I've written about this same premise quite a few times in the annals of Fail Blog, but any time your boss is accusing you of doing something despite there being no evidence—and especially when the evidence shows quite the opposite—it's more than likely that they're just projecting their own personality flaws, predispositions, and hidden thoughts. Basically, they're just admitting that if they were in your position, they would be doing the same thing they're accusing you of.

Management at one car dealership messed with the wrong sales team. In trying to save themselves money, these managers soured their whole team's attitudes toward their jobs. If you've ever heard a great salesperson sell something, you know it's a true skill. Some people are just born with the ability to effortlessly talk someone into buying their product. They can make you go from not wanting a fancy car, to taking out your wallet and buying something way pricier than you intended. In the moment…

Once you see what some CEOs are giving to their employees for the holidays, you'll never feel bad about your own gift-giving skills ever again. These people are out here giving gifts that are not just bad, but insulting to the very people who work so hard to keep their company going. CEOs who hand out M&Ms in lieu of a holiday bonus, you're getting coal in your stocking this year! These people all had a few mildly infuriating moments that happened to them during the holiday season. One person h…

People love to make mountains out of molehills. Most of the time, it's because their actual problems are absolutely nothing compared to those of countless others in the world. But people love to feel like the underdog in their own story, even when the obstacles they're up against are as simple as waiting in a long line at the grocery store. This form of main character syndrome has manifested itself in countless work environments, public spaces, and schools. It's the boss with five homes who mak…

From roughly the age of 15 to 22 (fresh out of college), we are expected to accept any position, as long as someone will hire us, regardless of the duties and responsibilities. Hold your horses; what I mean to say is that every position, within 'normal bounds', is acceptable. As a result, I believe we can all agree that for nearly ten years, we have been changing jobs frequently in the hopes of finding one that won't be emotionally or physically taxing. The jobs differ according to age, prefere…

The phrase “tripping over dollars to pick up dimes” has become a popular one in the discourse of online workplace discussion, particularly when it comes to employers holding out on overdue raises and earned bonuses from their top workers, though it has other applications too when it comes to other overly drastic cost-cutting measures in the workplace.

There's no greater sign of a toxic workplace than having a coworker looking over your shoulder at all times, waiting to see you mess up. Oftentimes, these are the folks who are threatened by someone else's presence, especially someone they think is the competition. However, just as it was in this situation, the employee did virtually nothing wrong and the coworker was just seeing what they wanted to see. To me, this phenomenon feels reminiscent of high school behavior. I remember when a classma…

Some unfortunate situations in life arise out of mere happenstance or coincidence—but when something unfortunate happens to you that seems just a little too conveniently inconvenient, it can be hard to dismiss it as such. Of course, such thinking gives rise to all sorts of ridiculous conspiracy, but when your employer suddenly fires you just before you're set to receive a huge payout—one that they've been dangling on a stick all year like you're some kind of cartoon donkey—it just seems like th…

Imagine wanting a single day to spend with your visiting relatives over the holiday period and being told that it's not an option. Unfortunately, it's a reality that many employees face, particularly in sectors like retail, which also happen to be experiencing pumping trade at this time of year, and can't afford to have a single staff member away—primarily due to the appallingly low staffing levels they keep. They regard their authority in this situation to be absolute and—to be fair, it often…

If you feel taken for granted more than anyone else you know, you're probably the parent of a teenager or you work in IT. Even worse, you might be both. Now, I have never worked at a company big enough to have an official IT person, but I know how grateful my coworkers and I would be if we did. One has to wonder where this lack of proper gratitude comes from considering how lost we would be without the technologically competent folks in our lives and especially in our workplace environments. No…

Some employers refuse to hear the truth, and if you're lucky, they will have to experience the consequences of ignoring your constant warnings. We all know what it's like to be a disregarded employee. Sure, most bosses say that constructive feedback is welcome no matter what your position in the company is, but in reality, you are likely to be ignored if you are at the bottom of the food chain. When this happens repeatedly, it soon becomes exponentially clear that the problems you are noticing…

It's not that employees should be careful around bosses with tempers; it should be that bosses with tempers should be careful around their employees. Those who throw tantrums and who have a habit of unfairly threatening employees should not only be fearful that they themselves might get in trouble for their tirades, but also they just might lose those employees forever and not of their own volition. I once had a friend who willingly took a job with a temperamental boss who had a known reputatio…

They say to never trust your employer, but we always need a former employer for references so do we have much of a choice in the matter? The truth is that we do not. Even after you leave a company, you're still beholden to your former employer in some way. If you have minimal work experience, you might not have another employer to use as a reference. It's the cyclical nature of the working world. Even when you leave one place, you're never really free now, are you? Sure, it's possible to frame…

An important lesson you learn early on in this world is to own your own mistakes, and whether or not someone makes mistakes is a good indicator of that person's character. As is often the case, there are plenty of people who never managed to learn this simple concept, with these people finding themselves in positions of authority all too often. It's not surprising then that there are a lot of toxic bosses out there who consistently find someone else to blame and someone else to shame for their…

Narcissists will always find a way to make everything about themselves, especially when the narcissist in question is your boss. We have all had the experience of working for someone who is just a bit too into themselves. I remember being warned about specific rules of formality around my first boss back when I was stuck in an unpaid internship in my late teen years. All this kind of behavior did for me was it taught me exactly what kind of work environment to avoid. However, sometimes it's com…

Usually, when you name an award after someone, it's done to memorialize their significant contribution to the thing it's being awarded for, and never would you ever expect the person being memorialized to be eligible—lest receive—their own award. Can you imagine if every year the Nobel Prize just awarded every award posthumously to Alfred Nobel? I think the entire process would have a completely different perception.