Have you ever had that one coworker who will manipulate every situation and use every tool and any loophole at their disposal in order to make sure that things always go their way? If you haven't, good for you, and please let me know how you've managed to avoid them for so long. These coworkers—Gary, let's call them Gary… Now, Gary is no dull blade; the ability to gaslight and manipulate your way through a team of people takes knowledge, brains, and skill. But Gary is often lazy, looking to avo…

There's nothing like an office party to figure out who's really a team player and who isn't.

There's nothing worse than making things worse for yourself when you're just trying to get some simple revenge.

Usually, when you leave a job, it's with the expectation that you'll never have to deal with anything to do with that job again. After years of fretting and toiling over your tasks, it's a type of freedom—even if things ended poorly or you got fired, you at least have the peace of mind that you're not going to have to worry about that place or its people any longer. Sure, you might catch up with your favorite coworkers from time to time and see how they're doing, you might even end up working w…

People tend to get very close with their coworkers at each job they're at. After all, if you spend 8 plus hours each day with the same people, you spend a lot of time talking, collaborating, and getting to know each other. Even if it seems like you know everything there is to know about your work bestie's personal life, you may never see them outside of work! So it's hard to know what they're actually like, beyond the information they tell you. Some of these people below couldn't believe their…

Some disgruntled workers are spilling the secrets of their worst coworkers ever. Some folks just aren't meant for work environments. It seems like there's at least one person at your job that makes you wonder, “How did this person ever get hired?” If they're anything like the people in the stories below,

As human beings, we all develop interesting ticks and facets of our personalities that can manifest into very strange behavior. Often our desire to feel “good” and avoidance of feeling “bad” can cause us to make a series of consecutive decisions that see us walking too far down a particular path and becoming something we might never have anticipated. Take "Disney Adults" or any fandom as a prime example of this. You get exposed to something at some point in your life, say, Disney media and it m…

Dealing with changing expectations from your boss or colleagues requires a strategic approach; after all, having all your t's crossed and i's dotted ensures that you have covered yourself when things inevitably hit the fan and they go looking for someone to blame, aiming to hang their own failure's of leadership on the neck of an unprepared scapegoat. Despite all of this, Hanlon's Razor still shines through; it's not as if these people are necessarily aware of what they're doing, and it's not a…

What is it with people constantly trying to blame someone else for the thing that they themselves are most guilty of? This hypocritical finger-pointing is just a vapid means of projection that these narcissistic robots employ whenever they feel threatened. This thread was posted to Reddit's r/AITA (Am I the A--Hole) subreddit by the coworker scapegoated by the others, Redditor u/Maleficent_Shoe3791. She had been doing all of the work to make up for their lazy behavior, and they still tried to b…

Let's be real… We've all had that one coworker who is always coming in late and leaving early to pick up their kids. No big deal, right? Everyone deserves to have a flexible working arrangement. But, when that flexibility and those considerations aren't offered to other workers, and it places more work or undesirable shifts on those workers' shoulders, it becomes a problem. Reddit especially champions the idea that those with kids shouldn't expect special treatment over their coworkers who are…

When you have a job, it's usually best to do that job if you want to keep it… Not get embroiled in a war of petty acts against a coworker who wanted no part in that war in the first place. If you choose the latter pathway, you need to be prepared for any consequences that follow. Redditor u/Peach_Gfuel shared this story to Reddit's r/MaliciousCompliance subreddit about their coworker who insisted on getting revenge on them for a perceived slight. u/Peach_Gfuel had previously worked for the Qual…

Being embroiled in an ongoing prank war sounds like a lot of fun—until you find yourself in one. It turns out there's not much that's desirable about constantly being on edge, wondering when the next strike will happen, especially when that strike is likely to come at the most inconvenient time. This is doubly true when you didn't consent to partake in the prank war, to begin with, and it always seems to come from that one clueless coworker who thinks they're hilarious despite being merely obno…

Just because you're in charge doesn't mean you know better or have more experience—that's not your job. It's your job to ensure that the people who know how to do that job are getting it done and have the resources and ability to do so. A lot of managers get this confused or let their gargantuan ego get in the way, and then they end up with situations like this. Bonus points in these situations apply if the experienced subordinate is also significantly younger than the manager, which will often…

Interviewing for a new role within a company or an internal promotion has its benefits, especially when compared to a normal interview process. For one, you'll typically already be at least somewhat familiar with the manager of the workgroup you're interviewing for, which means that they, in turn, have some knowledge of you and the work that you do. This means that you don't have to blindly convince a stranger of your qualities and capabilities like you would in a normal interview—playing the f…

Have you ever entered a workplace, friend group, or any social group and been warned to watch out for one particular member? It's an unfortunate aspect of our social nature; we always need a group or individual to be “othered” to feel like we're “in." While it's important to keep an eye out for red flags and not make yourself too vulnerable to possible exploitative behavior from these people (if what people say is true), it's just as important to form your own opinions. You might find that this…

Sometimes an inappropriate action deserves the appropriate response; it's the simple laws of cause and effect acting out their parts. This is how it was when worker u/elena247 's coworker decided to execute the clever ploy of bringing their dirty dishes to work to have others wash them. When u/elena247 discovered what their coworker was up to, they decided the appropriate response was to introduce the dirty dishes to the trash can. Sounds like a reasonable course of action to us. It's hard to i…