A recent Alberta Venture article features an interview with Janet Keeping, CBERN participant and President of the Sheldon Chumir Foundation for Ethics in Leadership.  

The Case
A three-year employee of a Tim Hortons franchise in London, Ontario, was caught on a surveillance videotape giving a 16-cent Timbit to a cranky 11-month-old. Two days later the employee, a single mother, was called into the office by three managers, and summarily fired, according to one report, for theft.

When the story went public, a spokesperson for the company apologized and told reporters that the managers who fired her were wrong and that the woman had been re-hired and offered a similar job at another store.

There has to be more to this than meets the eye. More than 350 bloggers posted their strong opinions on a CBC website. Editorials and letters columns of newspapers reverberated with indignation. But some suggested that there had to be other reasons for the firing. In another incident, also involving, as it happens, a Tim Hortons outlet (this time in Toronto), a woman is fighting a court case over being fired for stealing a toonie, which she claims was part of her tip money.

Whatever is really behind these stories, is it OK to resort to a technicality to fire an unwanted employee? Or is there a burden of honesty in providing reasons for dismissal?

The Panel
KEN CHAPMAN: a lawyer, principal in Cambridge Strategies Inc., a public policy consulting firm, and blogger | JANET KEEPING: a lawyer and president of the Sheldon Chumir Foundation for Ethics in Leadership | DR. ALEX MCPHERSON: former president and chief executive officer of Biomira Inc.

Access the Article here

CBERN Links
Organizations - Sheldon Chumir Foundation for Ethics in Leadership
People - Janet Keeping