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Horrible Bosses

HR Fires Employee While On Medical Leave: 'the company's needs have changed during your absence'

HR Fires Employee While on Medical Leave: 'the company's needs have changed during your absence'

Can anyone else smell a lawsuit coming? Imagine going on medical leave because of a series of upcoming scheduled surgeries. It's not like you're just on an endless vacation; you will be in recovery during this time. It will not be fun; it will be strenuous. It's not that you want to take a break; it's that you have to take a break. You simply cannot work in the way that you normally do. Now, imagine that your workplace is completely receptive to this need and is allegedly supportive of your cha…
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'I decided it was a matter of opinion': Boss makes casino workers where name tags stating their hometowns, cue malicious compliance

'I decided it was a matter of opinion': Boss makes casino workers where name tags stating their hometowns, cue malicious compliance

Why would any customer at a casino need to know an employee's hometown? People come to casinos for a very specific purpose. That purpose is not to make small talk with the employees about their childhood experiences or what their suburb looked like or what their parents did for a living. So how come this boss had the audacity to require employees to list their hometowns on their name tags in order to be able to make conversation with the casino customers? It's one of those ridiculous work polic…
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Worker given more work after trying to discuss their too-high workload: 'He responded by adding more work'

Worker given more work after trying to discuss their too-high workload: 'He responded by adding more work'

There's no feeling like constantly being behind the ball, especially when that ball is a heavy boulder that you're being forced to push eternally uphill only to have it roll back down, forcing you to start over. The Greeks regarded this tortuous task as suitable eternal punishment for violating the rite of hospitality and killing guests in your home, along with a long list of other crimes that included cheating the personification of death himself. Nowadays, we just call that “employment." The…
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'Never say that's not my job': Bad boss posts passive-aggressive signs all over the office when workers return

'Never say that's not my job': Bad boss posts passive-aggressive signs all over the office when workers return

Now that we've made it through the week, I think we can all agree that it's best to ease into returning to work at the start of the new year. Throwing your employees into the deep end does nothing more than start the year off on the wrong foot. Enforcing bogus rules, policies, and mantras will only make your employees change their New Year's Resolutions to “get a new job.” I remember distinctly feeling that my
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'My boss is trying to micromanage me while I'm on vacation': Boss won't leave worker alone while out of the country on leave

'My boss is trying to micromanage me while I'm on vacation': Boss won't leave worker alone while out of the country on leave

Nothing shows you how essential you are to the business like taking a vacation. If your boss or team can't handle a week without things going off the rails, then that's saying a lot. The thing is, the types of bosses who insist on being able to contact you during your “vacation” are the same bosses who try to tell you how expendable you and your role are, negging and gaslighting you to keep you in your place. This worker went out of the country in order to visit their family for the holidays, l…
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Worker wastes their boss's time before quitting: 'I asked everything'

If there's one thing your manager probably hates, it's having more work to do. Whether they're just lazy or already have too much on their plate, chances are pretty good that they won't want to be spending hours combing over your work in addition to what they're already working on. Even the most micromanaging sort will quickly grow tired of the additional work if you can manage to reflect their time-consuming processes back onto them.
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'I didn't see a day off request': Worker gets fired after being scheduled when they weren't available

In shift work, particularly in locations that rely on staffing part-time workers to handle annual increases in foot traffic and trade, it's pretty common to have workers list their availability, determining when they're available to work and be scheduled. This allows for part-timers to keep a second job, attend class, look after their kids, or whatever other life obligations they might have. Usually, some indication of your availability will be given and negotiated upon during the interview pro…
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Meddling boss demands more accurate timesheets, backfires spectacularly: '[He thinks] we are manipulating our hours'

Some employers have this tendency to assume that you're trying to get one over on them, constantly accusing their workers of claiming time they're not working or flat-out stealing from the business. Whatever the accusation is, it seems they're always looking over their shoulder, waiting for you to drive the knife in and pick their wallet out of their back pocket. Despite their constant insistence, you'll probably never see any evidence of this happening, with stocktakes always coming out clean…
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'He can hike back to town for all I care': Employee abandons manager on side of road and refuses to drive back to work

'He can hike back to town for all I care': Employee abandons manager on side of road and refuses to drive back to work

Workplace bullies are the worst for an obscene amount of reasons. The first is that you couldn't leave even if you wanted to because you came here to work, not to have fun. So either you give in to the bully or lose it and end up losing your job. The story that follows is about an emerging adult who is entering the workforce for the very first time. Unfortunately, OP had to deal with the worst workplace bully I have ever heard of. Nevertheless, as fate would have it, OP saw his chance and seize…
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‘Does he just want us all to quit?’: Boss enforces mandatory two-hour stand-up meeting at 8:00 am every day, worker rebels

‘Does he just want us all to quit?’: Boss enforces mandatory two-hour stand-up meeting at 8:00 am every day, worker rebels

Talk about starting 2024 on the wrong foot! It feels like there are a million ways for a horrible boss to anger and frustrate their employees, but even those of us here at FAIL Blog understand that sometimes there is no other choice and hard decisions have to be made. That being said, choosing to enforce mandatory meetings two hours early every single day where everyone has to stand does not feel like a decision that needed to be made. This thread was posted to Reddit by u/Classic-Dog8399 , who…
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'My work gets everyone a birthday cake but me': Top Mildly Infuriating Work Stories

'My work gets everyone a birthday cake but me': Top Mildly Infuriating Work Stories

This past year, we've seen some classic mildly infuriating moments in the workplace that serve as a necessary reminder that workplace culture is in desperate need of a makeover. This collection of stories, compiled from the top work-related stories from Reddit's r/mildlyinfuriating subreddit, showcases a variety of ways your boss, manager, or supervisor can intentionally or unintentionally offend you. Some of these stories include scheduling mixups, managers not honoring previously requested da…
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'I am counting EVERYTHING': Retail worker maliciously complies with supervisor's contradictory instructions

'I am counting EVERYTHING': Retail worker maliciously complies with supervisor's contradictory instructions

If you give unclear, contradictory instructions to your employees, you're just asking for problems. It makes you wonder how these supervisors got promoted in the first place. Clarity is pretty much the most important part of the job, and if you can't do that, you have no business expecting your team to follow you blindly. This thread was posted to Reddit's r/MaliciousCompliance subreddit by u/Correct_Campaign3707 , who worked on the Member Service team at a retail company and was tasked with ch…
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'You asked for this!': Team of employees humble micromanaging boss by taking four times as long to complete a task

'You asked for this!': Team of employees humble micromanaging boss by taking four times as long to complete a task

I think we've all had to deal with a smug and entitled manager at some point in our lives. My personal experience has shown me that it's simpler to find a method of working with them as opposed to confronting them outright. The story that follows is about a dissatisfied employee who works in a shipyard that specializes in ship repair and refitting. We are talking about a hardworking blue-collar worker. But things take a bitter turn when the entitled manager—who is occasionally referred to as EB…
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'View the job as a chance to give, not to earn': Out-of-touch executive tells struggling workers to do the job for the love, not the money

Sometimes, you really can't help but wonder if people even listen to the words coming out of their own mouths or if they're so out of touch that they hear and even believe the wildly out-of-touch things that they are saying. The reality is that whether we love, are passionate about, and believe in what we do—or not—is really a moot point. We work for money to provide for ourselves, to put a roof over our families' heads, and to put food on our table. The service, skills, and time that we provid…
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'I just did what she had asked me to do: Boss insists on detailed meeting notes, used as evidence to get them fired

If you're doing something wrong, you normally wouldn't want evidence that you're doing something wrong, and you certainly wouldn't want to order someone to—no, demand that someone—record evidence of your misdeeds. Well, beware of the power of the pen… when meticulous records are kept detailing your “leadership” and just the type of operation you're running: a toxic work environment rife with dismissive attitudes and unwillingness to acknowledge critical issues. Little did this boss know that th…
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workplace discussion employment issues antiwork workplace-stories jobs employment-discussion job work i quit quit workplace Horrible Bosses quitting employment in the workplace - 23744261

'HR shared what I wrote': Employee's exit interview feedback is paraded around the office by their toxic former boss

One should never give an exit interview, particularly if their employer has demonstrated a complete inability to listen to advice or honest feedback—and especially if they've shown a willingness to retaliate against someone giving that feedback. Even if you complete an exit interview and provide feedback with the best of intentions, you may just be burning a bridge you had no intention of burning once they've had some time to think about it.
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