I don't work here, lady!

‘Tis the season to receive an underwhelming Christmas bonus from your out-of-touch employer! Sometimes, it’s a basket of stale cookies. Sometimes, it's a water bottle with the company logo on it that you can't even put in the dishwasher. And sometimes, it's a $25 gift card to the AMC movie theater near you, which for this employee , was a full 1.5 hours away and in an entirely other state. First of all, anyone who knows anything about the state of moviegoing today would implicitly understand th…

I always feel like somebody's watching me

It's the time of year to get disappointed by your employers when they fail to give you the Christmas bonus you most likely rightfully deserve. There is nothing like the month of December to feel simultaneously grateful and jaded. On the one hand, you're planning to spend time with loved ones, which in and of itself requires figuring out logistics, purchasing gifts, and negotiating difficult personalities. On the other hand, you're looking forward to some much-needed time off work, which in and…

If you've ever seen even one episode of the show Succession, you must have wondered if rich people really do act this way, and if they truly are so detached from the reality of the plain old regular life. To be fair, I am sure some nice billionaires don't allow their money to go up to their heads, but most probably do get numb to other people, and to everyday problems their money easily solves for them. But can we really blame them for it? Well, yes, we surely can. Rich people who completely fo…

Some bosses call emergency meetings because of a work crisis, some schedule one-on-ones to discuss important matters, and others just want to start some drama. In theory, folks on the internet would align their sensibilities with this toxic employer, but in practice, no one wants their boss sewing seeds of doubt in your brain. That's exactly what this boss did to a manager who had been working for just three weeks and was buried in tasks and responsibilities. On top of this very difficult trans…

Let's talk about mandatory, after-hours work events. We all have mixed feelings about them. On one hand, we spend a minimum of 8 hours with the same people at the office, if we're lucky enough, we actually see them as friends, but more often than not, they are simply colleagues. Sure, they might be nice people, but we have no desire to see them after we clock out of the job . Being forced to spend more time with them at another location, is not something many of us appreciate. Once we clock out…

A good manager keeps their word. This applies to all aspects of management, whether it's expectations and responsibilities for employees or respecting employees' rights and boundaries. Here, we have a coordinator at an airline service provider who wanted to take off work for the Holidays and had been saving up his PTO to finally use in December. He followed standard protocol, put in his request months in advance, and that request was rightfully accepted. Flash forward, of course, to December it…

Sometimes, the only way to properly explain yourself to your micromanaging employer is by sticking to your principles. This employee had actively been trying to gain management experience over the years but was repeatedly denied the opportunity, which already left them feeling undervalued, under-appreciated, and underpaid. Matters were made worse after the employee , who was working checkout at the store, noticed an error when scanning a customer's item. They replaced the item with something si…

Experience vs. Education

How's that for security?

Sometimes, the only way to prove that you're a valuable employee is by showing and not telling. After all, most folks need to see things to believe them, and this employee had spent the better part of the last five years at their company automating systems so that tasks were far easier to complete for everyone involved, including their technologically challenged coworkers. However, clearly, their value was underseen, unnoticed, and not reflected in their salary. After an office Karen decided th…

When you are looking for a new job opportunity, everything seems so high stakes, and every small stumble can end up with you losing your one big chance. It mostly feels like you can never make a mistake because hiring managers usually need to sift through hundreds of candidates, so they wouldn't mind letting go of someone even for the smallest of things. However, it is one thing to lose a job prospect because of a mistake you made, it is entirely different to lose it because of a mistake of som…

Part of every job, no matter what field, is to take part in something companies like to call ‘team building’. It might sound incredibly silly to some people, and it is quite time-consuming, but companies absolutely love to find ways to make the team ‘bond’ and explore skills they would never use on a daily basis. I am a competitive person, and there is something about those team-building exercises that makes me thrive, especially if it involves puzzles and riddles. I enjoy taking charge and lea…

Communication, communication, communication

Sometimes, there is only so much poor treatment one can take. It is an unfortunate reality that in certain workplace environments, employees have to expect a certain level of vigilance from management that can, at times, border on micromanaging or even callous. However, the greatest indicator that a workplace is run by decent folks is how they treat their employees when they are going through hardship and need support. In this instance, we have an employee who was in the midst of a health scare…