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Comment by neilv | Hacker News Reader

The big mistake here was editing an engineering statement to say something false.

If you're an honest person, assume that your job under that director (and probably at the company entirely) was over as soon as they asked you to make a fraudulent engineering statement. Even if they backpedaled when you resisted, you're not a team player with them, and you're a threat to someone very dishonest.

At that point, options:

* just leave;

* consult a labor attorney (you can get a free initial consultation); or

* go above the director's head, probably (in a small company) to the owner/CEO, whatever attorney is on staff or they retain, or HR (though, you're still probably over at the company, even though they'll diplomatically pretend that you're not, because you are in 100% corporate butt-covering territory now, in a place that puts someone very dishonest as a director).

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> though, you're still probably over at the company, even though they'll diplomatically pretend that you're not

If you're professional about it (be factual, straightforward, and don't do a burn-the-world email blast), I wouldn't assume this to be true. Sometimes companies simply make bad high-level hires and are happy about exposing and terminating them.

Or sometimes not. But the vast majority of CEOs want to know when their direct reports are lying to them and would be happy about this outreach.

I've heard of that happening. An engineer somehow realized that top leadership wasn't getting an accurate story about the state of a bet-the-company engineering project, so the engineer went over the head of the VP (I don't know to whom). Turned out that upper leadership felt the VP had been lying to the board. Presumably because of where that left the business, the majority of employees were hit by a series of layoffs, but the engineer who'd blown the whistle to execs was still there, one of the last people, presumably very trusted/favored.

Though I've heard a lot more stories of the little people being considered disposable, and occasionally kill-the-messenger. :)

How do you even TRUST the leadership and that point?

I've been in this situation before, and the ideas in my head are basically paranoia. How do I trust that my manager isn't going to throw me under the bus in the next project? How would I EVEN KNOW?

Check his 2nd question on this site. https://workplace.stackexchange.com/questions/183956/what-is...

This shows even more worrying imbecils as his managers. He should leave now!

Yes, he should not have made the change. Period. It’s pretty simple.

Don’t write things that are not true.

One thing that I would just highlight with your options: be extra sure to save receipts for everything - that means screenshots, even with an external camera if you're worried about corporate spyware.

If you have everything well-documented, the likeliest outcomes look pretty good for you:

1. If you bring up the issue to HR or to a higher-level exec and they are competent, they will immediately either address the problem with the director or fire them for cause.

2. If you bring up the issue and they are shitty and try to fire you, it's honestly like free money for you if you have good evidence. If they're not complete idiots they'll settle in a heartbeat because their number one priority will be damage control.

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