Yelp's been catching a lot of heat lately from their employees who lament how the corporation treats them and the general populace who tends to rally around such causes.
First it was Talia Jane, the 25-year-old woman who was fired after writing an open letter to Yelp's CEO, saying she couldn't afford to live off what Yelp was paying her.
Then, a few days ago, it was Jaymee Senigalla, a single mother who claims she was fired for asking for three unpaid days off in order to care for her boyfriend in ICU. If that wasn't bad enough, Yelp then proceeded to publicly shame Senigalla, throwing her under the proverbial bus.
Regardless of how you feel about Yelp firing the two women, how they've handled both situations is a PR nightmare.
With Talia Jane, instead of saying they would review their wage policies for their San Francisco employees, Yelp announced that they were planning on growing the Eat24 business in Arizona where costs are cheaper. A wise business tactic, perhaps, but it comes off as cold and heartless as it does nothing to help the poor San Fran workers.
With Jaymee Senigalla, instead of handling the situation with care or taking the high road, Yelp made her employment history public, publicly shaming her and making it that much more difficult for her to get another job and, y'know, take care of her child and injured boyfriend.
The Senigalla tweet is especially disconcerting since Yelp had just recently said it doesn't talk about "personnel issues" with the public. At best this move was poorly thought out and reckless; at worst, it's a twist of the knife from a company that seems to hold serious grudges.
Twitter has responded in kind. Here are just a small sampling of how people are responding:
Yelp is a large corporation. It's a Goliath in both the tech and hospitality industry and is held in high standards by the public. When a Goliath appears to be bullying the Daniels of the world, the torches and pitchforks come out. And in mass.
If your business ever gets flack for an employee termination, keep the reasons private. Lock it away. Take the high road and don't ever talk about the reasons in public. You might really want to, but save the bitching and complaining to friends and family over food and drinks. No good ever comes out of crapping on a current or former employee in the public, especially on social media. You'll just end up with your own crap on your face instead.