This is such a ridiculous post, but if it comes to it I want to know how to respond and follow up with my manager in case they try to let me go.
For context, I am an at-will employee in IL at a small software company. I have worked here for 4 years. It’s always been kind of a bizarre environment, we literally got HR this year and the COO is a piece of work.
Recently we’ve had several employees resign without notice. Two of them I was pretty good friends with. My one coworker who resigned recently noted workplace harassment, undocumented sexual harassment, and generally a bad work environment. She told me about the email post her leaving the company, the day after.
Her being my friend, of course I knew she was unhappy, but we are in different departments. She didn’t let me know about her resignation until the day she resigned, because of the email she sent. An important part of this is I reported some of those sexual harassment occurances that went undocumented because we had no HR.
As soon as she quit, all of my mangers have been cold towards me. The day she quit, the COO asked another employee if I knew about this, and that there was “no way I didn’t know.”
My birthday is this week, and usually we have the choice between a gift card and a treat. I chose a gift card this year. I’m literally on the party planning committee who decides this.
My coworker told me in confidence that when the COO heard what I chose for my birthday (???) she told my coworker it was “very antisocial of me, it’s not in our culture, but honestly if you’re not ok with the culture the door is there. Zappos pays people to quit. We are not going to change our policy bc a couple people are not compatible with us. To just get $50 is not in the spirit of our birthday. It’s antisocial.”
Anybody have any advice? I’ve never had an upper management employee gossip about me and be threatening with her language. Granted maybe they’re just afraid of what I know, but now I’m concerned they’re going to pull a fast one on me and pay me to leave quietly or something.
Additional context that I don’t feel is necessary, I struggle with eating in front of other people. That’s why I chose the gift card. I feel so dumb even writing this.