happened. Thanks.

Dougthegreat said:

I don't know about you, but I would certainly know it if I wasn't doing as well at work without having to be approached by management, based on the projects I get assigned and my ability to meet my deadlines and supply deliverables.

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That's the thing, she didn't have any clue. She thought she was doing great!

If there are no laws about sharing poor reviews, then she is out a job and the rest of her bonus, period.

Thanks for the feedback.

Then that's a shame. But nothing you have posted suggests that any laws have been violated.

FTMom said:

That's the thing, she didn't have any clue. She thought she was doing great!

If there are no laws about sharing poor reviews, then she is out a job and the rest of her bonus, period.

Thanks for the feedback.

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Yes, but she got some of a bonus and severance. That's more than what most of the 500K or so people laid off last month got, so I guess she was one of the "lucky" ones!