It's often said that you'll only be truly appreciated for your work long after you've left the job; this is owing to what little visibility upper management has into your work or what little understanding they have about what it is that you actually do. Unfortunately, rather than being missed or celebrated, it's more likely that you'll be blamed for things that had nothing to do with your role (or even happened after you left.) In most workplaces, your boss will be shaking their head and mutter…

Some people want to have their cake and eat it too. But it's really not so much about the cake itself as it is the control over that cake; they want the cake to submit to their authority and stop questioning it all the darn time. The thing is, this cake-haver probably isn't qualified to tell the cake what to do, which is why they're so darn insecure in the first place… I don't really know where this is going or what this metaphor is supposed to mean, but people aren't cake—and you shouldn't try…

If we're taking bets for the worst thing a boss has ever done, my money is on this; using someone else's tragedy for your own gain is a specific type of evil with no moral restitution. Somewhere in a locked room, this boss has a portrait of himself with a curled, deformed hand and demonic visage. This heartbreaking workplace story was shared on Reddit't r/antiwork subreddit, with the original poster sharing how her former boss had scammed her coworkers into giving him money, which was supposed…

Standing desks may have become all the rage, but some people can't stand them. Being on your feet all day can be tiring and result in aches that can't wait to be eased by a well-deserved rest. Just ask anyone who works in retail, nursing, or the service industry and has to be on their feet all day. Workers from these sectors are probably permanently bewildered by office workers' obsession with standing. My own experience with standing desks has led me to believe that their sole reason for exist…

You'd generally expect your position on the pay scale of an organization to accurately reflect your contributions and experience in the role. Unfortunately, this usually isn't even remotely close to being the truth.

Remember that one kid from your high school English class who treated everything like it was a complete joke—to the point of cruelty—never taking or accepting responsibility for any of his actions? Yeah, well, that kid could have very likely gone on to become someone's manager or open their own business. Now there's a terrifying thought. It's like George Carlin famously put it: “Think of how stupid the average person is, and realize half of them are stupider than that.” Well, this bar owner and…

Coworkers either become some of your closest friends — or they become the most infuriating plague on your existence you would have never hoped for. They're either some of the most chill and kindest people in the world, or they're nosy, backstabbing, and cruel — there is no in-between. Unfortunately, some workplaces tend to have more of the latter category, and these coworkers make the workplace a toxic apocalypse. This worker had to endure a nosy coworker who was determined to make worse the fa…

Being denied a raise that you've legitimately earned often won't cause you to quit on the spot—but you might wish that you could. Often an organization won't see your contribution from your point of view, you might be coming from the standpoint of your raw productivity, but they're considering the entire weight of the top-heavy organization you've got presiding over you that they think is enabling that productivity to happen (and they have a point.) Plus, they have a standard to set; from their…

Unnecessary rules and processes must be followed to the letter—because some manager who has never actually done the job decided it must be so. As long as they only waste your time, they'll remain in place indefinitely as you're hounded mercilessly about the resulting drop in productivity (thanks to these new processes.) However, as soon as these processes infringe upon the time of the manager who made them, it's miraculous how quickly they can disappear, which means the easiest way to get rid o…

Sometimes your actions to prevent something can bring it into existence as if you're unknowingly fulfilling a prophecy of your own making. That's what happened to this boss, who attempted to keep their workers from taking sick days by demanding they get a doctor's note only to have the doctor recommend them to take more time off than they would have in the first place. This is a common experience we've all probably had ourselves or witnessed at some point in our working life. A lot of organizat…

At the end of the day, you can't just make it harder for people to quit to prevent them from doing so. You'd be better off putting the time and energy into fixing company culture and decreasing turnover. Yet, where there's a bad idea to be had, there's a manager somewhere looking to champion it with zealous vigor, abandoning it only after things go totally sideways and pretending that nothing ever happened. It's no secret that the medical sector is currently struggling for staff, with low staff…

Why are so many mangers like this? Is it the power struggle they have created themselves? Is it some sort of pride thing? Or are they really just that dumb? If you've ever had THAT kind of manager, then you've thought the same questions. This recently happened for one server when her manager tried to trick her into unpaid work.

Getting passed up for a promotion when you know you're the best candidate is heart-breaking—made worse by the fact that it's usually because of some petty political dynamic or so that they can bring in a nepotism hire. Bonus points when the person who successfully interviewed for the role turns around and asks you for help or tries to delegate your work because your peers and managers have recognized you as the “go-to person." Whatever you decide to do at that point… you probably would like to…

If you make a demand and expect people to follow it, don't be surprised when they do. That's the takeaway from this story that was shared to Reddit's r/MaliciousCompliance subreddit by disgruntled worker, Redditor u/Local_admin_user. They shared their story to the popular subreddit to share their boss's hypocritical policy of both forbidding and expecting the workers to work overtime. Too many managers set expectations like this, setting the standard for the working relationship to work when it…

When you give a demand, it's always wise to make sure that you're not demanding something that you don't actually want to deal with—being woken up before 6 AM anytime one of your employees needs to call out would fit right into that category. This manager tried to tell their employee that they weren't going to be paid sick leave for the hours they missed since they hadn't called out before 6 AM, according to the “company policy.” By the manager's reasoning, this meant that they hadn't appropria…

There's something inherently risky about hiring someone to create undoubtedly the most important promotional tool for your business, only to turn around and refuse to pay them once you've accepted delivery of the product. It's almost like screwing someone over when it's something you don't understand is a bad idea… Who knew? Stories about developers getting back at clients who refuse to pay are deeply satisfying; there's this classic aspect to it of someone (the client) thinking they're holding…