Respect The Position, Not The Person.

Today on the cutting room floor is an article about a woman who flipped off the president, which got fired from her job. In the article, it was explained that Juli Briskman, was passed by the presidential motorcade while cycling. With her recent concerns with the government, she gave a one-finger salute to the black cars, which was captured by a photographer. The image went viral, and her employer soon found out about the images, asked her to remove the images, and soon, she was promptly fired from her job in Halloween for lack of her "professionalism." 


This turn of events should not be surprising. The company she was working for would have gotten flak if she continued to work in it after disrespecting the president. Instead of it being traced back to an employee of theirs which may have put a bad name on their company, they removed her from the staff to protect the professional nature of their business. It all comes down to keeping their prestige. If the woman did not flip-off the president, she would most likely still have her job. When she gave the one-finger salute to the president's motorcade, she did not only ruin her name, but she tainted the professional nature of the company she worked for. It was lack of respect. Would you have kept her as an employee?

Another important factor is the viral nature of the image. If the photographer never captured the image, maybe she would have still kept her job. However, this is where the importance of knowing about your online presence and how having foresight would have been beneficial. Online, anything posted will forever be there. Able to be freely accessed by everyone. Since this photo went viral, everyone and their grandmother may have stumbled upon it at some point. Everyone would also know who the woman is and what she did. This means that future potential employers may look at this photo and not hire her just because of this one incident. Only if she was careful of her actions, it may have saved her job and the woman's reputation.

Be careful with what you do in the future, as this may happen to you.

As Major Winters said in Band of Brothers: "We salute the rank, not the man."