Mahindra Group's executive chairman Anand Mahindra has apologised for the way an employee was fired from the organisation. The apology comes after the unnamed employee was reportedly asked to leave with immediate effect and his recorded conversation with the HR representative went viral online.
"I want to add my personal apology. Our core value is to preserve the dignity of the individual & we'll ensure this does not happen in future," Mahindra tweeted, along with an CEO CP Gurnani's apology, which said: "I deeply regret the way the HR rep & employee discussion was done. We have taken the right steps to ensure it doesn't repeat in the future."
The HR representative reportedly asked the employee to resign by 10 am the next day and said that the layoff was a part of the company's restructuring plan. Even though the employee requested the representative to give him some more time, the HR told him that he needed to leave with immediate effect and cited the condition in the employment contract, which says that the employer can ask an employee to leave with immediate effect.
"Cost optimization is happening at the company and your name is part of that list. If you can put in papers we will be treating it as a normal exit with June 15 as last working day. If not, we will be sending you a termination letter and don't expect anything from the company including an experience letter or basic salary," the Times of India quoted the HR representative as saying on the call.
The IT giant, which is India's fifth largest IT services provider, also later apologised for the fiasco and Vineet Nayyar, vice-chairman, Tech Mahindra, said in a statement that necessary steps have been taken to resolve the matter and he regrets the way things transpired.
It was earlier reported that Tech Mahindra was set to sack about 1,500 employees for poor performance. "We have a process of weeding out bottom performers every year and this year is no different," the company had then told TOI.
I want to add my personal apology. Our core value is to preserve the dignity of the individual & we'll ensure this does not happen in future https://t.co/yBxAxvFZlc
— anand mahindra (@anandmahindra) July 7, 2017
Though the company has said that the layoff would be on the basis of the appraisal and the employees' performance in the past years, it did not reveal whether the decision will affect workers across the board or only at certain levels.
