My guess is thats where some of the defensiveness in the initial letter comes from that no one would have known if not for the self-report. Your second co-worker who sexually harassed a woman was put on a PIP? If any of those connections were being intercepted by an unknown third party, however, you've just put your customer's data into their hands. They have absolutely no obligation to keep secrets for government agencies or private companies. I do have to wonder if the hospital failed to educate its employees on how freaking serious that kind of breach was, And also failed to inform them that the system tracks who looks up a particular patients record. Im still pretty upset that I had no second chance, but I suppose I just lost their trust. Employees can't just post anything they want on Facebook or anywhere else. Its no fun to be fired. Before someone decides to do that, I encourage them to get legal representation. I feel like this misses the overall lesson Allison is trying to impart here. And while you felt mad at coworker, really youre mad at yourself. She showed no contrition or reflection. Its a great professional resource with a lot of professional development around ethics. +1000. You are right. I am a veteran employee in good standing, but if I shared Material NonPublic Information I learned on the job and was found out, I would be terminated immediately and they would be right to do so. You are allowed to feel your feels about things, so long as you understand the reality. I was in tech there and had worked on a new interface for agents, lets call it TEAPOT. Thats when it gets tricky. Assuming OP was correct and journalist friend never would have said anything, OP could have pretended it never happened. My point is that you learn how to share AND maintain confidentiality. You added nuance that I hadnt thought about. When they call for a reference, many employers will absolutely say if you were fired or laid off, and they will give detailed references. As others mentioned, the breach is possibly a fire on first offense potential, but since they fired you after investigating slack that makes me wonder if you had too casual and friendly of chats with the journalists whose job it was for you to talk with. It can, should, and does happen, depending on the details of what all happened. More employers are still going to be turned off by that than impressed. OP, its worth examining whether trying to assuage your guilt by sharing this with your mentor, rather than with some outside person who doesnt touch on your industry, was a version of getting post-mortem permission. It was a big enough thing that they gave you a 1st chance. This makes it seem like they owe LW something, to be loving and release her to her best life. 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. If asked specifially try to describe in detail what happened and what you learned from it, for example: ask if the new employer has clear guidelines on data handling. It was absolutely drilled into all of our heads during grad school and training that you can never, ever do this. This is your making, and while I wish you luck, you have zero cause to be disgruntled with your coworker or employer. Breaking certain rules in the workplace, whether written or unwritten, may get you fired. Better to have a 30% chance than a 0% chance. When I worked for the bank in the security investigation department, we had systems in place that monitored Famous Peoples accounts and would flag them if they were opened/touched. OP, I join Alison in wishing you the very best of luck! Both the affected parties were amazing clients who prided themselves on solid security practices. And especially in the field youre in, leaks are a big deal, and ESPECIALLY leaks to a member of the press. More commonly it means that you either cant share anything, or you cant share parts that someone could connect to a particular client. Many employers monitor emails, and some employees . The only thing even slightly puzzling is why during the conversation with the mentor, mentor didnt say you do understand I am obligated to report this? Maybe mentor thought that might prompt LW to do something track-covering so it was better left going directly to the bosses without warning. Sometimes were lucky and there arent any repercussions. I dont think your coworker ratted you out. i think we often send the message (societally) that making someone feel bad is a mean thing to do; its not. In this situation, I reported myself is simply false, given OPs expectation that her mentor wouldnt pass along what she knew to anyone else. The main problem is that 'copying data in a very insecure way to be able to bring those data. Employees who violate their companies' email policies can face penalties ranging from disciplinary action to termination. Can I get fired for . Medical too. I understand that you get that what you did was a very big deal as a single event, but I think you might need to spend some more time examining for yourself why you would describe this as a victimless crime. The fact that your friend didnt as far as you know tell anyone else about your bombshell doesnt meant that nothing happened. Some offenses are serious enough that a single incident is enough to fire someone. If you cant maintain confidentiality, you can work elsewhere. People just seemed to forget that with Epic, even one second of accessing a chart is recorded. In this situation, it is acceptable to make 'fear of attachment' jokes. We wont tell anyone. She screwed up, and they fired her because thats what she deserved. That OP knew it was wrong and felt guilty about it is a sign of strength. Like its going to be easier to find a job because she has the integrity to say she got fired. In most reporting policies i am aware of it would be considered tipping off and get the person reporting in trouble. Perhaps over official lines it could be interpreted by the journalist as on the record comments. And that is a hard pill to swallow, for sure. Libel or slander or posting comments about individuals that are not related to your work environment are not protected. Taking full responsibility isnt just the better moral choice, its the more effective one. Between that and having family members who have been laid off and lost access to their work account that they used for personal use as well, I have learned to keep work and personal email accounts separate. You still have to go through the same information request as someone who doesnt work there. There are many ways to say thing like this without lying. Im interested in the fact that the journalist friend is described as 100% trustworthy. Animaniactoo is right that folks who have to manage confidential information begin to cultivate the skill of sharing without making an unauthorized disclosure. Life may not look better in 6 months but I bet it does in 3 years. Even innocuous-sounding information, like the name of a database, can be a huge security risk. Yes of course it feels bad that you were fired. Noooooo. Thats crazy (and crazy lucky for the embezzler). All we can do is learn, rest, and go on another day. LW is undisciplined and has a big mouth. Wait, what the friend is a *journalist*?. On other occasions, you might accidentally receive a confidential email with information meant for one person (or a few people) you know. Contact the unintended recipient It's a good idea to contact the unintended recipient as soon as you realize the error. how trustworthy somebody actually is is never certain. They are not neutral. picture of male guinea fowl . Im glad that youve had time to think about it and can own the mistake, thats the most important part when we mess up. 3) The recipient was a journalist thats super relevant, even if its not in their area That said, I am curious if theres other context that explains why they fired you for a first offense without warning you first. |. That may not be the right wordbut Im having trouble finding the right one. obviously i cant know that for sure though. 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. Thats just not something you can let yourself do. In fact, think of it this way: you put your journalist friend in a situation where she was potentially sitting on a scoop but she actually kept mum to protect you. Maybe the information was a big deal to the agency but not externally (say getting a big grant funded), but if it was something that was legitimately important news, her friend would have been at least a little torn between loyalty to her friend and loyalty to her job. Additionally, J. K. Rowling won a lawsuit against the lawyer and the firm. This was all public information, but the original report was work product of Company A even if it had originally been created by the coworker. My father worked on defense contracts for a large portion of his professional career. It shouldnt happen but Id understand if it did. Yes. Personal info is never OK to share with anyone, or things that could lead to recognizing a person if someone happens to know that person (and you never know who knows who). Many types of information are protected only during specific time frames insider trading comes to mind as a particularly nasty one disclosing inside information about a pending large contract award or trade is absolutely firable. It's hard to answer this question without specifics, but it strikes me as very important to differentiate between an accident or mistake in the sense of "oops, I did that by unintentionally" versus misconduct, as in "this was against policy and I deliberately did it anyways" regardless of whether you knew about the policy or had a good reason to do it or not. Fired for gross misconduct because I sent confidential information to personal mailbox - how do I get another job? rev2023.3.3.43278. The above divulged details to a journalist about allocation and resources they should not know about. If it does, you can explain calmly that in a moment of weakness, you broke a serious rule regarding sending information to someone outside the company, but youve learned a hard lesson you never intend to repeat. 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. RIGHT NOW it is totally privileged information and it needs to be treated that way. Thats the very last reporting step for something illegal/dangerous. ! mode if she told me a general were harassing her, unless making this public is something shed want. Agreed. We received a staff email that shared that they were going to release some BIG news about positive new office changes and remodeling and that there was going to be a BIG press conference in 2 days at our office with a lot of high-up political bigwigs and asked everyone to show up for support. But if I did, itd basically just be gossip (I hear Senator Ys staff is really frustrated) that they could choose to report out in detail or not, and definitely wouldnt be traced back to me. You didn't accidentally email the material to yourself, you did it on purpose. I think one can be upset at not getting a second chance without feeling necessarily entitled to one. But how do I explain this story to future employers? Yep. That the information eventually became public is not in any way relevant. I just think it serves OP to choose a more benign explanation because it will help OP deal with the fall out of the situation going forward. But even the first is really really, really bad. And thats still very unrealistic / way off-base, if OP truly gets why this was a slam-dunk decision, in that particular circumstance. Later the coworker left the company and at company B was asked to write a similar report for the new company. When telling me about the call, she said that when the checker said the guys name, she couldnt stop herself from bursting out, Wait, he told you to call me?!. It would have been better if she had told you first that she was going to tell someone, but whether she warns you first has no bearing on whether she was obligated to disclose. JustAnswer is a public forum and questions and responses are not private or confidential or protected by the attorney-client privilege. How does this make it any better or worse..? Because I can almost guarantee that your reputation in that organization would never recover, even if you had remained employed. If I had an employee that did this, Id expect them to be mortified and I would expect to hear how seriously they were going to take embargoes from here on out, and the LWs letter and response are almost the exact opposite. Except that when the reference checker asks if the candidate is eligible for re-hire (for the position they left or any other position) should the opportunity present itself, the response will be no. Everyone absolutely everyone employed at a hospital has to undergo annual HIPAA compliance training. It still sucks, but its not really personal per se, and perhaps it will help a little bit to think of it that way. Unfortunately, someone did leak the info so all the employees read about the information in a major business news website AND the local newspaper the night before the event despite the intention for the employees to hear the news firsthand at the event before it was released to the public. The hospital I was working for last year had the best of this kind of presentation that Ive ever seen. I come across soooo much incidental information about people I know in the course of this job. Which means have to vet things like your friend is a journalist, but doesnt cover your area? It seems like LW has had time to process and isnt being combative. We had a discussion on a work committee about not using our work emails when discussing some sensitive information. Its too difficult to know which internally-discussed information is confidential and which isnt. Im now turning my head sideways and re-reading/rethinking. THIS ^^^ Whether it is age or just immaturity, there is clearly a major blind spot about the big picture and the potential impact resulting from this behavior. Is it FOUO though? Think of speaking with a colleague like speaking with your boss. This is why you never ever confidentially share work-related things with colleagues. I did not get fired for the offense, but I genuinely learned a great deal from the experience and it changed the entire way I interacted with clients, for the better. I got defensive and young from OPs response. Nah. In my experience, a FOIA request can come from anywhere. You've learned from this mistake and had no malicious intent. I cant say any details yet, but needed to share my excitement!!. The Smurfs have a secret colony in the woods of Maine!. Im sure the OP will find a new job. Oh honey, how young are you? This is 100% on you. And sometimes at shows they dont identify themselves as press immediately.
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