Friend's job being offshored to India and he must train the guys b4 his layoff

[Sandie5]

A friend's company has decided to send his job plus others to India in the next few months. He's now expected to train the Indian workers on his job before his layoff.

Is this even legal? Doesn't begin laid off mean your job is not longer needed not your job can be done by someone else for less?

[packardbell]

so he is not officially laid off but still getting paid.
so if he needs to train the new staff then he can if he still wants his salary until the official lay off date.
must suck to be in his shoes

[Mark77]

All an employer is obligated to do is provide appropriate notice that a position is to be eliminated. Someone who refuses to work during a notice period (and work can include training others) could be dismissed with cause.

Its an unfortunate situation, but perfectly legal.

Personally, in such a situation, I would suggest training the replacements improperly and superficially. Do everything to make sure the 'replacements' don't learn the 'secret sauce' of the job.

[Firebot]

Personally, in such a situation, I would suggest training the replacements improperly and superficially. Do everything to make sure the 'replacements' don't learn the 'secret sauce' of the job.

Yeah that will teach the company. All it will do is potentially cause the employee to be fired with cause, and losing any potential good reference. The best option is to start looking for another job right away and quit once you land a job offer.

[Mark77]

Yeah that will teach the company.

Many experienced workers will develop proprietary techniques (or the so-called 'secret sauce') involved in getting their jobs done quickly and efficiently.

But why give up those secrets to the newbies? Teach them the hard way. Make them re-invent the wheel.

For instance, if you're a truck driver, and you have to train your replacement because they're firing you -- why show them all the shortcuts?

[AudiDude]

Yeah that will teach the company. All it will do is potentially cause the employee to be fired with cause, and losing any potential good reference. The best option is to start looking for another job right away and quit once you land a job offer.

At my job if you do everything according to the book, you will fail. I could not be fired with cause for not training someone with how I get the job done, because if I divulged that secret to management, they would make sure you had to follow the rules anyway. People in boardrooms making rules has never worked, and most likely, company procedures don't work and there is nobody smart enough to develop proper procedure that doesn't actually do the job.

I did have the exact situation at the job before this and I refused to train anybody, it wasn't my job. The outsourced new guys learned nothing and two days after we all left, they were banned from doing the same tasks because they broke things they touched. The company will still go ahead with what they planned, but there is no way they will get what they wanted. I wanted them to let me go early because there is really no way they could be productive with me gone. They let me stick around and torture them until the last minute. Their plan didn't work and they lost the control they had with inhouse workers. They have now closed their doors.

[Rainne]

^ Tricks of the trade

[aaaaaa]

Yeah that will teach the company. All it will do is potentially cause the employee to be fired with cause, and losing any potential good reference. The best option is to start looking for another job right away and quit once you land a job offer.

You can be laid off for anything, but there's a very specific list of things you can be fired for. Coming to work drunk, Yes. Sucking at your job? No.

I'd definitely do as everyone else has said, and go through with the bare minimum. If you are expecting to use your current employer as a reference, then do the bare minimum that will still land you a reference. If you're not expecting or needing a reference (as they're far less valuable in a lot of industries these days), then do the bare minimum not to get fired. See some reference points here:
http://www.e-laws.gov.on.ca/html/reg...s_010288_e.htm

The sentence to note is: "3. An employee who has been guilty of wilful misconduct, disobedience or wilful neglect of duty that is not trivial and has not been condoned by the employer."

Basically if you show up, and don't refuse to do what you're told, they can't fire you (at least that's my condensed version for when you're getting laid off anyways, it's not like you got a lot to lose). In the mean time, tell your friend to start job hunting asap. If he gets a new job lined up, he can leave sooner

[Starkicker]

I had this happen to my uncle, and he did the best to train his new staff - this was known as Knowledge Transfer (KN). He was still being kept on at his company, but in a different role so he had nothing to lose in a sense.

What his company found was tough the indian staff was capable at their job, they lacked the interpersonal skills needed to fit the corporate culture and interact with the north american sales/services division.

Not sure where it stands now, but I believed they were bringing the technical support roles back to north america.

[tylaw83]

All an employer is obligated to do is provide appropriate notice that a position is to be eliminated. Someone who refuses to work during a notice period (and work can include training others) could be dismissed with cause.

Its an unfortunate situation, but perfectly legal.

Personally, in such a situation, I would suggest training the replacements improperly and superficially. Do everything to make sure the 'replacements' don't learn the 'secret sauce' of the job.

This coming from a guy who keeps telling us engineers are ethical and wouldn't have run the economy into the ground.

[Mark77]

This coming from a guy who keeps telling us engineers are ethical and wouldn't have run the economy into the ground.

And I suppose you'd supply your executioner with the ammunition? You'd sell your hangman the rope? I agree with the others, best to move on as quickly as possible, but if not possible, its best not to make your job look trivial by embodying a full body of knowledge to the new recruits within weeks.

[adehbone]

If your job is being outsourced guess what "you do not have any secret sauce". You are just proving management's decision to outsource the position based on that attitude. It really is like a baby crying that their bottle was taken away. Maybe the sign of outsourcing your job should be a wake up that it is time to evolve.

This reminds of my friend who is a manager at a plan in Ontario for a F500. All his management comes from South America, because every South American plant kicks North America's ass by far. They send these magicians from Brazil/Domican to scream at my friend for how inefficient Canada is and try to instill all these policies that work over there. My friend literally screams at them and tells them off that Canadian workers would never put in that effort or extra work and unions cover their ass.

The company's #1 goal has been to downsize and close down as many plants as possible over the next 3-5 years. They have given up to bring efficiency up to speed.

[adehbone]

I had this happen to my uncle, and he did the best to train his new staff - this was known as Knowledge Transfer (KN). He was still being kept on at his company, but in a different role so he had nothing to lose in a sense.

What his company found was tough the indian staff was capable at their job, they lacked the interpersonal skills needed to fit the corporate culture and interact with the north american sales/services division.

Not sure where it stands now, but I believed they were bringing the technical support roles back to north america.

Good on your uncle, that is the adult way to deal with a situation. Surprise that in this scenario the company re-thought their decision. Versus the employees sabotaging the company's plans.

[peanutz]

Good on your uncle, that is the adult way to deal with a situation. Surprise that in this scenario the company re-thought their decision. Versus the employees sabotaging the company's plans.

ROFL What kind of warped sense of "ethics" do you and tylaw83 have? Audidude and Mark77 have it right.

And I suppose you'd supply your executioner with the ammunition? You'd sell your hangman the rope? I agree with the others, best to move on as quickly as possible, but if not possible, its best not to make your job look trivial by embodying a full body of knowledge to the new recruits within weeks.

If an employer thinks he's going to get the same value out of a new group of employees as his current employees, those getting laid off have every right to demonstrate their value by showing what they knew and had is not so easily reproducible.

Then again, who knows. I'm sure there are cases where the new workforce does demonstrate its own value.

[jda]

All an employer is obligated to do is provide appropriate notice that a position is to be eliminated. Someone who refuses to work during a notice period (and work can include training others) could be dismissed with cause.

Its an unfortunate situation, but perfectly legal.

Personally, in such a situation, I would suggest training the replacements improperly and superficially. Do everything to make sure the 'replacements' don't learn the 'secret sauce' of the job.

I thought engineers have to take an ethic class, if you need the textbook please let me know, I can dig it up.

To OP:
Either do it right or don't bother do it at all, if you don't want to train your replacement, just quit or tell your boss that. Don't do douche things like what Mark77/Pitz has suggested, that shows character or lack there of.