'Think about whether you want to keep working here': Temperamental boss loses it and gives ultimatum, employee maliciously complies

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Ben Weiss • Writer and Editor
Dec 7, 2023 8:00 AM EST

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 reputation for getting away with ridiculous workplace behavior. Unfortunately, the friend felt like he would be the exception and would be able to handle it. It turns out he did not last more than six months, but at the very least, he had enough sense to quit and to call his boss out on his nonsense before leaving forever. Who knows whether or not this confrontation got through to the boss's head but at least my friend was able to get it off his chest.

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  • 01
    "Bossman flipping LOST IT"
    via Michael Fousert

  • This thread was posted to Reddit's r/MaliciousCompliance subreddit by u/beerbellybegone, who was essentially hired to run his own marketing team and to clean up the mess of his predecessor. Unfortunately, despite his known success during his employment, his request for a raise was frequently ignored by his employer. On top of that, the one time he made a mistake, his employer threw a giant fit and requested for OP to pack his things and “think about whether [he wanted[ to keep working here.” Well, let's just say his boss set him up well for some much-needed malicious compliance. Keep scrolling for the full story. When you're done, check out this post about this boss who kept cutting an employee's hours.

  • 02
    Boss: Think about whether you want to keep working here. Me: OK. I don't L OC Apologies if the English isn't perfect, it's not my native tongue.
    via u/beerbellybegone
  • 03
    Nearly two years ago I started work at Company as their digital marketing person. After I started, it turned out that I was brought in to put out the fires left by my predecessor, the VP Marketing, who had a team of 4 plus himself, spent over $1 million in one year and brought in 5 deals, 2 of them for under $10K.
    via u/beerbellybegone
  • 04
    As you can well imagine, after a performance like that, I had lots of work to do, and very little to do it with. Aside from 1 or 2 paid tools, everything else was to be done using free tools only. I'm gonna do some bragging here, I beat the previous year's figures in all categories with 10% of the budget.
    via u/beerbellybegone
  • 05
    When I started, I thought Bossman (Founder/CEO) had a really good management style, saying things like: "Your successes are yours, your mistakes are mine", and "The enemy of good is great. I don't expect perfection, I want you to make sure things work and get them done". In essence, I was allowed to run my own (one-man) department and outsourced freelancers, and as long as I was getting results, he left me alone.
    via u/beerbellybegone
  • 06
    Since I was the only person on the marketing team, I also had to learn a large number of skills and platforms that weren't directly related to digital marketing.
    via u/beerbellybegone
  • 07
    Not to say everything was perfect, but things were pretty good. One of the main things that weren't perfect was that Bossman had serious anger management issues. As I said before, he left me alone but I saw him blow up at and fire other people for stupid . He lost it at me too once or twice, but he'd calm down after a coupla hours and things would be back to normal. If it looks like an abusive relationship, that's because looking back, that's exactly what it was.
    via u/beerbellybegone
  • 08
    As the year came to an end, I approached Boss and initiated a performance review. I ran him through everything I had done in the past year, and he was pretty surprised at how much I had done with so little. I asked him for a raise, pointing out that I was currently making 8,000/month in local currency (average is 4,500/month) when people with my (now augmented) skill set were making between 13-14,000/month.
    via u/beerbellybegone
  • 09
    I asked him for 12,000. He said he'd get back to me, and never did. Every time I asked him about my raise, he had another excuse. After the last excuse, I began looking for something else.
    via u/beerbellybegone
  • 10
    The other day we had a meeting, and it turns out that two months ago I made a mistake. It wasn't a critical mistake, and it was rectified within a few hours of discovering the mistake. No harm or damage was caused whatsoever to Company, but Bossman flipping LOST IT. I mean slamming on tables, yelling for the whole office to hear, what have you. Then he said the magic words: "Pack your things up and go home. Think about whether you want to keep working here". So that's what I did, and 10 seconds
    via u/beerbellybegone
  • 11
    I started packing my up while he turned an even deeper shade of red and got even louder. I didn't answer him at all, just kept on packing up my things and saying goodbye to my colleagues. Turns out that being ignored really pushed his buttons, to the point where he started threatening to call security to have me removed, while I was actively removing my self and my things from the office.
    via u/beerbellybegone
  • 12
    Here's the part where it gets beautiful: My country is very strict on employee's rights (sorry, Americans, I feel your pain). His words and behaviour are considered an improper dismissal.
    via u/beerbellybegone
  • 13
    By law he's required to give me 30 days notice of dismissal, which he didn't. When he realized his mistake, he convened a pre- dismissal hearing, but it was already too late, he's opened himself up to a lawsuit, which I'm already talking with lawyers about.
    via u/beerbellybegone
  • 14
    Because by law he has to give me those 30 days' notice even though he already fired me, for the next 30 days I'm eligible for ALL the benefits and social rights in my salary, but I can do for him and there's nothing he can do to me without making the incoming lawsuit 10 times worse.
    via u/beerbellybegone
  • 15
    I've already got 4 interviews lined up for next week, paying almost double what Boss was paying me, and best of all, I'll be interviewing for other places on his dime. The cherry on top is that because I'm the only marketing person, without me, nothing happens in the marketing department for the next month, and if he doesn't hire someone on in time, I won't be around to answer any questions the new person might have.
    via u/beerbellybegone
  • 16
    siensunshine. despicable person getting karmic recompense. He could have treated you fairly but didn't. 5.9k Reply Share
    via u/beerbellybegone
  • 17
    2broke-squirells. If you plan on having a lawsuit, maybe remove this post and resubmit after the case closes. 1.7k Reply Share
    via u/beerbellybegone
  • 18
    HWGA_Gallifrey. Remember, your consulting fee is triple your hourly rate... 1.6k Reply Share
    via u/beerbellybegone
  • 19
    Shinhan I beat the previous year's figures in all categories with 10% of the budget. This is the kind of thing that goes great in a cover letter :) Good luck in your next job. 638 Reply Share
    via u/beerbellybegone

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workplace-stories work stories toxic-workplace malicious compliance malicious-compliance-reddit horrible-management toxic-boss Horrible Bosses reddit thread Reddit malicious compliance reddit toxic-work-environment
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