Work smarter, not harder

If you've ever pulled an overtime shift, you know the psychological warfare that goes on throughout every step of that OT journey. Once you pass hour 8 of your work day, your concept of time starts to warp, turning your workplace into an inescapable purgatory in which you're trapped until your next 15-minute break. For the nurse in our next tale, her accidental overtime shift turned into a nightmare after her relief no-showed...

Time and a half… These are the magic words that make any hustler consider working a little overtime. Nobody wants to work OT if there's no reward. Our 40-hour work week is plenty of time on the clock, so anyone who's contemplating picking up a few extra hours on top of that is looking for s significant payout for their time. We work extra hours so we can get extra pay.

Employees do the work, while bosses do… what exactly? When it comes to daily operations in your workplace, there's nobody who knows stuff quite like you do. After countless hours watching the time click by on the dated analog clock in the corner, employees are specifically trained to know every detail about their office space.

Some companies' policies don't allow overtime, as paying minimum wage employees a slightly more humane salary is just not in their budget. Despite this, managers can overrule this when holidays arrive and they are in dire need of help. In this case, OP was working at a retail store; unsurprisingly, this was the type of company that paid its employees little but expected a lot. The holidays were fast approaching, and management knew that they were way behind, thus they would need many hands on d…