Hey everyone,
My interviewer met up with my boss at a networking event and long story short the interviewer revealed I was interviewing at his firm.
My firm is likely to ask me to leave as they are very unhappy about it. Just wondering, how do you guys go about your job search to protect yourself from such instances? This seems like pure bad luck that can't be prevented but happy to hear any thoughts.
ty
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My thought is, why did that interviewer rat on you to your boss? Bad form by that guy, really bad form.
I'm curious if there are employment laws against this. I guess I've never thought about it since it's in such horrible form to rat out a job candidate that it rarely happens.
No laws, but in the land of the free and home of the lawsuit; this could easily be grounds for punitive damages, pain and suffering, and reimbursed legal expenses.
I worked at a place where a person of a certain race was let go with cause. That person claimed discrimination with racial slurs being spoken. Despite the fact all of this was false; internal legal motioned to settle to just keep the noise down.
Most interviewers use their common sense and realize they should probably not mention that their target is looking for a job when talking to said target's boss.
However, situations like yours can happen - small world. Could've been in the same analyst class, could have been friends in college, their kids might play on the same basketball team etc..He probably wanted some intel on you before offering you the position.
For future reference though, if you don't want your current firm to know you're looking for opportunities, you need to always tell the recruiter/interviewer that you want it kept confidential.
That guy's such an a-hole!
I was once suspected of interviewing elsewhere (I wasn't) and bluntly confronted with, "Are you interviewing at other places?"
Coffee had yet to kick in so I scowled and said, "Should I be!?"
I quit about a month later anyway when a competitor tapped me.
This sucks and there isn't much you can do here. But I'd take two steps:
Make it clear your boss doesn't know you're looking in any future interview, and request that they not contact your firm. If they push back, you can agree that they can call after you've accepted an offer but must check with you first.
There's no point in sueing or making a huge public deal out of it, you'll come out looking bad too, and they haven't done anything illegal, just crappy. However, I would ABSOLUTELY reach out to this person's superiors and HR department to let them know both that they informed your boss that you were job hunting and that it directly led to your job loss. Do it professionally, maybe they have somewhere else they can refer you to. But more importantly, this person needs to be disciplined internally so that this issue doesn't occur with other future candidates.
Something doesn't have to be illegal for you to sue. In fact, that's what most litigation is surrounding--non-criminal and very much legal activity. If the OP gets fired he likely won't be able to brush himself off and move on to the next industry job. That's not how this business works. He will almost certainly suffer real, actual financial losses.
https://www.legalmatch.com/law-library/article/wrongful-interference-wi…
Wrongful Interference with Employment Relationship: When a person other than an employer intentionally interferes with another person's employment relationship and thereby causes the other person to lose his/her job, that interfering person might be liable for the economic losses that result.
The person damaged by the interference (the employee) will usually need to prove the following things in order to sue:
1) There was an existing employment relationship; 2) The person who caused the interference was a third party to the relationship (i.e. the relationship was not between the person damaged and the person who interfered); 3) The third party's conduct interfered with the relationship; 4) The third party intended to interfere; and 5) The third party's conduct caused the employee's termination.
In most states, the employee also needs to prove that the third party was not justified in interfering with the employment relationship.
Skank speaking: you have a slamdunk case of tortious interference with an employment relationship. I'm currently looking for a new job and your story makes my blood boil. Sue that motherfucker for all he's worth. No, sue his company. He fucked you over in his capacity with his company.
No, this isn't correct! In a civil case, you just have to convince the jury that it's 51% likely that you were terminated because the prospective employer wrongly divulged your information ("preponderance of the evidence"). This isn't a criminal case where the standard is "beyond a reasonable doubt"--circumstantial evidence is exactly the kind of evidence civil cases were designed for.
I’m assuming the best from people when I say this. Having interviewed hundreds of employment candidates over the years, it is possible that company leadership know one another casually well before candidates show up to interview. We should frankly assume this to be true. Conversations can and do happen between friends if there is no compelling reason for them not to.
One small prevenatative measure can go a long way: be explicit about the fact that you’re interviewing and your current employer does not know that you’re doing this. Ask for discretion. I can’t imagine anyone I know from an HR department who would violate that request if it was made explicit.
I would simply caveat that if you make a comment like this in an interview, also be clear: 1. That if you do get an offer, that you will owe your current employer the respect of adequate notice and don’t plan to jump ship without notice (this can make you look bad) 2. That you explored the options available to you through your current employer, and they either don’t exist or they come with a condition that you can’t meet (like you would have to move to some small island that serves only food you’re allergic to). 3. That a career path in your new company is something you want as opposed to your soon-to-be ex-company for X reasons. A good interviewer will ask you this anyway. They won’t likely want to hire a naturally disloyal or quick to disappear employee.
Be smart enough to be both honest and sensitive to everyone involved.