The Weirdest Things People Got In Trouble For At Work

Author image for Eric Lund
Eric Lund
Oct 15, 2021 1:00 PM EDT

Our jobs are challenging enough without a manager publicly shaming us for saying "hi boss" too happily. The things these people's managers got angry about are extremely arbitrary, unpredictable, and frequently hypocritical. We can only hope that they found better places to work soon after. These sound a whole lot like the reasons these people quit their jobs on the spot.

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  • 01
    Gesture - Katie Harrington @katieharr1988 What's the weirdest thing you ever got in trouble at work for? I was accused of being disrespectful because the six people I CCd on an email weren't listed in order of seniority. 12:26 PM - Oct 4, 2021 · Twitter Web App 10.2K Retweets 12.2K Quote Tweets 200.1K Likes
    via katieharr1988
  • 02
    Font - Roy Smith @RS6484 · Oct 5 ... Replying to @katieharr1988 As a young postman in the 1970s I got reprimanded and sent home at 3.30 in the morning for wearing trainers. I had to change into proper boots. The supervisor who sent me home was my dad, who had taken me to work in his car. I had to walk home and back.
    via katieharr1988
  • 03
    Font - Andrew Kehoe @AndrewKehoe8 · Oct 4 Replying to @katieharr1988 I got devoured for multiplying numbers in my head instead of using a calculator because I was "showing off"
    via katieharr1988
  • 04
    Font - Occupy Recovery @RecoveryOccupy · Oct 4 Replying to @katieharr1988 I was once written up for outperforming my coworkers and told to 'take more breaks and work slower'. (It was my first job out of grad school).
    via katieharr1988
  • 05
    Font - Susan McGhoulway @SusanMcGalway · Oct 4 ... Replying to @katieharr1988 The only time I ever lost a job it turned out be because when we were choosing a new decor scheme I told them that pale blue was cold & uninviting & when they told me they didn't want to be inviting I told them it was uninviting to staff too. It was a property management co.
    via katieharr1988
  • 06
    Font - OnE Sucka’fish (Richie) @TurtleSoupMix · Oct 4 WETEARTH Replying to @katieharr1988 I had to have a meeting with my store's GM because I was speaking Spanish and it offended a customer who "doesn't like Mexicans."
    via katieharr1988
  • 07
    Font - Kayleigh Payne @OhLookltsMe7 · Oct 4 Replying to @katieharr1988 I got reprimanded because a colleague wasn't invited to another colleagues baby shower (which I wasn't throwing) because they didn't like each other
    via katieharr1988
  • 08
    Font - Caoimhe Kiernan @CaoimheKiernan · Oct 4 ... Replying to @katieharr1988 I asked a director's secretary when he was free to sign a doc and she told me to ask him myself. I did, and he asked me why I hadn't just asked his secretary. I told him she told me to ask him myself. He was annoyed. She reported me to my line manager for being insubordinate.
    via katieharr1988
  • 09
    Font - Alan Kennedy @AEAKennedy · Oct 5 ... Replying to @katieharr1988 For using headphones while working (alone) because other staff might be talking and I might think they were talking about me and that would create a bad atmosphere. I worked alone the majority of the day apart from maybe 15 minutes.
    via katieharr1988
  • 10
    Font - Brian Higgins @DrBrianHiggins · Oct 5 Replying to @katieharr1988 I was told I was too friendly to customers working on a till in a shopping centre.
    via katieharr1988
  • 11
    Font - Máiret @MaireTNC · Oct 5 It was once written in an annual review that I was too happy.
    via katieharr1988
  • 12
    Font - ?everything @qstnvrythng_ · Oct 5 Replying to @katieharr1988 ... Told a guy who was about to do a presentation to "break a leg" - Hauled in front of HR to explain myself - needless to say it was in a foreign land.
    via katieharr1988
  • 13
    Font - Sarah-Jane @JaneyHurley · Oct 5 Replying to @katieharr1988 I was reprimanded because I was reading the newspaper when a director walked past .. Reading the papers for media articles relevant to our business was part of my job.
    via katieharr1988
  • 14
    Font - Dublin 8 lad @Libertieslnfo · Oct 5 Replying to @katieharr1988 I worked in Guinness as a security.Anyway while doing my hourly patrol i walked in to an office to find two staff going hell for leather on the desk. I had to report it as it was after hours, I got into trouble as the time I recorded showed my patrol was done afew minute's late
    via katieharr1988
  • 15
    Font - EAMWOR Haleybob @Haleybob10 · Oct 5 DREAM WORK Replying to @katieharr1988 I asked someone to stop referring to a female colleague as that blond girl and the person a made a complaint worse the boss took it serious
    via katieharr1988
  • 16
    Font - Stuart Neilson @StuartDNeilson · Oct 5 Replying to @katieharr1988 I opened new instant coffee jars silently, slicing around the rim with my thumbnail. I was banned from "ruining it for everyone", who apparently have to noisily smash the foil with a spoon. I (still) get great pleasure from slicing out a perfect gold foil circle.
    via katieharr1988
  • 17
    Font - The Fab Commuter @theFabCommuter · Oct 5 ... Replying to @katieharr1988 I was called insubordinate because as an assistant manager I stood up for the staff & pointed out (privately) to the general manager that he was violating labor laws and creating a hostile workplace. PS: I'm a woman and was also told I was being hysterical.
    via katieharr1988
  • 18
    Font - Natasha Green @Tashtashgreen · Oct 5 Replying to @katieharr1988 I was scolded for standing up too quickly when greeting people and offering them cups of tea when I was PA to the Chief Executive of a London local authority.
    via katieharr1988
  • 19
    Font - Fon_Ellard @Fonril · Oct 5 Replying to @katieharr1988 I asked for day off to attend my 23 year old cousins funeral. I was told if I took the day off not to bother coming back. I went to the funeral.
    via katieharr1988
  • 20
    Font - Jonthemon @Jonthemon6· Oct 5 Yeah I got told I couldn't go to my grandmother's funeral because she wasnt Immediate family I went
    via katieharr1988
  • 21
    Font - Sarah @lostducky · Oct 5 Replying to @katieharr1988 Got in trouble for cutting toast for children in triangles rather than squares the way my manager preferred, oh and I folded a towel the wrong way O
    via katieharr1988
  • 22
    Font - Cian McG @CianMcGar · Oct 5 Replying to @katieharr1988 In a video shop 20 or so years ago, I turned off Gladiator and put on a different film. The Assistant Manager gave out to me because Gladiator was the only film he wanted shown in the shop. When it ended he put it on again. Every day.
    via katieharr1988
  • 23
    Font - Cowlra @nightowl1610 · Oct 5 Replying to @katieharr1988 I got told off for walking from the kitchen back into the office with my hood up because it was winter and there was no heating on in the kitchen. It was a call centre type place. They thought they were running NASA. I left after 6 months.
    via katieharr1988
  • 24
    Font - Anna @Annacreegan · Oct 5 Replying to @katieharr1988 I was told off in a review for not working late. I said that O always had my work done, helped others and looked for more work but apparently it was more important to be "seen to do extra work by working late" than actually doing extra work.
    via katieharr1988
  • 25
    Font - Jacqueline @Bankyghirl Oct 5 Replying to @katieharr1988 As an office junior, I got into trouble for giving the director of another company biscuits from our biscuit tin with his tea. He said he was starving and had missed lunch! Next day he sent me a thank you card and a box of biscuits!
    via katieharr1988
  • 26
    Font - Declan Reilly @declander · Oct 5 ... Replying to @katieharr1988 Telling a customer what time we closed at. The company owner felt this was classified information that could be used for a robbery. I wish I was making this up.
    via katieharr1988
  • 27
    Font - Dr Monty "Frankenstein" Bojangles. @ · Oct 5 ... Replying to @katieharr1988 I worked at a cafe in my teens, boss yelled at me in front of a full cafe that l'd not washed my hands after going to the loo. How did he know? The bar of soap was bone dry. Had he paid attention he'd have seen it was a brand new bar I just put out 'cause I used up the last one.
    via katieharr1988
  • 28
    Font - * : : CREEPY : : : Gozer @... · Oct 6 ... Once I took a day off & when I returned, people kept expressing surprise that I came back. The previous 4 legal secretaries who worked for the bullying attorney I worked for had all walked out on her. I stuck around another 3 months until all my credit cards were paid off.
    via katieharr1988
  • 29
    Font - Font - Katie Wyer @KatieWyer0815 · Oct 5 Replying to @katieharr1988 I wrote *NB - PLEASE READ* in an email subject to a bunch of people in science and was called up for using offensive language to staff members, because one of them thought I meant "No Bulls***" and not "Nota Bene", the literal abbreviation for "note this well".
    via katieharr1988
  • 30
    Font - Font - Jonathan Mock Esq.O @MrJonathan...· Oct 5 Replying to @katieharr1988 Local newspaper. Got a bollocking for taking 1hr lunch break. I let the manager bawl himself Red then gently reminded him that 1hr lunch break was in my contract. My parting shot - in best Michael Caine - was "don't you ever speak to me that way again". He never did.
    via katieharr1988
  • 31
    Font - Font - Kate Jones @Tryn2BKind · Oct 5 I had a situation like that. The boss was furious that I hadn't read his mind about visitors we had, and kept .. calling me Kathy. I quietly pointed out that he hadn't told me to do the thing I hadn't done. My Parthian shot was "My name is Kate." He looked poleaxed.
    via katieharr1988
  • 32
    Font - Froukje @angelfrouk · Oct 5 Replying to @katieharr1988 When I worked in Lidl, I got told by the manager that I "wasn't hired to think." I asked him if he meant it and he said yes. From that day on I asked what needed to be done every single time. It drove him mad, but when he told me off for it I told him "I wasn't hired to think..."
    via katieharr1988
  • 33
    Rectangle - Buberella @buberella · Oct 5 Oh, my boss told me off for "not cc'ing him on all of my emails" so I did it until he begged me to stop. That is how severely he underestimated my workload.
    via katieharr1988
  • 34
    Font - Fl ronman @RonmanFi · Oct 5 Replying to @katieharr1988 I had an employee who suffered with anxiety and depression. Good worker, but on his bad days, he couldn't phone in sick, best he could do was write "sorry" in a text. I decided he was worth bending the "company process" for. I got told off for not firing him for his “disrespect"
    via katieharr1988
  • 35
    Font - Just Risë @ResaRisaRise · Oct 5 I was once asked if someone on my team should be fired because they looked sleepy all the time. It was just her eyes were hooded. I am not firing someone for their face!
    via katieharr1988
  • 36
    Font - (((Sara Gee)))7 #FBPAZ @saralike. · Oct 5 Replying to @katieharr1988 A man I worked with screamed & threw his pen across the office because l'd sent him five emails in one day, which he said was too many, & then came to give me a lecture on email etiquette & flooding people's inboxes (all of my emails were replies to emails he'd sent me that day)
    via katieharr1988
  • 37
    Font - Chops of Alec @RLokomotiv · Oct 5 Replying to @katieharr1988 Not being dead. There was, unbeknownst to me a person in a Bank I used to work for who had the same (uncommon) name as me, and one weekend he’d sadly died suddenly I came into work on the Monday and the receptionist kind of scream-howled. I was admonished for joking I was dead
    via katieharr1988

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