There's always a bigger fish… No matter how big or small you are, you can almost take solace in the fact that there's always going to be someone bigger or better than you at something and will soon come to take your place. This is a real worry to the big fish out there who are desperate to maintain their status as top dogfish. In this way, sometimes being the smallest fish is beneficial because all the other fish are so much larger than you that they consider you to not be a threat or even wort…

"Cause and effect" or "action and reaction" is typically a predictable concept—bounce a ball on the ground at your feet, and you'd expect it to come flying straight back at your face. Still, when the factor of human perception motivations is included, you can end up with some interesting reactions that you might not have considered. Take for instance, this worker who injured themself during their lunch break while working from home, leading to their boss's ending of their workplace's flexible w…

Doesn't work like that, lady

Match their energy

If you’ve ever worked a job where your work site was off-site, then you know exactly how this goes. It’s not unusual for some superior, probably your boss’s boss or boss’s boss’s boss, to make important decisions about the manner of your work and instate policy that makes very little sense in the reality of your working conditions. Almost always, they're sitting behind a desk in a city a long way away and entirely disconnected from the reality—even the context—of your job. The problem is that t…

If you've ever worked in retail, you've probably fantasized about telling off a customer.

The last 50 years have brought an unprecedented amount of technology and reform to the way we do business. Those writing Science Fiction around that time might have predicted that we'd either be living in a utopia where we no longer needed to work to live or we'd be living in a dystopian world where few oligarchs, like the fictional Eldon Tyrell, hoarded wealth from the masses like dragons sitting on a pile of gold, while many struggled just to survive in a world of decaying infrastructure amid…

Management doesn't always make the best decisions for their team. Next up, read about some outrageous HOA rules that'll make you roll your eyes, like one that decided “They want a $10 fee for overnight guests.”

The age-old workplace practice of requiring workers to go to the doctor after missing a day of work to get a sick note feels a little strange; it's infantilizing in the sense that the only other thing like it in our lives is when we had to bring a note from your mommy into grade school after missing class. If your boss wants to treat you like a child, you might as well act like one and act like you don't know a thing. The real problem comes in the form of the fact that it's impossible to get in…

This bad-mouthing Betty might think twice before disrespecting anyone in the workplace

Working in modern workplaces can be exceptionally exhausting. Constant distractions due to open-plan offices tear employees away from their work. At the same time, success is attached to social and political status with heavy reliance on the “optics” of busyness rather than employees' actual effectiveness in completing their tasks. The reality is that we all work differently, and forcing all staff to work what you perceive to be the “appearance” of hard work will result in a performative cultur…

Memes to help you procrastinate looking at those 'urgent' emails

We all have that ONE coworker… you know, the one who likes to push everyone's buttons, gets on everyone's nerves and seems like they intentionally dance on a razor's edge over HR technicalities. They're entitled as heckin' heck and it's as if their agenda and opinions are the only ones that matter in the workplace. I like to call this type of person an ‘extroverted steamroller’.

You've probably heard that old adage about the new hire who goes in for their first day of training ready to do everything by the book but is instead surprised and maybe even disappointed when they're instead taught all of the shortcuts that the experienced grizzled employee has developed over the years, cutting out the parts of the process that are superfluous and unnecessary. The problem is that by learning and only using the shortcuts in the first instance, they're never going to understand…

The gaul to schedule a quasi-mandatory work event on Labor Day weekend is insane

Being told that there's absolutely no way you can or should possibly be paid more for your work when you've taken on the responsibilities of not one but two vacant levels of management above your actual role is disappointing for certain. It's almost more disappointing, though, when you get another job offer for 32% more than your current pay, and when you tell your employer the news, they're more than willing to give you the money you originally asked for and more. As always, in situations such…