"alleges Seagate knew that the position for which he was hired did not actually exist, but falsely represented that it did so in order to use Vaidyanathan’s credentials to better market one of its divisions to be sold to another company"
Wow. This happened to me once, many years ago. Never thought of suing over it, but I am still angry about it. I'd prefer not to get into all the details or name names, but I had published some papers in a specialized hot domain that was highly mathematical, and owned some modest but important IP. This company hired me, and then trotted me out in meetings with suitably impressed clients to get three multi-million dollar contracts. Once they had the contracts, they dismissed me. They also tried to steal my IP despite our licensing agreement, but that's another matter. They are now out of business, but they did so by leveraging the existence of the development contracts to flip the company to a bigger company that didn't realize it was buying a pig in a poke. The three owners of the privately held company were sociopaths who then took off with the acquisition money.
So details are a little different, but basic idea is I got shafted in the same way as that guy. I was hired only to be a prop in a scam where my existence as an employee was only used to screw over clients for money as part of a larger scam to sell off a company to another company for profit and pocket the money.
It's very cool that Minnesota has a law prohibiting lying to people to get them to come work for you. I wasn't in Minnesota and am fairly sure that I wouldn't have had any case even if it had occurred to sue over this specific aspect of it.
>a law prohibiting lying to people to get them to come work for you //
Isn't fraud a general prohibition in most legal jurisdictions? Why would it matter that the company personnel committing the fraud were doing so in the arena of employment as opposed to sales or whatever?
If I had a dollar for every time someone wanted to "hire" me just to be able to qualify for a given government contract, I'd be a millionaire.
No, not really, but I'd have a meal at one of the ludicrously expensive restaurants down the street from my office.
Many times, when I said that I didn't have the time for a freelance job, they even told me I wouldn't have to actually work. All they needed was to present my name so they would qualify. I wouldn't even be required to be present at client meetings.
Of course I refused.
OTOH, had I accepted, I could possibly be a millionaire. Either that or be in jail. ;-)
I know you prefer not to name names, but I think it would benefit a lot of people to be on the lookout for the three owners of that company.
I'm sure there is someone out there, who would create a new throwaway account and reply to this comment, who had a similar experience with the same company, and who would name the company and owner names.
Just drives home the point that you have to do your research before joining a new company, I'm not criticizing you at all, by the way, its just the more I have thought about software businesses the more I have realized how people can be used in this sort of fashion. I've gotten myself into an untenable situation before with a startup where I felt misled, for me, however I was able to quickly move on and I didn't have any IP that was exploited, so it wasn't that big a deal.
Normally I find a lot of these lawsuits frivolous, but on the surface this sounds completely legitimate.
It's obvious he wasn't just another engineer, but rather someone with very specific skills and credentials such that his employment caused other parties to enter into business, sign a contract, etc.
Coupled with the fact that this wasn't a simple decision for the guy and his family (up and move from Texas to Minnesnowda), Seagate obviously made some short-term decisions that were quite underhanded.
Makes one wonder -- what was a reasonable threshold time that Seagate needed to employ the engineer before this lawsuit didn't have merit?
I'm not sure that a simple "months on the job" threshold is sufficient to decide wrongdoing here. From what the article says, it seems like Seagate misrepresented the position to the engineer. Given that, I think a better standard would be to look at the job listing and the communication that Seagate had with Mr. Vaidyanathan, then compare that with what he was asked to do.
Great for Vaidyanathan and all, but what I really dislike about this article is this "wrongful hire" neologism. Seagate committed fraud, and calling it "wrongful hire" makes it sound so much weaker. And maybe I'm just paranoid, but the author of the piece definitely operates on the employer's side of these relationships (read his bio), so half of me wonders if this is intentional.
I agree and think it was intentional. It won't be long before politicians are mocking "Companies have even been successfully sued for wrongfully hiring someone." as a pretext for cutting employee protection laws.
FTA "Vaidyanathan alleged that Seagate
knew that the position for which he was hired did not actually exist, but falsely represented that it did so
in order to use Vaidyanathan’s credentials to better market one of its divisions to be sold to another
company."
I wonder why his employment didn't transfer to the acquiring company if Vaidyanathan was so important to the success of the division being sold.
Something similar happened to me during the dotcom era. I was poached from a very nice job at an airline by someone I did work for on the side who always paid well. The salary he offered me was about 20% higher, plus he offered a massive cash payout over the first few months. I quit my job and joined this company, only to find out that the cash was based on his businesses selling a lot of equity to a large company, and I was part of the deal. The deal fell through as I joined, probably because it became apparent to the investor that the guy was a crook. I was paid a third of my salary for several months and left with a lot of debt. I really should have sued when I was back on my feet again, but I didn't really want to deal with this guy any more.
The intention of this law is good for employee in spirit but I wonder if companies will now be reluctant to have clear career paths in fear of a lawsuit.
In this case they wanted a "big fish" type of engineer, they have to compete to get this type of employee because the guy has weight in the industry. I don't see how a company can not present a clear, desirable path to a prospective employee of this status and still expect to attract "high caliber" (whether perceived or real) talent.
IANAL, but "bait and switch" is usually a specific thing; for instance, in Illinois, it's covered by the Illinois Consumer Fraud statutes. The general concept of "baiting and switching" is not automatically considered "fraud".
To win a fraud case, this person would need to cite specific material false statements provided by Seagate, and then additionally establish through a preponderance of evidence that those misstatements were made knowingly with the intent to trick him. Since they actually gave the guy a job and paid him for 9 months, that could end up being hard to do.
Note also that this cuts both ways. You probably don't want every business to find itself in the situation of having to fend off fraud claims any time it dismisses someone after less than a year's employment, or being in the situation of not being able to terminate someone for performance after having relied on that person in a sales process somewhere.
That doesn't make much sense....they offered him a job with a salary and he got there and was given a job with a salary. Not like he got there and they had a car with a sandwich waiting for him and a note that says "Sorry :(".
Bottom line, bait and switch is a consumer law not employment law.
[+] [-] droithomme|14 years ago|reply
Wow. This happened to me once, many years ago. Never thought of suing over it, but I am still angry about it. I'd prefer not to get into all the details or name names, but I had published some papers in a specialized hot domain that was highly mathematical, and owned some modest but important IP. This company hired me, and then trotted me out in meetings with suitably impressed clients to get three multi-million dollar contracts. Once they had the contracts, they dismissed me. They also tried to steal my IP despite our licensing agreement, but that's another matter. They are now out of business, but they did so by leveraging the existence of the development contracts to flip the company to a bigger company that didn't realize it was buying a pig in a poke. The three owners of the privately held company were sociopaths who then took off with the acquisition money.
So details are a little different, but basic idea is I got shafted in the same way as that guy. I was hired only to be a prop in a scam where my existence as an employee was only used to screw over clients for money as part of a larger scam to sell off a company to another company for profit and pocket the money.
It's very cool that Minnesota has a law prohibiting lying to people to get them to come work for you. I wasn't in Minnesota and am fairly sure that I wouldn't have had any case even if it had occurred to sue over this specific aspect of it.
[+] [-] pbhjpbhj|14 years ago|reply
Isn't fraud a general prohibition in most legal jurisdictions? Why would it matter that the company personnel committing the fraud were doing so in the arena of employment as opposed to sales or whatever?
[+] [-] rbanffy|14 years ago|reply
No, not really, but I'd have a meal at one of the ludicrously expensive restaurants down the street from my office.
Many times, when I said that I didn't have the time for a freelance job, they even told me I wouldn't have to actually work. All they needed was to present my name so they would qualify. I wouldn't even be required to be present at client meetings.
Of course I refused.
OTOH, had I accepted, I could possibly be a millionaire. Either that or be in jail. ;-)
[+] [-] daenz|14 years ago|reply
I'm sure there is someone out there, who would create a new throwaway account and reply to this comment, who had a similar experience with the same company, and who would name the company and owner names.
[+] [-] devs1010|14 years ago|reply
[+] [-] LearnYouALisp|14 years ago|reply
http://dilbert.com/strips/comic/2011-12-24
[+] [-] jroseattle|14 years ago|reply
It's obvious he wasn't just another engineer, but rather someone with very specific skills and credentials such that his employment caused other parties to enter into business, sign a contract, etc.
Coupled with the fact that this wasn't a simple decision for the guy and his family (up and move from Texas to Minnesnowda), Seagate obviously made some short-term decisions that were quite underhanded.
Makes one wonder -- what was a reasonable threshold time that Seagate needed to employ the engineer before this lawsuit didn't have merit?
[+] [-] quanticle|14 years ago|reply
[+] [-] bmm6o|14 years ago|reply
[+] [-] forgotAgain|14 years ago|reply
[+] [-] mikeash|14 years ago|reply
[+] [-] rboyd|14 years ago|reply
I wonder why his employment didn't transfer to the acquiring company if Vaidyanathan was so important to the success of the division being sold.
[+] [-] angus77|14 years ago|reply
[+] [-] kokey|14 years ago|reply
[+] [-] ck2|14 years ago|reply
I wonder if he will even see $1 of that award though and how many years later.
[+] [-] GBond|14 years ago|reply
[+] [-] devs1010|14 years ago|reply
[+] [-] tomjen3|14 years ago|reply
[+] [-] tptacek|14 years ago|reply
To win a fraud case, this person would need to cite specific material false statements provided by Seagate, and then additionally establish through a preponderance of evidence that those misstatements were made knowingly with the intent to trick him. Since they actually gave the guy a job and paid him for 9 months, that could end up being hard to do.
Note also that this cuts both ways. You probably don't want every business to find itself in the situation of having to fend off fraud claims any time it dismisses someone after less than a year's employment, or being in the situation of not being able to terminate someone for performance after having relied on that person in a sales process somewhere.
[+] [-] jetti|14 years ago|reply
That doesn't make much sense....they offered him a job with a salary and he got there and was given a job with a salary. Not like he got there and they had a car with a sandwich waiting for him and a note that says "Sorry :(".
Bottom line, bait and switch is a consumer law not employment law.
[+] [-] mfringel|14 years ago|reply
[+] [-] unknown|14 years ago|reply
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