San Francisco Employment Law Firm Blog
Many workers find themselves in a situation where they believe (and often rightfully so) that they will soon be wrongfully terminated due to some type of discrimination or retaliation. Can anything be done to prevent a future wrongful termination form taking place?
Realistically, there is nothing you can do to physically prevent your employer from firing you, if they are determined to do so. Just like they can’t force you to work for them against your will, you or anyone else can’t force them to employ you for longer than they want to. However, there are several things you can do to make your potential future wrongful termination case stronger:
- Make sure you don’t give your employer any independent, lawful reasons for firing you. For instance, if you send mean / rude emails to your boss who has been retaliating against you in violation of the law, and you are terminated shorly after sending those email for some type of policy violation of verbal violence (which would be totally lawful), it will be quite hard to prove that the reason for your termination was that unlawful retaliation you were experiencing before, and not those angry emails that you sent most recently prior to your termination.
- Make a connection with as many witnesses of the employer’s unlawful conduct toward you as possible. Some of your co-workers may not be willing to talk, which is fine, while others will want to help. Even one co-worker who witness unlawful harassment toward you can make a big difference in a typical he-said-she-said employment case.
- Talk to an experienced employment lawyer, who can assess you situation and help you decide what the best option for you is given your specific situation, i.e. building up a case prior to your termination v considering resigning earlier than later v filing or not filing a charge of discrimination with EEOC, etc.