[IncRnd]

> I can think of two times in my life where I even considered the possibility that one of my peers would do something malicious on their way out the door, but management worries about this all the time.

Because employers see how some employees act as they depart, even though they don't act similarly around their coworkers. Employers also see trusted employees smile and leave for competitors even after signing that they would not do that. Employers are right to suspect departing employees, because some steal information or otherwise cause issues before they leave.

> So it troubles me a bit how quickly the C Suite prioritizes having a giant switch to lock people out.

I've seen dozens of systems that had to be accounted for when an employee left. Almost all of those systems required separate action to remove the departing employee, plus follow-up checks that sometimes had to be from humans.

It only makes sense to have your employee separation procedure get automated, and during automation it makes sense to communicate with one system instead of communicating with 30 systems that each respond in different ways - some of which require human intervention.

[feoren]

> Employers also see trusted employees smile and leave for competitors even after signing that they would not do that.

Employers who ask their employees to sign immoral and usually illegal non-compete clauses deserve whatever they get, honestly. Employers should expect their employees to go work for competitors when they leave. Where else are they going to go work, but companies with similar operations? An ecology management company fires and ecologist and they clutch their pearls when that ecologist goes and works for another ecology management company, instead of McDonalds!? Gasp! The nerve of that person!

Don't want your employees to go work for a competitor? Don't treat them like shit.

[IncRnd]

> Employers who ask their employees to sign immoral and usually illegal non-compete clauses deserve whatever they get, honestly. Employers should expect their employees to go work for competitors when they leave.

That's my point as to why employers want to immediately stop access to employees who leave for competitors.

> An ecology management company fires and ecologist and they clutch their pearls when that ecologist goes and works for another ecology management company, instead of McDonalds!?

You can word it that way, but what can and does happen is that employees leave and steal confidential processes or information to boost their own value at a competitor. Many people agree with you, until they start their own company and theft happens to them, draining their work straight to a competitor.

[Bellend]

If that was the goal, wouldn't you do that in advance anyway before any suggestion you were bailing?

[thwarted]

Sure, but it doesn't always happen like that.

You're in sales at a company in a highly competitive space and are exited. You're not the kind of person to premeditate taking anything with you, perhaps you left on good terms. You join another company and someone there asks you for the book of business or sales leads you were working on that the previous company. Oh look, your login to the CRM system is still working, and you can get a glimpse of information that you shouldn't have access to as a non-FTE. It seems benign, so you copy down a few phone numbers and email addresses. This isn't an academic example.

This wouldn't even be a possibility if the account was locked down immediately. It's obviously much more difficult to control access to information while you are employed (this is a subplot of Snowcrash, afterall), but immediate lockout isn't meant to mitigate that risk. It's meant to mitigate risks from an account being active that shouldn't be.

[r00fus]

Absolutely not only is immediately removing the terminated employee’s access critical but setting up SSO and auto-provisioning/de-provisioning so straightforward and effortless with many SSO products that it’s essentially malpractice to not do so.

[mhink]

> You can word it that way, but what can and does happen is that employees leave and steal confidential processes or information to boost their own value at a competitor.

I mean, couldn't you make an argument where that's just capitalism at work? If Firm A is going to be competitive, they'll need to compensate their employees well enough that Firm B doesn't have the ability to poach. An employee with a considerable amount of stock in Firm A is gonna think twice before they devalue their shares by running to a competitor.

> Many people agree with you, until they start their own company and theft happens to them, draining their work straight to a competitor.

Again: tough luck.

[phh]

> Because employers see how some employees act as they depart, even though they don't act similarly around their coworkers

It's fun, because in my experience, departing employees are always playing ball, while employer starts doing stupid things.

In France, we have 3 months (!) of resignation notice (and it usually really lasts 2). I've always seen departing colleagues still working the whole notice. However managers start asking stupid things "please prepare demo for this prospect, it should take you one month and a half, so 2 weeks to spare!", "hey we need this feature, you're the only one who can do it, please code it before you leave", but rarely "write documentation for everything you did".

> Employers also see trusted employees smile and leave for competitors even after signing that they would not do that.

What? Such clauses actually exist and are actually used?

In France, such a clause requires (ex)employer to pay at least 50% of salary during the period where the (ex)employee isn't allowed to work for competitors (I can't see how this can be a fair agreement without that compensation), but companies pretty much never enact those clauses, because well, they don't care about employees going to the competition /that/ much

[kelnos]

> What? Such clauses actually exist and are actually used?

Unfortunately it's pretty common in the US, though in some states (like California) such clauses are illegal and unenforceable.

I'm always torn on these sorts of labor requirements/protections. I think anti-compete agreements are gross, but I also wouldn't want to be subject to a mandatory notice period of any kind, let alone 3 months.