A former manager asked the speaker to write a favorable letter for a labor-court case. The speaker explains why you should refuse: legal risk, court involvement, and career damage in a small world. Offer support instead, but don't sign your name to someone else's fight.
Hello, friends. I'm here for a quick video. Someone left me a message on WhatsApp and he told me the I was working for a company that I left. And then my manager, a manager with whom I didn't get along very well, gave me a bad job. At the time, he didn't like me, he didn't make my life easy. And today he contacted me. He was all honey like that. And he said this to me. Do you remember your colleague? So and so, the one that no one got along with? Well, he's taking us to the labor court. So I'm taking the liberty of contacting you today to ask you for a favor. Could you write us a letter? Just to say that you had a good experience within the company, that everything was fine, that you were never harassed, for example. That could help us in court. Well, I'm shocked. I'm shocked. I'm thinking to myself, these people dare to do things. It's unbelievable. They have this ability to dare. There are lots of things that I don't dare to do. I have some sort of internal inhibitions. I have some sort of limits to what I can ask of people. But there are some. I'm really impressed by their ability to ask for things. The answer is, of course, no, you shouldn't do that to them. Letter no. So either you want to be unpleasant, which is what I generally advise you to do. No, no, no, I don't advise you to be unpleasant. If you want to be unpleasant, you say. You wait for him to finish, you say, no, no, what? No, no, I'm not writing the letter. No, thank you, and don't call that number anymore. You can do that if you want. Now, if you don't want to go that far, you say something like, yes, it's sad. It doesn't cost anything. It's sad that it got so bad that it ended up in front of the Industrial Tribunal and everything. I'm really sorry about this situation. I mean, it doesn't mean anything. I'm sorry about this situation. You. You're sorry for them, you're sorry for the colleague, you're sorry for y. Really. But there you have it. I'm sorry about this situation. On the other hand, as you can understand, these are extremely unpleasant situations. Okay, something like that. And then generally in my career, I stay out of this kind of thing. So as much as I can understand, unfortunately, I am not in a position to write such a letter. That's it. Period. That's all. No, you shouldn't do it. Same. So you're going to tell me, I'll cross it out. If it's the colleague. That wasn't the case in this question. But let's imagine I pretend that it's the former colleague who contacts me and says, do you remember that manager? He was a jerk and all that. Don't you want to help me? Should I file a complaint against them with the Labor Court? Help me with a letter or a statement. The answer is no. No, don't do it. I want to stay out of it, you know, I have a family to support. You wanted to buy it. I wanted to buy it like that. I have a family to support. You know, we only have one career. The world is small, all that. As for me, I support you morally. Nothing. I support you morally. Right. But I'm not in a position to write a letter right now. When I retire, I will do it, but not now. Why? Because quite simply, you know, colleagues, honestly, when you have problems of this nature, they tell you to go away. They tell you to go away. No one will do that for you. You have to stop being too generous at work. You have to stop doing things that no one else will do for you. So it's a no. Especially since if the story is poisonous beyond the industrial tribunals. Because you have to know that, well, there are industrial tribunals, but there are other things. There is also justice, there are also courts, there is the police. If ever the story, for example, turns sour, and we are talking at some point about discrimination, things like that, what do you do? Do you want to be involved? Do you want to find yourself one morning in a court of law, testifying? Do you want to find yourself in front of the police, this time with someone typing like that, with two fingers? And you, who is repeating for the fifth time what you saw. No, you don't want that. So in general, I tell you 1. Stay out of these stories. There's absolutely nothing to gain. Don't play the night, don't take not stories of honor. Don't defend the widow and the orphan. Get out of these stories. Stay away. Stay out of these stories. And let them eat each other. Thank you, my friends, for listening to this video. I'll remind you once again of my book Toxic, which talks about what career coaches don't tell you. Honestly. Honestly. Just this morning I was listening to a career Coach talking on YouTube. I couldn't believe it. Honestly, I couldn't believe it. She spoke with a smile, explaining that you have to work, that you have to give value to your employer, that you have to Give your all to do a perfect job and all that to get promoted. But is she dreaming or what? Is she dreaming? What world does she live in? I mean, these career coaches talk about an idealized company that only exists in their mythology. It's a company that must exist in the mythology of the world of coaching. In reality, it doesn't exist. At no point does it say, for example, make sure you belong to the right clique. Make sure you're singing the right praises. Make sure you keep quiet when you need to keep quiet. Make sure you don't offend people's sensibilities, even if it means letting multimillion dollar projects go to the wall. She doesn't tell you that even though this is reality, this is true. This is real life. Do you know what I mean? Something else do you want to talk about? Toxic Translated into English. I'll show you. This is the only copy that exists on Earth right now. It'll be available in a few days. It'll be available on Amazon in English in a few days. And so it starts again. I would say that it's 98% the same thing. Hey. This is a translation with some passages rewritten in the sense that culturally it would not have been understood by English speakers because some passages are really deeply rooted in the French language and would not have been fully understood by an American or a British Australian reading them. So some sentences or references have either been cut out or changed to others that they can better understand. That's it, my friends. So thank you for your support. And please note, no labor court letters, no testimony for or against anything. And I'll see you in a future video. See you soon.
