Young Daughter Sees Father Fired In `Day At Work'

MARISA MEANS found "Take Our Daughters to Work Day" confusing. She was all ready to spend the day at her father's workplace when she found they had to leave again. The firm, which had even sent out a reminder that employees were free to bring their children, called the incident "regrettable."

MILFORD, Ohio - Marisa Means hoped to observe her father doing his job last week on Take Our Daughters to Work Day, but the 8-year-old and her father were escorted from the building when he was fired.

Bill Means, 42, a systems-engineering manager for two years at Structural Dynamics Research Corp., had no idea of his fate when he was called in to talk with his supervisor the morning of April 27, said his wife, Daileen Means.

"It was traumatic that day because she was expecting to go in there and work with her dad all day, and then it's like all of a sudden she has to leave and be escorted out two hours after she gets there," Mrs. Means said yesterday from her home in West Chester, Ohio.

Bill Means asked someone to watch his daughter when he left her in his office to go to what he thought would be a meeting with the supervisor, Mrs. Means said.

The daughter then was escorted from the office to be reunited with her father and they were sent home before lunch, Mrs. Means said.

"She was confused. She had packed up her things to take for the day. . . . She had packed her lunch. Then the next thing, they say, `Come on, we've got to get out of here,' " Daileen Means said. "I just thought that was so unbelievable, that they would do that with our daughter there."

Employees had been sent an electronic mail reminder in advance that they were free to bring in their children for the day, said company spokesman Donald Newman.

"The timing of the dismissal of Mr. Means was regrettable," he said.

The company will give Means severance pay and help in finding a new job. Newman declined to discuss any details of Means' severance package.

"I hope that the next time, they'll think twice before they do anything like that," Mrs. Means said.

Her husband was off on a job interview yesterday, she said.

Structural Dynamics makes and sells computer software used worldwide to design manufactured products.

SDRC has been laying off employees and restructuring itself since last fall when the company disclosed deceptive sales accounting and sloppy bookkeeping practices that cost the company millions of dollars.