[Vermont Lt]

I was a Senior VP at a place. I wasn’t even allowed to clean out my desk. I turned in my laptop at the Corporate office, and was told that anything left in my office would be delivered to me.

It was amicable. And I had seen it before. But damn...it kind of pissed me off.

[sphinx]

One of the worst I ever heard of was a company back home that had decided to pull the plug on a major project. This was highly confidential until the ax dropped. On the day appointed, the project staff were all transported to an off-site meeting, where nice things were said and then they were all fired ... nothing personal, you understand, and we'll give you a package and good references, but this is over. As of now.

The employees were not permitted to return to the office. Personal items were boxed up and delivered, and any necessary discussions with HR took place elsewhere.

I understand that companies need to be concerned about distraught and perhaps vengeful employees. In this day and age, I can certainly understand taking down computer access on the company system without notice; in theory it only takes a few seconds to download X or erase Y. But there are decent and indecent ways of doing things. Most managers aren't jerks, but there are enough jerks around to generate no end of stories.