What would you have done?

[burpatricia]

I want to thank everyone for their points on this subject both the negative and the positive. I thought very hard about my decisions. And in a small company of under 10 and we are in two different states it makes email and instant messaging the primary communication methods.

The part that upset me about what this person did was this: The monitoring of email is YES reading it and handling what can be dealt with and making notes, etc for what could not be handled. HOWEVER, in saying that our email system is NOT set up to open emails into a display box you have to double click them - and second the paystub issue - those emails are sent with a PDF format - there fore it was not like someone accidently read an email when they double clicked it - she had to double click the emai and then download the pdf file and then open it - all actions at any point she could have stopped.

Finally, I am not at all ashamed or uncomfortable with my decision - and I knew when I spoke up that she ran the risk of being fired. I had to make a judgement call on my ethics and my job as the description for which I was hired to do - AND I did that.

I am also thankful that there is a place here that I can get feedback of all kinds back that is what this whole post was for - so see what others would have done - but at the end of the day I can sleep with this and I would do it again if someone breeched company policy and then stated it to me - ultimately putting myself and my position with the company at risk.

In conclusion, I am proud of myself for making the right choice even though I knew the end result could cause discomfort and someone losing their job because of their own actions. She was infact fired - and after from what I was told - "begging" for her job back - she was allowed to stay on a probationary period and under very strict guidelines. As far as our "friendship" outside of work even though we are 3000 miles apart - I lost it as I knew I would - and it is true if she was a friend to begin with she would NOT have put me in that position. As far as our work relationship - again relying mostly on text messages and emails it is ok.  Thank you all again for all your comments and points of view. I will take everything all have said as a learning experience and keep it with me so in the future at any company if this situation ever comes my way I can stop and think again what I would do . . . . . the same thing.