‘I stopped coming in one hour early’: Boss gets fired for causing University worker to stop volunteering unpaid work hours, leading to worker's promotion

Author image for Eleonora Bader
Eleonora Bader
Aug 16, 2023 1:00 PM EDT

'Enter my boss, who, for a University educated manager of a university group, had the personality of a mid-19th Century mill owner', are OP's exact words when describing their boss, who really stepped on the wrong person's toes when he lashed out at OP when he saw him reading a newspaper at work. What characteristics does such a personality entail? Well, entitled, rude, and arrogant to start. If you'd like me to use some more descriptive words, I'm afraid I cannot… so your imagination must suffice.

OP was working as a Systems Supervisor at a university-based group, and out of the will of his own good heart, he came in one hour early every day. Keep in mind he wasn't paid to do this… but he did so in order for things to run more smoothly in the morning. There was a very logical thought process behind this decision. OP needed to check the stack of line-printed logs, which he did, happily.

Then one hour later, at 8 am, when his work day was supposed to begin, he would take a ten-minute coffee break, where he would read a newspaper, enjoying the calm before the storm.

One day, OP's boss came in and saw OP reading a newspaper and drinking said coffee. The clock read 8:05, so OP was technically supposed to be working. What his boss didn't know, was that OP had been working… for one hour already. Instead of letting OP explain why he was chilling, his boss went on an angry rant, telling OP that he better not see him to that ever again.

So, OP made sure that from now on, he would only come during his actual assigned work hours. Which meant he wasn't coming in one hour early anymore. Which means, chaos ensued. Scroll down to read exactly what that chaos entailed. Then, here are some of the best and funniest stories of employees getting fired on the spot, as told by the employees themselves.

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  • 01
    Font - Posted by u/Practical_Ad3462 1 day ago 2 Ç You can't read your newspaper in work time.. My best ever 'malicious compliance' M OC
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  • 02
    Font - Years ago I was the Systems Supervisor at a University based group. It was a joint group with the Administration Board and budget coming from University Libraries around England and Wales.
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  • 03
    Font - It was a cutting edge Network to each of the Universities Libraries, did their book dispensing and receipt and also did the cataloguing, which is quite complex. The Catalogue entry processing and various other batch processes ran
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  • 04
    Font - automatically overnight and the System had to be up and running for 8am when the libraries opened their doors. Before that could happen the printouts from the overnight runs needed to be taken off the printer and the stack of line print paper Logs had to
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  • 05
    Font - be gone through to ensure no failures ocurred. Only then could the Computer be rebooted into online mode for the libraries. Checking the stack of line printed logs took about an hour. So my practise was to arrive an hour early for work,
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  • 06
    Font - go through the printouts, then I would restart the Computer and while that process was going on would get a cup of coffee and sit down to read the news headlines and drink my coffee, maybe a 10 minute break time.
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  • 07
    Font - Enter my boss, who, for a University educated manager of a university group, had the personality of a mid-19th Century mill owner. Rude, arrogant and entitled were just a few words to describe him. We has clashed a few times
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  • 08
    Font - previous to this but this was a real kicker. He came in and saw me reading a newspaper and drinking coffee at 8:05am and, not letting me explain, he gave me a 'good talking to' and told me he didn't
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  • 09
    Font - expect to see me doing this again. Next day I came to work at 8am on the dot. Then got the printout pile and started working through it, normal pace, no need to dawdle, the Libraries were already
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  • 10
    Font - getting frustrated before I even started the checking process. But they didn't call us, they called him at home. He rushes in at 8:30 demanding to know why the Computer wasn't up and available for the libraries yet.
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  • 11
    Font - I told him, because the overnight logs need to be checked for failures first and that takes almost an hour. He said "We have been running on this machine for a year, why has this not been a problem before? " I looked deadpan at him and replied
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  • 12
    Font - "Because until yesterday I had been giving the group an unpaid hour of my time to enable the Computer to be available to the libraries at 8am. As my efforts were not only ignored but treated with such anger yesterday, I have
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  • 13
    Font - started working to rule on this now. The Computer will never be restarted to Online mode until these printouts are checked and that will not start till 8am" He said I can come in early myself and check them. I
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  • 14
    Font - said not if you don't want a country-wide University workers strike you won't - Unions can be useful in some circumstances. Standoff for the next two days, followed by the deputy coming in to see me and asking me to a meeting with
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  • 15
    Font - a group-board member (an aged professor) who had come to get this fixed. Boss went away, Deputy, a much better person, got promoted, I got a promotion + pay rise and asked to change my start time to 7am. Problem solved and
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  • 16
    Font - everybody was happy, including the board who had had their own problems with the now ex boss and were pleased that I had given them chance to remove him.
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  • 17
    Font - tl:dr: My boss caused me to stop working an unpaid hour each day and caused a major uproar at Universities across England and Wales. Which got him fired and me a promotion
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  • 18
    Font - inr12 · 1 day ago Great MC example. Very inspiring, thank you. 505 Reply
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  • 19
    Font - +2. 1 day ago Lay-ZFair Let every person be quick to listen, slow to speak, slow to anger. You'd think that in a University environment he might have run into that phrase sometime
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  • 20
    Font - in his life. At least he was in the right place to learn! Vote Reply Share
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  • 21
    Font - Vanners8888 16 hr. ago Something similar happened to someone I know. Worked in an office with about 12 people. She was paid to go in an hour early to open the curtains, turn
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  • 22
    Font - on the lights, run the dishwasher, clean the staff room, make the coffee, wash, dry, fold and stock linens, sterilize instruments and clean suctions. The other b ahem, employees in the office
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  • 23
    Font - got p that she was being paid for an extra hour and kept complaining about it to the new owner. So the idiot new owner took the hour away from her. She made a point to get to work 15-20 minutes
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  • 24
    Font - early to finish her coffee and get ready for the day. Chaos obviously ensued since these idiots couldn't figure out a system to get the tasks done that she had been doing, before the office opened. We
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  • 25
    Font - laughed about it every day for a year and a half until she retired and left that toxic workplace. ↑ Vote Vote Reply Share
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management promotion boss printing employee fired university students malicious compliance malicious-compliance-reddit pay raise library education volunteer unpaid printer newspaper
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