The recruitment and selection process is complete, and a new employee has been hired successfully by the library. That person has filled out the I-9 forms and reported on time for the first day of work. Now begins the employment relationship between the library and the new employee, a relationship that will invariably end in termination, either voluntary or involuntary.
It may seem incongruous, having just selected a new employee, to be thinking about termination. But it is an important part of the employer- employee relationship and an important aspect of establishing the employment arrangement. There are essentially two types of employment arrangements: contractual and at-will. In the case of contractual employees, the rights of both parties to terminate are quite clear. Those rights are spelled out in the contract and by the policies of the institution. In the case of at-will employees, however, the extent to which employers are free to dismiss employees and the rights of those dismissed employees have not been established in any final sense by the U.S. legal system.