The terminated employees were allegedly taking more than one online course simultaneously during the company’s “EY Ignite Learning Week” in May.

Fired for multitasking

However, the sacked employees told The Financial Times that their punishment seemed disproportionate to their actions.

According to the employees, they did not realise that they could get terminated for multitasking, especially since they were under the impression that training on digital brands and AI was unimportant, Quartz reported.

One terminated employee also told The Financial Times that the company “breeds a culture of multitasking.”

“If you are forced to bill 45 hours a week and do many more hours of internal work, how can it not?” the employee told the news outlet.