'I took a video of me dancing on his desk': 20+ Hilarious quitting stories

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Remy Millisky • Writer and Editor
Mar 5, 2024 3:00 PM EST

A good old-fashioned dramatic quitting can really boost morale. When times are already rough at the workplace, watching someone quit with flair can feel so righteous. 

Most people don't quit on the spot. Even if it seems like they're doing that, usually the resentment has been building for some time. There's that common saying that people don't quit bad jobs, they leave due to bad management. Over time, having a micromanaging boss or a supervisor who continually berates you really wears an employee down. One day, that employee will hit their limit and decided they'd rather have no job than take another moment at their current one. Being miserable at a job can break a person down until leaving is all they can think about. 

Luckily, it seems like a lot of people who shared stories of the funniest ways they've ever quit have since found much better jobs. In fact, more than 4,000 people shared their stories of the folks who "quit their job in a hilarious fashion." Some people shared their own stories, while others regaled us with tales of their coworkers' final workplace moments. You can check out all the great anecdotes below. 

Next, this person got a $10,000 revenge on their former boss. 

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  • 01
    K 2.29⁹ 79 polar Pop 'I worked overnights at a gas station through college. After being scheduled to work my 3rd Christmas in a row, on Christmas morning, I gave my boss a card that said "I QUIT!!!"" Omiks 15 Omiles CIRCLE
    via Diego Carneiro on Unsplash
  • 02
    People that quit their job in a hilarious fashion, how did you do it?
    via u/croxy0
  • 03
    The_MonBear My wife worked for a certain chain coffee shop a few years back. She got another job, so requested reduced hours. This didn't happen for 3 straight weeks. During that third week, she had a soccer mom from try to get her attention, by throwing snowballs at her through the drive-
    via u/The_MonBear
  • 04
    thru window. My wife then stopped what she was doing and tossed this soccer mom's iced tea at her (which exploded everywhere) and slammed the window. 5 minutes later she had written her letter of resignation, with the only things she could find: a purple crayon and a sticky note.
    via u/The_MonBear
  • 05
    [deleted] I used to work at a place that rhymes with "Pizza Hut" and the managers there were real cheapskates. There was this nice old man that would come in every Sunday and order a triple extra cheese pizza and while they charged him for the 3x cheese, they would forbid us from ever actually putting
    via u/[deleted]
  • 06
    that much cheese on a pizza because apparently cheese in the pizza selling world is akin to gold. So instead of 3x extra cheese he would really be getting what the instructions would qualify as barely enough for a regular cheese pizza.
    via u/[deleted]
  • 07
    On the day my 2 weeks notice ended the old guy just happened to be my last order so I went into the walk-in and grabbed an entire box of cheese, proceeded to dump the entire thing onto his pizza and tossed it into oven. It was stacked so high that it couldn't even fit into it and half of it was scraped off.
    via u/[deleted]
  • 08
    Anyways, the look on the old guys face when he saw me do this made it all worth it (imagine pure excitement). Needless to say I didn't put the correct phone number down for future job references.
    via u/[deleted]
  • 09
    spikey182 Worked as a teller at a bank for a few years, GM and supervisor were both kind of crappy in their own ways. My buddy there was also a teller who felt similarly and wanted to get out. We started applying to places and both got interviews at the same company. As luck would have it, we both got hired and got
    via u/spikey182
  • 10
    phone calls about 10 minutes apart. There was only one other teller aside from us and when it got busy, supervisor usually had to jump in as well (and usually hated it). It felt like we were constantly short staffed and days when 1 person would call out sick or be on vacation would Being down 2 people was the worst.
    via u/spikey182
  • 11
    Naturally when we both got hired, it became a race to see who could turn in their two weeks notice first. He printed his off and raced into GM's office, walking out with a big smile. GM calls me in and offers me full time hours (after I had been requesting them for months). I jumped in saying "Let me stop you right there, I'm also turning
    via u/spikey182
  • 12
    in my two weeks notice." Remembering that look of disbelief will make me smile every time. A solid professional Eff You is just as enjoyable to me was going out with a bang.
    via u/spikey182
  • 13
    Cypher1710 Wrote a normal letter of resignation before I got in the shower one morning. Nbd. Got into the office and was straight ignored by management. Oh well, my last told you when my day was. Fast forward 3 days they pull me into a conference room to ask what it would take to keep me. I say
    via u/Cypher1710
  • 14
    nothing but don't want to ruin them (sole IT manager for a staff of 70) and would be willing to consult part time. They liked that idea and said they'd be willing to pay me my current hourly as a consultant. I was prepared for this and told them that wasn't what I said. I said that i would consult and my consulting rate was $200/hr. They were flabbergasted and
    via u/Cypher1710
  • 15
    insulted (I was making about $18/hr salary). They thought it was insane even though they'd pay a consulting firm $600/hr when I was on vacation. Needless to say, having planned to quit it was no skin off my back and laughed about it.
    via u/Cypher1710
  • 16
    They didn't take kindly to me laughing about their anger and told me to pack my I did so, got an extra 10 days vacation paid out of it.
    via u/Cypher1710
  • 17
    QU AnotherCleverGuy. My boss was never in the office and wasn't even there for me to turn in my resignation.. So I took a video of me dancing on his desk and singing about how he's never there and sent it to his boss.
    via u/AnotherCleverGuy
  • 18
    Focie Someone at my previous workplace (a huge grocery store in a large mall) went to the PA system we use to issue nessages to the whole mall, and said something along the lines of "dear customers, managers and co-workers. I _ quit", and then proceeded to leave.
    via u/Focie
  • 19
    InternetSpaceship. I wrote a respectful letter thanking them for the opportunity and all they've taught me. The first letter of every sentence spelled out <boss>". Nobody noticed. "I
    via u/InternetSpaceship
  • 20
    daveyb86 I knew someone who worked in a really call centre. His boss never had time for anyone. When he went to tell his boss that he was leaving, the boss waved him out of the room as he was on a call. So he wrote "I quit" on a post-it note, stuck it on the boss's screen and just walked out.
    via u/daveyb86
  • 21
    Your_Lower_Back · I used to work for my Father. It was probably the worst time of my life. He treated me like absolute , paid me very poorly, and made me work 70+ hours a week. I was young, just out of high school, and I complained about my predicament quite a lot. His response was always "if you don't like it, there's the door."
    via u/Your_Lower_Back
  • 22
    6 months before I quit, he made me run his night shift, which meant 6PM -6:30AM monday through saturday. I was very unhappy about this, so I applied for another job. I got it, and went to my Father's office with a list of demands, he responded with his usual reply, so I said, "Alright, I've gotten a job offer somewhere else, you, I quit."
    via u/Your_Lower_Back
  • 23
    The look on his face was priceless. He truly believed that because I had amazing job security that I'd be willing to put up with anything and that I'd stay there for my entire career. In one short, sweet instant, I proved to him that this was not the case, and he lost his most valuable employee.
    via u/Your_Lower_Back
  • 24
    The icing on the cake was the fact that the job that I left him for is at the company that manufactures the very machinery and software he relies on in business. So any time something goes wrong in his factory, he has to call me to fix it for him.
    via u/Your_Lower_Back
  • 25
    Cactusface987 First job when i was 15 for a discount clothing brand store. Head manager was the aunt of our store manager who was 19. Our store manager did nothing most of the time and used to chat to her boyfriend and friends loudly on the store phone...much to the annoyance of everybody.
    via u/Cactusface987
  • 26
    One night its come closing, we are grabbing our coats and getting ready to leave after a really busy day and the store manager storms in, telling us how shes lowered the shutters and wont let us leave untill we have helped her finish the one job she had all day to do cos her aunt is doing a "surprise" inspection in the morning. Everyone is
    via u/Cactusface987
  • 27
    esp the people who have had to watch I her do literally nothing all day. She turns spiteful, threatening to delay our pays, dock our wages etc etc. All . For one woman it was the last straw (she had a kid to pick up from a club) so
    via u/Cactusface987
  • 28
    she waited till she left us alone to work, walked up to the shutters and pulled them up manually by hand. All of us crawled out to freedom. We left her a note saying "Good luck explaining to your aunt why four people just quit."
    via u/Cactusface987
  • 29
    jphiz During my exit interview I told HR the real reason I was leaving was due to the quality of the office chairs. I said they were an eyesore, uncomfortable and made me ashamed to come to work and resulted in sub-par job satisfaction.
    via u/jphiz
  • 30
    Two weeks later I was told by previous co- workers everyone got brand new, top of the line office chairs.
    via u/jphiz
  • 31
    Photog1981 I worked for a law firm doing research and analysis. I wrote a custom program, on my own time, that would automate editing down these huge lists we'd get from an outside vendor, boiling it down to only what we wanted. First, only my team used the code. By the time I left, over 150
    via u/Photog1981
  • 32
    people were using it. Sounds minimal but it was actual a huge time saver. The program would boil down a list ~100 pages long down to about ~10 pages; a process we used to do manually a couple times a day. A layoff was announced, I was part of the outplacement, but the firm wanted to continue using my program. I asked if
    via u/Photog1981
  • 33
    there would be compensation as it was coded on my own time, never paid for it, etc. I was told no and "besides, there's really nothing keeping us from still using it when you're gone." For the remainder of my time (2 years), I would create patches whenever the format of the data changed.
    via u/Photog1981
  • 34
    With my last patch, I put in code that would disable the program and erase key parts of the program one month after my last day. From what I understand from people still with the firm, on day X everyone came in, booted their machines, and the program was simply gone. Efficiency fell through the floor, delaying opening
    via u/Photog1981
  • 35
    cases, billing clients, etc. I wanted 10k, they lost more than that in the first week without the program. Edit: some have stated I might have been in a position to sue for compensation instead. This was a huge law firm, billed in the hundreds of millions a year, had thousands of
    via u/Photog1981
  • 36
    very talented attorneys. I could have sued, sure, but they could have made it so expensive for me, dragged it out so long, it would have cost me way too much in the long run.
    via u/Photog1981
  • 37
    [deleted] I was working for argos as a Christmas job while studying. After a while it was becoming too much as I had to stay in work until deliveries were unpacked; this meant that some days I was leaving for college at 8.30am and not getting home until 1am that night.
    via u/[deleted]
  • 38
    One night it was a particularly large delivery and it was getting very late with no end in sight. I decided I'd had enough and told the supervisor I was finished, didn't want to do the job anymore and wanted to go home. He rejected this and said that I was going nowhere until the delivery was unpacked.
    via u/[deleted]
  • 39
    I stood in front of him and repeated that I quit therefore I don't care about the delivery, completing my studies was more important to me than earning a bit of extra cash. He still said I was going nowhere and refused to unlock the door to let me out. Despite feeling I had a case for false imprisonment I decided to take
    via u/[deleted]
  • 40
    matters in to my own hands; I ran out the fire escape door and down the street never to return. I'll always remember the sound of the fire escape door making a big DOOONG as it hit the metal railings and I made my escape to freedom.
    via u/[deleted]
  • 41
    definitelynotme_ Worked in the cinema as a teenager. Came in late for work after they changed my schedule during my days off and didn't think to mention it to me. Boss lost it and started shouting at me, as far as I'm concerned if you need to shout I ain't listening. So let her rant away for a good 15 mins while I was at my locker clearing it
    via u/definitelynotme_
  • 42
    out. When it finally clicked that I wasn't listening or getting ready to work she stopped and asked what I'm doing I said " going to see lotr with the lads who've just finished as I'm doing nothing else with my evening, may go for a pint after. what's your plans? "
    via u/definitelynotme_
  • 43
    Prettygoodpizza I wrote my two week notice on a condolence card that said, "I can't comprehend the depth of your loss." Saw someone else do it online, ordered my own and held onto it until a better job offer came along. It went over well.
    via u/Prettygoodpizza
  • 44
    [deleted] I managed to find a telemarketing job as one of my first jobs. It sucked and we were treated like animals, but it was close enough that I could walk there from home. I only intended to stay long enough to afford a car. One day, I realized that I had reached my set dollar amount for a car
    via u/[deleted]
  • 45
    purchase. As a joke, I strayed as far from the sales pitch as possible. I changed my greeting to things like "Hey." or ""Sup?" I impersonated celebrity voices. People stopped working around me. They just listened in shock. But it completely backfired.
    via u/[deleted]
  • 46
    It was my highest day of sales ever. I sold 10 times my average. The pit boss was bewildered, which is why I wasn't fired right away (he listened in on all my calls that day). He begged me to stay, but I was out.
    via u/[deleted]
  • 47
    CashingOutInShinjuku · It's the middle of the lunch rush at the restaurant. It's a gorgeous day but the porch is closed, so myself and this poor middle aged waitress are taking everyone who expected to sit outside into our room. We're providing service because usually there are 5 servers for
    via u/CashingOutInShinjuku
  • 48
    this many people, not two. I ask the manager if she wouldn't mind calling people in to open up the porch, which is where all of these people are expecting to sit. She goes off on me. "Are kidding you me?" I exclaim. "YOU JUST SWORE AT A MANAGER. YOU'RE FIRED!" I was going to
    via u/CashingOutInShinjuku
  • 49
    be back at college in two weeks so I really didn't give a . The thing is, she had to cash me out first. So for those ten minutes I quietly cussed her out in front of everyone until she started screaming her head off in the middle of the restaurant. She was fired a couple weeks later.
    via u/CashingOutInShinjuku
  • 50
    [deleted] Worked at Arby's. When I planned to quit I typed up a formal letter of resignation and put it in an envelope. I walked in and handed my boss the envelope and she said "ARE YOU QUITTING?" I stammered "No!!!" as I walked backwards out the door and booked it out of there.
    via u/[deleted]
  • 51
    I wasn't very good with confrontation back then.
    via u/[deleted]
  • 52
    ssuperhanzz My boss was a had me on a disciplinary for something that wasnt my fault, and had my bonus taken off me. So i found a new job, threw out £2,500 worth of stock as technically the food hadn't been stored away correctly,
    via u/ssuperhanzz
  • 53
    went above my boss and got head offices backing, then handed my notice in, knowing that id his bonus up to. THAT. GUY.
    via u/ssuperhanzz
  • 54
    LasersAndRobots. Not my story, but one a coworker told me. The guy who it turned out I had replaced knew he was going to be fired and wanted to quit ahead of time in style. So he enlisted the help of the guy who told the story, and spent the entire day fashioning a suit of Spartan armor out of cardboard boxes in the back.
    via u/LasersAndRobots
  • 55
    Then, right as they were closing (because he was still a decent guy and didn't want to make a scene) he donned his armor, walked up to the atone manager, saluted with his cardboard sword, and with a straight face asked "Permission to leave your employment to go on campaign, sir." Without waiting for a reply, he saluted again and walked out.
    via u/LasersAndRobots
  • 56
    I would have thought some details were embellished, but the guy showed me the video.
    via u/LasersAndRobots
  • 57
    Tmon_of_QonoS I worked over nights at a gas station through college. After being scheduled to work my 3rd Christmas in a row, on Christmas morning, I gave my boss a card that said "I QUIT!!!"
    via u/Tmon_of_QonoS
  • 58
    CaptainKingChampion. This is a long one, but hopefully worth the read. A little after high school, I worked in a fish market attached to a full restaurant. We had a couple small bar tables by the market/restaurant shared entrance. I didn't like working there very much
    via u/CaptainKingChampion
  • 59
    because it was a fairly place to work, but I was good at the job and their go-to guy for closing shifts, doing inventory, etc. The job of the opening/morning crew was to filet fish for the day and prep King Crab leg portions for dinner. Morning is pretty much dead so the morning shift is waaaaay easier.
    via u/CaptainKingChampion
  • 60
    The job of the night/closing crew was to clean, de-vein and peel several thousand shrimp (of multiple sizes) in time for dinner. This shift was much harder because we had steady business from 4PM onward with a rush from 7-10, but all of your duties still needed to be completed.
    via u/CaptainKingChampion
  • 61
    I came in for the night crew around 2pm on a Saturday, the last day of the pay period. I discovered the morning crew did all during their shift and was still around until 4 when they left. I spoke with the manager and he said "Unbelievable! I'll have a talk with them and when the second night crew guy gets here at 7, you can get cleaned up and be a
    via u/CaptainKingChampion
  • 62
    host." This was a sweet deal because we almost never got tips in the market and the hosts got tipped out by servers. I agreed to his terms. I finished fileting the fish, then did about a hundred portions of king crab legs. Finished with the morning crew's work, I did about 2 thousand shrimp and noticed it was 7:15. I looked in
    via u/CaptainKingChampion
  • 63
    front of the market and saw Oscar, the second night crew guy, seating people. He looked right at me and smiled like a cheeky little . I went to the manager and he said "Oh, Oscar is fresh so we're just going to have him be the host and you can close up tonight. I'll sign off on your OT." That's when I realized Oscar was wearing a nice long sleeve button-down shirt and not the
    via u/CaptainKingChampion
  • 64
    polo they had the market guys wear. This meant the manager called him and told him to dress for the host role that night. WHAT THE was not the agreement. I didn't want to do any OT. I was supposed to be out at 10:30 and we closed at 1 AM. ?! This Around 7 is when the place really started to
    via u/CaptainKingChampion
  • 65
    get busy so I popped back in front to run the market. Some friends of mine showed up asking when I got off because they were going to the movies. I told them to go find out what was playing and what the times were. Since I was the only one doing transactions and filling market orders (clam chowder, shrimp cocktails, fish
    via u/CaptainKingChampion
  • 66
    and chips, raw fish orders) the line was building until it hit about 10 people in line. My friends came back and said the movie started in 45 minutes. The theater was in the same parking lot, so getting there would be easy. I said "Give me 30 minutes. Get me a ticket and someone meet me in front so the rest can get us seats."
    via u/CaptainKingChampion
  • 67
    For the next 15 minutes I worked at about 1/4 speed. The line hit well over 20 people. The food was not great, but for some reason people were stubborn? I clocked out on the register and walked out from behind the counter. To the next person in line I said "I have to clean this table and somebody will be right with you!"
    via u/CaptainKingChampion
  • 68
    I walked right out the door and threw my apron in the trash. I went to my car to swap shirts, threw on a hat and walked back by the restaurant. Oscar had to put on an apron over his nice shirt and slacks to start filling fish orders in the market and people were yelling at him about the wait. I laughed and went to the movies. That movie was Death to
    via u/CaptainKingChampion
  • 69
    Smoochie, and it holds a special place in my heart to this very day. Epilogue: I came home with my friends to a bunch of voicemails from the manager. I told them the story and they were laughing as we listened to the messages a few times. "CaptainKingChampion ?! WHERE THE ARE YOUUUUU?!"
    via u/CaptainKingChampion
  • 70
    "CaptainKingChampion ?! YOU BETTER GET YOUR BACK HERE!" "CaptainKing Champion ! YOU ARE FIRED PAL! THANKS FOR NOTHING!" I called in the next Thursday and got the manager who 1 me over on the phone. I said "This is CaptainKingChampion. When can I can pick up my last check?"
    via u/CaptainKingChampion
  • 71
    "Wait, you mean CaptainKingChampion who left in the middle of his shift CaptainKing Champion? !" "Yeah." "You can come get it today. I have something I'd like to say to you." "OK. See you in a couple hours." I went in about 30 minutes later and the hostess
    via u/CaptainKingChampion
  • 72
    on duty was my friend. I told her I was there to get my check and she said "Oh, I can get it for you. I'll be right back!" She walked into the manager's office and grabbed my check for me. I left with my check and he didn't get to have his final rant at me for quitting after he me over for the last time.
    via u/CaptainKingChampion
  • 73
    TL;DR I quit by walking out the door after I let a line of 20+ customers build up for 15 minutes, then went to see Death to Smoochie and got my final check a week later without my manager able to get the last word in.
    via u/CaptainKingChampion
  • 74
    [deleted] Not me, but a great story. One guy I worked with hired a mariachi band to follow him into our bosses office. Unfortunately for him the boss was on vacation so he ended up quitting over the phone and was so he spent the $300 on the band.
    via u/[deleted]
  • 75
    [deleted] I gave in my two weeks notice wearing socks and sandals.
    via u/[deleted]

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