I've worked for this company for three and a half years, been there through all sorts of hirings and firings, booms and busts, you name it. Despite being underpaid, I've stuck around because management was great, and I loved the work I did.
Then came the investors... The company was bought out by a holding company that owned dozens of other similar businesses. We were promised that nothing would change, and this would only provide better career opportunities and incentives 🙄. Of course, it wasn't long after that that they started changing everything. "Streamlining" and "optimizing". I saw the red flags and started looking.
Fast forward to this month. I finally heard back from a great company, progressed through the interviews quickly, and received a job offer. Great benefits, almost a 10% increase on my current salary, nothing but green flags, and the company even has 4.8 stars on Glassdoor. Start date is two weeks out (they specifically stated they did this out of respect for my current employer, so I have time to give notice and wrap things up). Of course I accepted the offer.
Now here was the dilemma: since all of the changes had been implemented, employees have been treated more as replaceable resources, and much less like people. I heavily debated whether I should even give notice, or just wrap things up and walk out the door. After a couple hours of thought, I came to the conclusion that I should "take the high road" and "do the right thing", so I pinged my boss and asked for a quick chat. He agreed, and we jumped on a call. I told him that I had received an offer, and that I was likely going to take it, and that I would likely be sending my two weeks notice to HR, and just wanted to tell him first. He looked upset for a second, then responded with "you can go ahead and just go home. There's no point in keeping you on for those two weeks". Sure enough, HR had processed my termination within a couple of hours. Even better, HR is refusing to pay out any PTO, and will not pay for the remainder of the notice period.
I'm just blown away that a company that claims to care so much about their employees and put "people first" would act like that in response to two weeks notice. Lesson learned I guess...
TL:DR Gave my two weeks notice, got canned on the spot, and no pay for the remaining two weeks.