'Not my job, not my problem': Coworker gets fired for questioning policies, company suffers after no one takes on her work duties

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  • 01
    Font - "oh that was Katy's job" I'm not sure if this belongs on malicious compliance but I figured people will enjoy this LOC I was working for a manufacturer years ago, it was a small operation run by a husband (CEO) and wife with a sister business of a front end platform that was run by the wife's brother. The husband's mom and some cousins also worked there between the two businesses.
  • 02
    Font - With an operation like this you had the typical micromanagement from CEO, minimum wage pay for top dollar performance expectations, and the general nonsense you can expect in a set up like this. I had this job while in college and needed to build my resume, they let me have a flexible schedule so I could leave early for my night classes and when I had midterms and finals so I knew I had to stick it out. After about 6 months of working there my job responsibilities grew tremendously, but m
  • 03
    Font - One of my friends (we'll call her Katy) was looking for work and my company was hiring, I told her what she was getting into but as a recent college grad looking for office experience she decided to give it a shot. First, my referral bonus never came even after she had worked there for 90 days and I was told that I shouldn't inquire about it because I referred someone to help the company not to get the extra money. I wasn't in a position to push so I didn't.
  • 04
    Font - I trained Katy in her role as she was taking some of my old responsibilities. Well the CEO and the wife didn't like how much time the two of us spent talking to each other or how much time we spent away from our desks, which was genuinely us using the restroom, and getting water.
  • 05
    Font - This made no sense because I handled product onboarding and Katy suggested products for curated events so it was important that she knew what new products were coming out and when she could start promoting them so that stock wouldn't sit in the warehouse. We separately had meetings with the CEO and office manager putting us on probation for this behavior.
  • 06
    Font - Cue malicious compliance, we stop talking as much in the office effectively cutting me off from curated events and making it impossible for Katy to use our new products on the upcoming events (events could be scheduled anywhere from a week to several months in advance so it was a great way to boost sales and visibility for our new items).
  • 07
    Font - My friend ended up getting fired for having a brain and questioning some of the stupid policies. Also for doing something so outrageous as taking her unpaid lunch hour, showing up at 9 and leaving at 5. Normally I would've gone back into the platforms to curate events until they found someone to take over the role but I was petty. I had been there for a little over a year, I was training employees, teaching myself the ins and outs of all our retailers back ends to upload products, coordin
  • 08
    Font - Fast forward a few months, the CEO decides to show up to work on the office floor instead of working out of his private office (whenever he was on the floor he was always super loud and disruptive to the general flow). I hear him talk about sales from the past few months specifically about sales from events, so naturally my ears perk up. He starts getting louder "I don't get it, there's this huge decline in sales. None of our new products are getting any traction." I haven't been addresse
  • 09
    Font - He calls over the office manager and they start hashing it out "six months ago the sales for our new items went down significantly" (I'm thinking yeah duh that's when you told me and Katy to stop talking. The initial data that was supplied with product photos and descriptions weren't clear it would've been a very long process for Katy to sift through the new products to try and match them to events as opposed to what we used to do which was she would tell me the theme and what she was loo
  • 10
    Font - (Three months ago is when Katy got fired.) Eventually the two of them piece together that they need to blame whoever is curating events and the CEO starts asking everyone in the office "whose responsibility is it to work on events?" Finally it gets to a point where I can't stay quiet, the office is too small and I play too big of a role in product management so I chime in "oh wasn't that Katy's responsibility?"
  • 11
    Font - CEO replies "she hasn't worked here in three months, you mean to tell me no one has been submitting products for three months!?" He is LIVID and it's clear that I am now in the path of his rage. "Why has no one been handling this???" Everyone is kind of looking around and the office manager (let's call her Karen) starts shifting the blame onto me since technically Katy was in "my department". Once the finger pointing started I was prepared to defend myself.
  • 12
    Font - "Well Karen I thought you were the one who was in charge of managing and keeping track of every employees role." So Karen replies "I am, but you knew this is an important part of our sales and marketing." I reply with "the week before she was let go didn't you specifically get all of her passwords and a complete list of all of her tasks?" Karen replies "yes" she is clearly concerned with where I'm going with this. "And after she was let go did you communicate to me that those tasks were n
  • 13
    Font - Karen: "Well no but I shouldn't have had to!" Me: "but you're in charge of delegating tasks and making sure all work is assigned to employees. Are you implying that I was supposed to know that you had a list of tasks unassigned? Why would I assume that you didn't delegate those to another team member when that's an essential part of your role?" Needless to say while Karen was very annoyed with me, but I wasn't taking the fall.
  • 14
    Font - They didn't ask me to curate events, Karen handled that which got them to hire another person very quickly because it was too much work for her on top of her other duties. The story of me and the new girl needs its own post so I'll end this one here.
  • 15
    Font - Tldr: office manager and CEO let go a very productive employee for stupid reasons and then discover six months later no one's doing her job because they never delegated it to anyone else.
  • 16
    Font - cero1399 +1 13 hr. ago So they stop communication to the sales person and then fire the sales person and wonder why sales go down? This family knows how to business!
  • 17
    Font - Stabbmaster +3. 5 hr. ago I'm going to be honest here, your first mistake was this defeatist attitude you had. Yes, you push for the raise. Yes, you inquire about the referral bonus. Yes, you deny the extra work. If they try to be vindictive and change schedules, then you keep calling out until they back down or fire you. Then it's back to normal or you get to collect unemployment, either way you win.
  • 18
    Font - Unfortunately, this is also an experience everyone gets at least once so they know not to let it happen again. It's also how they learn to get everything in writing, no matter how mundane it seems, and always keep a copy for yourself.
  • 19
    Font - Current-Fly8346 OP. 5 hr. ago I had no business acumen at this point it was my first corporate/ office job. Looking back I definitely could've handled the situation better, but I was young and didn't know better.
  • 20
    Font - I'm currently a supervisor and I mentor everyone who works under me. I give them advice going into raise meetings, to get things in writing, prioritizing mental health over work etc. Sadly I didn't have someone like that when I started.

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