Thursday, September 15, 2005

Grandmother unfairly fired?

It appears in the above linked story from CNN that there were some other past problems with either absences and/or the majority of her available time off had been used. However given this situation was one that was unavoidable should Barbara Roberts have been fired?

The basic facts as reported by CNN:

Roberts, 54, had driven 200 miles from her home in Mount Vernon to Columbia on August 27, the Saturday before Hurricane Katrina came ashore, to care for granddaughter Trisana for a couple of days. Her daughter, Tina Roberts, and son-in-law, Chris Hardin, were in New Orleans.

But when her son-in-law tried to schedule the flight home on the afternoon of August 27, he was told all flights had been canceled because of the approaching hurricane.

With no other relatives in the area to take care of the child, Roberts said she had no choice but to call work on August 29, the day the hurricane hit, and tell her boss that she would be missing a few days.

I have to wonder had Barbara Roberts been trapped in New Orleans with no way home would she have been terminated from her job?

6 comments:

Cyberseaer said...

If Katrina didn't hit the coast, grandma would still be fired and this would be a non story.

Cyberseaer said...

After reading the article, the company was within it's rights to fire her. I was in her contract and she knew it and decided to help her family. She did make the right decision. She can always find another job, she has only one family.

historymike said...

Still pretty crappy to fire her, though.

Sounds like a lousy company to work for; perhaps grandma helped future potential workers from landing a job at a company run by soulless nimrods.

historymike said...

Just did a Google search - no previous web pages featuring the phrase "soulless nimrods."

This could either be a great name for a rock band or the title of a anti-corporate book.

Better copyright it either way...

Unknown said...

It sounds like a good band name, I can still play guitar

:-)

Hooda Thunkit (Dave Zawodny) said...

"soulless nimrods"

Why, that's right up there with Evil Conservatives and Flaming Liberals ;-)
(both of which, in my experience, are in the extremely small minorities...)

I like it!


BTW, if it was fully and properly properly explained to her manager/boss, grandma should have NOT been fired for this (this time, she should have been given a pass)...

(the boss sounds like an Evil Conservative. Maybe NOT conservative, but surely evil and a nimrod.)