In a bizarre workplace mishap that divided the internet, an employee revealed that their company’s HR department had mistakenly sent a “termination notice” to all employees – including the CEO.
The incident came to light after a Reddit a user wrote about it in the platform’s popular thread r/Wellthatsucks. According to the post, the HR team was testing a new offboarding automation tool designed to send exit emails to departing employees. However, someone allegedly forgot to switch it from “test mode” to “live mode”.
Result? About 300 employees — including senior management — received an email that began with the words: “Your last day of work is effective immediately.”
Within minutes, chaos erupted across internal communication channels. “Slack has gone nuclear,” the employee wrote, adding that one manager even asked, “Should I start packing?”
Finally, the IT department had to step in to control the panic and send out an urgent message in all caps: “NO ONE IS LETTING GO. PLEASE DO NOT RETURN BADGES.”
The post quickly went viral, garnering over 40,000 upvotes and hundreds of amused comments. Many users shared their own experiences with mistakes in the workplace, while others found humor in the HR team’s predicament.
The user wrote: “The guy who just showed it said, ‘damn good, I must have been fired.’
Another user wrote: “Honestly, I’ve worked some jobs where my energy was like, ‘If you’re really stupid enough to fire me, I don’t want to work for you anyway’. I’ve had a few jobs where I’d just thumbs up this message and then start packing shit.”
One user summed up the sentiment perfectly: “Any company that needs a mass termination tool is doomed.”
“Yeah – that’s incredibly destabilizing. They’re testing software to automate layoffs,” echoed a fourth.
“No one is fired, I repeat, no one is fired. Except you, Bob, come see me in my office,” a fifth user joked.
