Just because a story wasnt published about it doesnt mean it wasnt discussed internally among coworkers. If you want to work in comms, you need to be crystal clear that the TIMING of disclosure is a crucial issue. was my company right to fire my coworker for accidentally sending me a they dont owe it to you to offer that opportunity, That reminds me of the guys who say, I know I cheated on you, but I want a second chance.. Its not an obligation to confront. Its very dangerous to OPs professional reputation to assume OP can trust anyone who is unauthorized, including a good friend, with embargoed information. Im not saying the employer didnt do these things or even if they didnt that its anybodys fault other than LW that this happened, but its a good way to stop situations like this before they happen. In my first job out of college in the insurance industry I reinstated someones coverage without verifying that they had had no claims in the lapsed period they immediately called claims and filed a $40,000 claim. In some cases, those policies . Before someone decides to do that, I encourage them to get legal representation. This issue recently came up for me as an interviewer. I feel like this misses the overall lesson Allison is trying to impart here. I have absolutely no clue in your situation, but there are times when it really can be appropriate to let someone go without any second chances. Im assuming the LW plead their case and filled in relevant information. I agree. And thats still very unrealistic / way off-base, if OP truly gets why this was a slam-dunk decision, in that particular circumstance. Because when your mentor is a coworker at the same employer, you cannot, cannot speak as freely. Is it FOUO though? I just want to remind people that it happened. We go through training every 6 months, that we should NOT to tell the coworker or customer that we will need to report them. What probably really hurt the OPs case was that the friend is a journalist. But how do I explain this to show I learnt from my mistake and get a new job. In "Labs," scroll down to "Undo Send" and enable it. Im confused about the fact-finding meeting. Yeah, if the LW is in the US or things operate the same way in their country, theres no point in trying to lie or even waffle about what happened. It involved something the OP had learned about in confidence, but hadnt even been publicly announced and the OP blabbed about it to someone completely unrelated to her job. If each person tells just one person it can end up being a lot of people. Was the friend a journalist, or is there something else that would explain why she said that? The reply: Yes, the friend I texted happened to be a journalist but doesnt cover the area that I was working in. And if it is a part of that, the coworker was obligated to report it! At the time, I thought it would be ok since it wouldnt cause a problem, but I realize it was not up to me to make that judgement. Whether she is under FOIA or a state public records law, there are a lot of rules about non-disclosure of certain information. You are right. In other words, this whole line of discussion is moot. I am now going to assume that its exactly that. In a professional context, close friendships and personal trust arent always as ironclad as they can be in personal relationships, particularly when it comes to security and confidentiality. Employees who violate their companies' email policies can face penalties ranging from disciplinary action to termination. A few weeks ago I worked on a medical chart for A Big Rockstar, but not only do I get fired if I tell anyone which one, I get fired if I open up a single page of his chart that I cant explain, if asked, what the exact and specific work-related reason for opening that page was. reading. (For your job search, this might be obvious, but steer clear of medical, legal, PR, or any other field that deals with privacy.). I dont think you have to be Catholic.). You made yourself very vulnerable, your mentor knew that, and unfortunately, youre now bearing the consequences. Learn more about Stack Overflow the company, and our products. you get to a point where you just really really need to share. Excitedly texting confidential, FOUO information to a friend who happens to be a journalist, unconscious of the optics and real potential harm? Heres one: You work for the Census Bureau , which runs demographic surveys beyond the decennial Census, and came across [popular celebrity]s personal info, perhaps noting they live near you. Well meaning (or at least not meaning harm) maybe, but very foolish. Rather than leading you on and allowing you to continue to work for them under a cloud of mistrust (and all the downsides that come with that), they made a clean break and released you to get a fresh start elsewhere. But that was the right response to what you did. It made it seem like some part of OP still feels hard done by, rather than really getting it. And if I tell anyone, including a coworker ,that I processed said claim, my butt could very well get in a lot of trouble. Think of speaking with a colleague like speaking with your boss. That doesnt mean you need to go into all the details or give a lengthy mea culpa, but you dont want to sound like youre minimizing it. This is an actual security headache/nightmare for my government department as its so common for people to go out to lunch and start discussing what theyre working on while eating. Compare someone in law enforcement happening to find out the (secret) address and phone number of their friend-groups favorite celebrity, or finding the contact information for the cutie in the convertible, after their roommate catches the license plate numberand sharing. Talking about your work on a more general level is usually allowed unless your employer or their client is unusually paranoid. Im a fed and we have annual mandatory training out the wazoo on these kinds of rules, as well as frequent reminder emails from the ethics folks and/or the IGs office. Show prospective employers that you can reflect on your actions and learn from mistakes, because thats not at all what Im seeing here. The hospital I was working for last year had the best of this kind of presentation that Ive ever seen. When it came up during her interview, the candidate said it was complex and that shed learned from it. Yes! If yes, that is relevant to the question. The first job will be the hardest but gradually you are less and less likely to be asked about an older job. I minored in journalism and this attitude is why I never worked in the industry. Dont blame the co-worker for ratting you out. But he either kept it so vague as to be useless or said nothing at all. Unless this job was the bulk of your experience, I would leave it off your resume. You cant let yourself act out of emotion. It would have been nice- but Im sure the coworker was also pooping masonry. In jobs that require non-disclosure, active disclosure is a very big deal. Note: You dont want to frame this as It would have been made public eventually so I did nothing wrong. Your tone is still very much acknowledging that you messed up. In a couple of hours, the news agencies were calling the federal government, to verify the news. An in-person meeting might be more appropriate if you accidentally sent information about your plans to find another job to your manager. Email Basics: Email Violations Can Jeopardize Your Job - GCFGlobal.org The thing is though, you dont get credit for leaking to a trustworthy person who decides not to hang you out to dry. I wonder how trustworthy the LW considers themself (sp?)? You know thats not how that works. And especially in the field youre in, leaks are a big deal, and ESPECIALLY leaks to a member of the press. If I was that coworker, Id have to think shed continue to go around blabbing about this, and there is No Way I could just sit on it until *I* got called on the carpet. Im sure the letter writer has plenty of that to deal with already. People tend to share with trusted confidants/partners/etc. You made a mistake. Likewise, they would have fired you anyways regardless because they now feel that they cannot trust you with information. If OP had confessed to their manager, it would make sense for the manager to say, I have to report this to such-and-such, but the coworker was right not to warn OP. Can You Be Fired for Sending Personal E-Mails at Work? Age is hardly an indicator of a persons ability to consistently make the best choices at all times. If you had the same role in a public company, you could have have been fired because of regulations preventing insider trading. All journalists are human and many of us have spouses/friends who do things that are news, and this is a situation where good boundaries can protect everyone. The OPs comment here didnt seem defensive to me at all, and its definitely understandable that the letter was written in the heat of the moment. it really should be I made a foolish mistake, Its more a case of I broke the rules bigtime and expected someone else to cover up for me.. I dont love not being able to tell her things (even though we are each others I promise not to tell anybody (but Friend) person), the way we share this information is by forwarding press releases once the information is public. Theres no context where calling a stranger honey doesnt feel condescending (whether someone intends it to or not!). The person whos emailed may have inadvertently caused a data breach, so it could be important you get in touch and let them know. Clearly yall do not understand handling confidential information. (Obviously it would have been best not to give her journalist friend the info to begin with.) Can you get fired for accidentally sending confidential information? Monitoring should not be excessive and the employee must know what will and won't be caught, for example, whether personal emails will be read. She screwed up, and they fired her because thats what she deserved. Don't be me, is what I'm saying I guess! People do stupid or extreme things all the time; their lives dont end, but they *can* be turning points for a downward spiral. Everyone in the workplace has an equal obligation and responsibility to ensure that rules are upheld because thats what keeps the company operating smoothly and in business and able to provide jobs to you all. ), You also werent fired for technically breaking a rule. You were fired for actually breaking a rule, and a serious one. Same applies here as you stated. Yes, you can get fired for opening a phishing email. However, placing the blame on the coworker for the entire situation, even just in her own head, is likely to come though when she talks about why she was fired. Maybe you get a 2nd chance IF you were contrite enough and blamed your excitement at the new teapot program. Those kinds of disclosures often rise to the level of immediate termination, which is what happened, here. Ferry carrying 183 people catches fire in the English - Daily Mail Including their reputation being damaged. Fortunately, I was not fired for the mistake, but my employer did call me on the carpet for a very serious discussion on why we cant share any information that we only have access to because we work there, regardless of how sensitive or not sensitive we think it is on a case-by-case basis. But at the end of the day, Alison is right. If she had been doing something perfectly acceptable, seen by someone who misunderstands the situation, and fired because of that, then she would be an innocent victim of a very unfair employer. I think thats misunderstanding the severity of why what OP did was not ok. Theres any number of non-confidential matters that are embargoed prior to their public announcement. Heck, at my agency were cautioned to not use work email on our personal devices (unless were management or its an emergency) because records requests could potentially get our personal devices as well. The info is out, the tech used to spread it is irrelevant and a distraction from the problem. Why is there a voltage on my HDMI and coaxial cables? They are not neutral. Some things a company wouldnt want you to tell a competitor, but wouldnt mind if you told your spouse. I admit to being incredibly curious as well. In my experience, it was highly effective. This was also my thought. Those who work in circumstances that require them learn how to filter through multiple layers of risk when they get to a point where they come up against that need to share. Reporting misconduct is the right thing to do, and thats how an interviewer is going to see it. Yep, I have a friend whose grandmother was a codebreaker and took loose lips sink ships seriously till her dying day. You arent entitled to a second chance to screw this up. This was more or less what I was thinking. Right. I understand the issue had to be reported, but why this way ? I dont even share work release information (good or bad) early with my spouse. I mean, yeah, absolutely! I just wasn't thinking at the moment I sent the information. OP if I was part of an interview for you, and you brought up this situation the way its phrased here, Im sorry to say it would be an immediate pass. While irritating, email from mass marketing lists dont require a response and you probably wouldnt get an answer anyway. 2. You can avoid finding yourself in this position by double-checking the recipient email address (especially when autocomplete is involved), the cc field, and the Bcc field. Received confidential email not for you? | Email DLP | Egress I work in communications for a large organization and I see this as a trust issue with leadership. The one time I filled a confidentiality-bound role (as a temp) the information I was given was specifically NOT to tell the person you were obligated to report. I think also this illustrates how hard confidentiality is; these are trained and likely reasonably experienced people who still couldnt resist this temptation.
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