I don't want to get too far into the specifics of confidential personnel matters, but I'll say it shouldn't have blindsided her, but I think (and she stated) th

I don't want to get too far into the specifics of confidential personnel matters, but I'll say it shouldn't have blindsided her, but I think (and she stated) that it did. You can only do so much for some people. I'll also say that for all the politically-correct management platitudes that people like to throw around like "if someone gets fired, it's always the boss that failed" or "your employee should always know what's coming", real life is frequently somewhat more complex. I completely agree with the principles behind these populist quips, but like most things in the real world, there are imperfections -- mitigating factors -- that can make the application of the principles complex. These are generalizations, and they're good generally, but they're not good all the time. I've also been able to maintain good relationships across employment status changes, fwiw. I've hired back people I've fired before and maintain a good rapport with most employees I've had to dismiss. I'm in an engagement now with someone who I've hired myself, been hired by, quit on, and been fired by (remotely, for a gig he didn't hire me for) and we've been able to remain friends through all of that, so I don't think it's a generalized issue with my conception around employment relationships. EDIT: Also, even if people know a termination is coming somewhere along the line, it's easy to forget and they often will have an adverse reaction when it actually comes down. I don't think "employee is so naive they think they'll be kept around after X Y and Z" is the only situation where this kind of consideration is appropriate. I guess we'll just have to agree to disagree; we place fundamentally different values on "looking someone in the eye" (maybe because I've done so much telecommute stuff that I don't see this as the MO for "big decision" discussions, at least not with reference to employment). It simply isn't an important independent principle for me, and I try to consider what will make the employee most comfortable, within reason.