this is one of the reasons why its best to have a mentor who is NOT at the same company as you. So seriously, just dont tell anyone at all, fight the temptation, its an icy slope. LW, youve learned half of your lesson, but really need to keep working to get there. And it seems like you do. Im not feeding a narrative, Im expressing my opinion. Shell lose credibility in the hiring process, and even if she did slip through and get hired, its automatically grounds for a dismissal if the truth ever came to light (even in Canada, where it is harder to let people go from roles than in most of the US states). Aug. 4, 2008, at 11:14 a.m. 7 Ways Your E-mail Can Get You Fired. If its obvious who the email was intended for, just forward it on and cc the original sender, letting them know what youve done. And if the coworker didnt tell and it somehow got out that she knew another job lost. A member of the public wants some data, they contact anybody in the agency they can think of, the internal employees bounce it around because somehow they dont know who to send data requests to, and finally it gets to us and we respond. You made a mistake. OP, there is another thing to keep in mind. More commonly it means that you either cant share anything, or you cant share parts that someone could connect to a particular client. This is a good way to think about it. In this situation, it is acceptable to make 'fear of attachment' jokes. She shared *exciting* embargoed information. Same applies here as you stated. Another public sector worker here. I went to a church where I attended youth group, sat outside, and repeated my news over and over to Jesus for about three hours before I felt certain I could keep it from anyone else (note that no one else was anywhere nearby). But what you do when youre on the other side of the inbox? Specifics dont matter, but to me, being able to explain you told your friend your employer was about to buy this farm to build a park so they bought the farm so they could raise the price and make a profit would make a huge difference in terms of making the OP aware of the consequences of their actions. You are allowed to feel your feels about things, so long as you understand the reality. I hope you mean it when you say you understand the magnitude of this mistake and why you were fired for it. Shes assuming the friend has more self-control than she does, which is precarious at best. What happened is reputation-ruining for such jobs so re-assessing what is realistic in terms of job expectations after this is important to moving on successfully True, but youre talking more about deciding to become a whistleblower over something potentially dangerous to the public. No, shes a person with ethics who plays by the rules. Here are the things that OP needs to remember: First, the coworker is not a rat, even if she misunderstood the scope of OPs unauthorized disclosure and mistakenly misrepresented it. You can -and often should convey emotion in your official public statements. You made yourself very vulnerable, your mentor knew that, and unfortunately, youre now bearing the consequences. The emphasis on how not harmful the infraction was is totally hurting your case, OP. Examples that most journalists would find pretty snoozy (although journalists who cover the agency super-closely for trade publications, Politico Pro, Bloomberg Gov, etc, would still be interested): The ex-coworker reached out to me asking if I could send them a copy of the report so they didnt have to start from scratch and repeat the same work they had already done. To be fair Jules, I was making the assumption that it had been, in effect, sexual assault, which may not have been the case. I would go through the channels to fire someone immediately over this, because it would make me lose all trust in them and if I can no longer be confident in their abilities to do their job effectively without spillage, theyre of no use to my team. When we think about misdirected email, we often put ourselves in the shoes of the sender. First coworker punched second coworker. [Well-known bad person] is going to be fined/punished/arrested. While some employers will accept the I take personal accountability and heres how I address it path, this probably does remove some employers from consideration. Ive been under NDA for things I cant even disclose to my boss, much less a friend outside the organization. Understand the true risk of accidentally hitting send to the wrong person. OP, Im sure in your excitement you truly didnt think there was anything wrong with telling your friend, someone you trust implicitly to remain discreet. 1. While that obviously wasnt the result Id have wanted, I learned an important lesson about confidentiality, and its not a mistake Ill ever repeat.. You didn't accidentally email the material to yourself, you did it on purpose. +1000. How did you talk to your boss about the slack channel full of journalists? Were you able to correct the factual mistake in context, and what phrasing did you use? Or if youd like to start a trial, get in touch and well be more than happy to arrange a free demo with your IT team. You say that the information eventually became public, and you seem to think that this mitigates the problem. Take full responsibility. I understand the issue had to be reported, but why this way ? Still wondering why there was no second chance, though.
can you get fired for accidentally sending confidential information 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. But the judge's response to the request for a. 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. The Census Bureau does NOT play with that sort of thing, and you would indeed be given the boot as soon as the breach was uncovered. Journalists get embargoed or off-the-record information all the time and are able to play by those rules. This is a bad enough screw-up that I would be contemplating a career change, or at least a pivot to an area of communications where things like confidential information and media embargoes arent ever a factor. I work in the auto industry in media communications. 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. As a government employee she would have been trained on that rule and should have fully understood the ramifications of breaking it. 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. Dec. 17, 2009 -- You probably don't think twice about sending personal messages through your work e-mail. But what might walk that back to a performance plan would be a sincere, unqualified apology showing understanding of the gravity of the error. Minimizing it will make it harder for future employers to trust OP, whereas frank ownership and an action plan will read as much more responsible and accountable. And most of the real socialising happened at house parties and dinner parties, not restaurants or bars. You can bounce back! I was sent home, and then fired over the phone a few hours later. She would ask every rep if they were using TEAPOT o service accounts, and would proudly exclaim, My daughter built TEAPOT! She thought she was connecting with the people who helped her. (Also the NASA leaker didnt get fired. 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. One of my favorite shows had a plotline about a sibling not liking someone not breaking doctor confidentiality. FIFTY?! I got that impression as well and have had younger coworkers who sent random, very personal info to me in texts. Depending on their responses it ranged from retraining, to suspension, to immediate dismissal.. My boss and I had a very serious conversation about it, and I think the only reason I was not fired was that I immediately and unequivocally took responsibility. Dang! Tessian Cloud Email Security intelligently prevents advanced email threats and protects against data loss, to strengthen email security and build smarter security cultures in modern enterprises. LW doesnt seem defensive at all here, and its okay to feel upset while still taking ownership of their actions. Your coworker was probably legally obligated to report this, and even is she wasnt this is the type of breach that reasonable people WILL report. If I ever texted a journalist about nonpublic information Id be fired. That doesnt seem to be you, which is a great sign. From there they have 72 hours to resolve the situation. (Im a journalist, there are only a few specific cardinal sins in our industry, so lets euphemistically call this a case of inadequate attribution.) This x 1000 to the comment by ENFP in Texas. how to explain you were fired, when interviewing. No matter how small the company, they trust you to safeguard the data, and you didnt do that. She already acknowledged that its 100% her fault. Its definitely not a spur if the moment decision. Accidental disclosure of PHI includes sending an email to the wrong recipient and an employee accidentally viewing a patient's report, which leads to an . I think thats a ridiculous overreach but whatever).
Ferry carrying 183 people catches fire in the English - Daily Mail If you stay in comms, good to always remember the optics. Misdirecting an email can be awkward. It may be unfair to assume a journalist is cutthroat and would kill for a lead, but its also nave to assume they wouldnt let anything slip to the exact wrong person. OP, take a deep breath. I empathize, having both been in government service where the people can let the boundaries get too loose and, separately, had a career-breaking moment in a toxic workplace. Period. A supervisor discovers that an employee has recently downloaded thousands of pages of confidential Company billing and financial information, and e-mailed it to her personal e-mail address. Period. Then whenever you send a message, you'll be given an option to "Cancel" at the top of the message before it's sent. And then there are things you cannot even hint at under any circumstances. While I dont think the LW should be endlessly flagellating herself, this was her fault, not the co-worker. Its a great professional resource with a lot of professional development around ethics. Learn how to protect your investment management firm through intelligent email DLP. And Im pointing out that it wasnt a record at all. It happens. Yes! 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. This is a situation that youre going to have great difficulty explaining away and I might prefer a resume gap to being at such a disadvantage. OP has been mature about admitting fault, lets not undermine that by implying it was no big deal. The contact form sends information by non-encrypted email, which is not secure. This is important both in terms of owning your mistake and not blaming the person who reported it. (Im not from the US, and not in government) If I were in OPs place, I would also be upset and feel betrayed. Yeah, this is an excellent point. Taking full responsibility isnt just the better moral choice, its the more effective one. For me, it was like OK, she shared embargoed information something she shouldnt have. Please do not include any confidential or sensitive information in a contact form, text message, or voicemail. And you might know that you trust that friend 100% to keep it confidential but your employer would prefer to make that call themselves, and thought theyd done so when they told you the information couldnt be shared. There could be a situation where it might be the journalists job to share the information LW thought they were telling to just a friend. Im so paranoid about it, that I only talk about what the company has already shared publicly. Im confused about the fact-finding meeting. It sounds like OP is young enough that they havent learned that there are some jobs where gossiping about your workplace with your friends is okay, and some jobs where that absolutely cannot fly. I can't remember the details, but there was a point about the fact the word "confidential" added in every e-mail by such a notice wasn't actually helpful, since tools that looked for the word confidential were flagging everything up, including a large number of false positives. Before I was born, there was a project where mother had to get clearance as well. Maybe you get a 2nd chance IF you were contrite enough and blamed your excitement at the new teapot program.
How do I prevent staff accidentally sending personal information It would have been better if she had told you first that she was going to tell someone blue_haddock wrote: . Its like winning the jackpot in a slot machine then declaring that you KNEW you were going to win, so it wasnt really gambling at all. I recall a year or so into this administration at least a couple federal departments making A Big Deal out of leaks because it seemed like every other story (usually negative) was quoting an anonymous source sharing sensitive information they werent authorized to release. Yes of course it feels bad that you were fired.
Eight Warning Signs of Potential Employment Termination and Eight Ways Yep, I have a friend whose grandmother was a codebreaker and took loose lips sink ships seriously till her dying day. So in regards to the tell an imaginary friend idea, I have also: openly disclosed highly confidential information to a) my cats and b) Jesus. Because, if you did the first apology option then I think it would be (more) possible youd get a 2nd chance. Best wishes! December 15, 2009, 1:05 PM. (And yes, the records request would come through the custodian of records, but the point of my second paragraph is that non-public information does not have special protections like confidential information and that the general public has a right to access that information as soon as it is available, and not just when the agency finds it convenient to send out a press release.). So this. And the coworker, well, this was information that was a major conduct infraction, not just embarrassing or private if a coworker told me theyd done this, Id have promptly reported it, not to humiliate them, but to start the process of damage control. +100. Businesses have a term for that kind of behaviour, and that is 'data leakage'. It is ok to be upset at the coworker but it is important to recognize that she did nothing wrong and is not a rat. Its especially challenging if youve grown up immersed in social media, where confidential emails with the names and sensitive details blacked out are frequently posted on Facebook or Twitter or someones blog, where they go viral. Leaking anything that could put those things at risk is an insta-fire offense.
Know your workplace rights: New laws protect employees during - NBC12 I actually think this was a little rough of her mentor. I doubt she had it out for you and rather was worried you confided a big breech to her which could adversely affect the company. Where I work, there are policies that state an employee that finds out about certain kinds of misconduct is mandated to report it or face consequences if it comes out that they knew and didnt report it. you can include that in there too, not as a way to cast doubt on their decision but as a way to indicate this was a fluke, not a pattern of bad judgment. Im interested in the fact that the journalist friend is described as 100% trustworthy. (Or maybe the coworker did fabricate it, but I feel like thats a massive assumption itself. And you did it over company lines. Thats pretty ratty behavior. Better to say in a single instance of poor judgment I let a piece of information get outside of the company to one person which I immediately knew was a mistake and I notified someone in my company. Your feelings are wrong, in this context means,Your feelings arent *morally* wrong.. We asked them why they did it. Yep, I think its worth LW remembering that while she knew shed never leak anything again, her boss and co-workers dont. How on earth could you know this was a misunderstanding? What am I doing wrong here in the PlotLegends specification? But would the government do that? That said, is there any reason you need to answer these questions? OP came to her, she felt guilty, they apparently talked about this a bit, so why not tell her that this cant be kept secret and she has to come forward to her boss ? I used to work in a one-industry town. You hear something genuinely classified and blab it too because its so cool? People have gotten jobs in their field after vastly more serious forkups, don't despair. I dont think you have to be Catholic.). And in fact, NOT getting that second chance with them might mean that you take it more seriously and handle the next relationship in a trustworthy manner. This is one reason why I could only ever give a vague explanation of what my dad did. But fairly often it was classified to some degree, and he could only talk about how his project was going but not about what it was. Or well often hear from contacts on the Hill about something going on behind the scenes, like that a bill is about to be introduced. 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. "Yes, humor in the workplace is a fabulously invaluable thing that any workplace can benefit greatly from, but when your colleagues already feel buried under a pile of never-ending emails, adding. Ive been poking around in our payroll system for the last two weeks. Blame yourself for breaking the rules. :) :) :) :) Being a wealthy heiress and a socialite IS a full-time job! Like, firing on the spot if I access my own chart. I was coming to the comments section to say the same thing. LW I encourage you to ask yourself why you wrote this: Your actions showed you were not trustworthy with confidential information. Mandatory reporting is a thing that exists. They have absolutely no obligation to keep secrets for government agencies or private companies. If you had stayed, they would never have trusted you again. If she really understood or valued confidentiality, she would not be trying to convince us of how victimless this was. The focus moving forward should be about realizing how serious a problem it was, how badly you feel about it, and how youre committed to not making the same mistake again. Yup. It was a refreshingly candid answer and so we wound up hiring him. so that youre ready the next time it happens at your next job. I wonder if OP ever got the chance to correct the misunderstanding. Even there, be very sure the person youre talking to has the same access you do. Im more curious about what KIND of exciting information it was. (i hope this story still makes sense with all identifying details purged, but hopefully its clear from context uh why i am purging all those details smdh) If you are still defensive or dismissive about this, it will come through in an interview.
10 Ways to Rebound From an Embarrassing Email Mistake Its very possible that LW could think what happened to me wasnt totally fair and still accept full responsibility for it during interviews (which is obviously the smart thing to do). If someone had been privy to the list of cities prior to the announcement, and leaked it, they would 100% have been fired. Life is full of these weird potholes we find ourselves in at times. Embargoes and off-the-record information are for journalists who are actually covering a story and in most cases that information can be shared in the newsroom (by saying a source told me off record if confidentiality is really important) and acted upon (you can start to write out a story to be ready when the embargo lifts, or call work to corroborate the off-the-record with on background or on record sources). Funny story: My mom used to call the bank I worked at where she had an account. And honestly, you broke an embargo for your own company. Sure but I think its highly unlikely that someone at OPs level would have access to that. 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. Accidents happen inadvertently but this is not the case here. Its understandable youre upset, but I wouldnt have given you a second chance either. Im sorry, what? In the US, sexual harassment wont merit a police response. Leaking information can actually be the right thing in some cases. You kind of glaze over this, OP, but if you spoke in this meeting as you did here then I wonder if thats the real reason for the firing. A breech of confidentiality like that can land you and others in jail. Our newspapers report quite frequently on gossip of whats happening behind the scenes. But you see that now I hope. Feelings can be irrational though, or overblown, or immature, or any number of shades of wrong that means you shouldnt give them 100% credence. Ohhhh come on.
Why Sending Data To Your Personal Email is a Security Risk - Tessian Thats a good friend but you put her in a bad position. 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. It will also help you to not repeat the mistake in the future. Also, its not clear from your response Do you understand how serious what you did was? That was a stressful week for all concerned. Oh, I wish Id seen this before replying. But, its important for an employer to know that you understand the need for reporting and would report things yourself if needed. Draft your UI forms and pre-write your objection to his unemployment on the grounds of "good cause" firing for willful misconduct- Then after all that you can fire him. Weve all made mistakes. I think that is also part of the lesson that OP needs to learn. Then both OP and Coworker could be out of a job. Had OP not made the initial mistake and then compounded it by telling the coworker, shed still be employed.