I work in a law firm and signed into Outlook yesterday morning to find I was scheduled for a 'HR Meeting' in a few hours with two senior staff members and a member of HR.
I asked my boss about it and he pretended to be completely ignorant and just gave me a list of ‘urgent' tasks to do. Meanwhile, I frantically teams messaged and emailed the HR member who had scheduled it for any context about the agenda of the meeting. My messages were seen but left on read.
I got to the meeting, and as there had been a wave of redundancies this month I assumed I would be culled as I'm the second-most junior person in the team. No. Instead… SUPRISE! You're being fired!
The reason for my surprise firing was that my boss had told them he didn't think I was capable of the role. However, I had received no warning of this at my Annual Review which occurred less than three weeks earlier. I've worked at this firm for 11 months. They've also just hired two new paralegals in our department this month but at one of the firm's rural offices in a much cheaper city.
And now the icing on the cake… they nervously laughed that the meeting was timed badly as our office Christmas Party / Lunch was happening an hour – an event I had already paid $25 towards the entry ticket for. I know I should have attended out of spite, but the whole ordeal was so distressing I felt physically sick. So, I ended up packing my things and going straight home.
Happy Holidays!