When asked why you were fired, being able to say "I was asked to do something illegal or unethical" is a strong response. That certainly helps with the "find a new job" part.
I'd suggest you drop the "or unethical" part if you're actually going to actually use this. The law is a fair amount more objective (still lots of subjectivity but it's not perceived to be as subjective) whereas personal ethical standards are extremely subjective (and perceived that way). Many companies see the former as 'I don't want to break the law and go to jail' and the latter as 'I get to impose my personal standard of ethics on all my bosses and the entire company and if they don't like it I'll throw a fit and quit in the middle of a critical project while accusing them of being monsters.' If you can add the word repeatedly, it might help. It suggests you wouldn't do something illegal but wouldn't quit if someone asked you once (possibly by mistake not knowing it was illegal) but if you get asked again after you clarified it was illegal and you wouldn't do it and they wanted you to do it anyway that leads to you quitting.
It actually does not help to say this answer, it would go over badly in 95% of interviews no matter how egregious the unethical request. The interviewer typically questions if you're being truthful and if they will be accused of the same in the future. When I worked as an agent, we generally coached people to state one of the other reasons they quit or were fired and if ever asked the interview question "Have you ever been asked to do something illegal or unethical?" to just answer "No."
The only time you're allowed to mention this is when it becomes easily verifiable in something like a newspaper. I actually have personal experience in one of my jobs where the owners very casually asked me to do some unethical things and then shrugged it off. At the time I highly suspected I was fired because of it, but had no evidence. So for years at interviews when asked why I was fired, my answer was "Nepotism," which is true because they replaced me with an incompetent relative. The FTC shut them down 5 years after I was fired. I only mention it if the employer tries to verify past employment and asks why the phone number doesn't work.
I would tend to agree with this. Many top managers want people who will do dirty work for them if told to, especially in the usual case where they themselves are at little risk from prosecution themselves. Particularly in certain fields like finance, a strong sense of morality or ethics would be perceived as a serious liability.
> Particularly in certain fields like finance, a strong sense of morality or ethics would be perceived as a serious liability.
I read an article which claimed that if you want a job as a car salesperson, you should make it clear that the reason you want the job is that you want to make the most money you can, not that you have a passion for cars. Don't know how true this assertion is but the rest of the article seems to corroborate. There were anecdotes which mentioned the dealership getting a decent kickback from the manufacturer for selling say 80 cars (and the prospect of getting nothing for selling 79) which could mean the difference between the dealership being in the red versus being in the black. Given these constraints, you don't want to hire someone who does the right thing and turns away prospective customers based on what is in the customer's best interest. I can imagine similar pressure to bank tellers at places like Wells Fargo (whose ex CEO should be in prison btw)
On the other hand, you could always respond by saying: I expect not to be asked to do something illegal; I have no interest in working for such a company. However, I have high expectations of you, and that's why I believe I can be fully loyal to you.
Could? sure. Should you expect it? If so, then the industry you work in is systemically corrupt.
I and a co-interviewer recently voted "strong yes" for a candidate partly on the basis of hearing that he took a hard line against giving his CEO access to the text of conversations on a messaging platform.
"I am absolutely going to be loyal to Corpco and its best interests. If I am so much as arrested for my work, regardless of how the trial goes, I can't work for Corpco. If I do something that causes an investigation into Corpco, I will be hurting the company. I left Donoevil because I saw that if I stayed, it would be bad for the company, and I didn't want to be part of that - I wouldn't be showing the loyalty I promised the company. I'm proud of my decision and I wish all the best success to Donoevil."
