'There is no such thing as business ethics': Top HR nightmare stories featuring entitled bosses and unprofessional coworkers

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Ben Weiss • Writer and Editor
Jul 9, 2024 8:00 AM EDT

Working in human resources requires keeping a lot of drama to yourself. This poses a problem for those of us on the internet who want all the juicy gossip about all the messed up workplace environments so that we can feel ever so slightly better about our own messed up workplace situations.

Thankfully, these HR employees were bold enough to share their stories and spill the tea for the rest of us. It comes as no surprise to report that the vast majority of these anecdotes involve those at the top misbehaving or acting irrationally while on the trippiest of power trips. Yes, every so often there is a story of an unprofessional coworker who oversteps a boundary or two but the frequency of those stories pales in comparison to those about the head honchos. Need we say more about who is ultimately at fault here 99% of the time?

Keep scrolling below for the full list. For more, check out this post about poorly-written job advertisements.

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  • 01
    "I had a bookkeeper [who] paid himself two checks every week. We did not catch it for a year."
    via Tim Gouw
  • 02
    Human resources employees. What are your best "HR nightmare" stories?
    via u/Kristoff___
  • 03
    [deleted] ⚫ I am on the HR team that supports a wide variety of US cities for our company, including our colorful Florida locations. This is the best story I heard.
    via u/Kristoff___
  • 04
    We had some woman trying to avoid doing work by sitting out in her car in the parking lot. While she was hiding out there, she needed to use the restroom. Well, instead of going back inside (or doing literally anything else).
    via u/Kristoff___
  • 05
    she decides to pout her car window. Even though I am also a woman, I was impressed and disgusted by the physics behind this feat. She had stuck her bare outside the window and just went for it. Unbeknownst to her,
    via u/Kristoff___
  • 06
    her male co-worker had arrived at work late due to an appointment. He drove past to find a parking spot as this was happening, and got full view. He then reported the incident to us.
    via u/Kristoff___
  • 07
    One of our HR people had to investigate this, and sure enough, parking lot cameras could corroborate his story. Our HR person confronted the woman. Her response: "Well how did he know it was me?? It could have been anyone."
    via u/Kristoff___
  • 08
    We thought, ok fair enough. The cameras aren't CSI grade zoom, so we only saw the part. It was harder to completely identify the face. So we went back to the male peer and asked how he knew it was her. His response? "Oh it was definitely her. The face tattoos are pretty recognizable." We definitely don't get paid enough for this.
    via u/Kristoff___
  • 09
    - VoidDrink I had one employee submit a form to increase her own salary, she also forged her manager's signature. Like, for real?
    via u/Kristoff___
  • 10
    asdaaaaaaaa E My job is a constant HR nightmare. Boss has slept with coworker A. Coworker A is married to coworker B. Coworker B+A have been married (unhappily), for 10 years or something now, B has no idea, even though B invites boss over for dinner once every other week.
    via u/Kristoff___
  • 11
    Boss is now dating new coworker (my best friend lol), and has already "gifted" her 2000$, despite another coworker suffering from cancer and barely being able to pay the bills when he was still working.
    via u/Kristoff___
  • 12
    My other boss, who owns other lesser half of company has called me a narcicist in a meeting, told me literally "there are no such things as business ethics".
    via u/Kristoff___
  • 13
    That's barely the past couple months, been there for four years. Sorry, not HR, we don't have one.
    via u/Kristoff___
  • 14
    bobbyk I don't work in HR but I do have a nightmare HR story. When I was on my gap year I worked a part time job as a fitness instructor at a leisure centre. One of my coworkers, call him Bill, was a nice guy and I would often sit and chat to him on my breaks etc. Long term GF and baby at home.
    via u/Kristoff___
  • 15
    As part of my job I used to teach spinning classes on a fairly regular basis. I would normally leave my phone in the staff room while I was teaching, or behind the reception desk. Both these places were secure and my phone had a passcode on it. I didn't want it going off while I was teaching because the when it received calls/texts it interfered with the stereo in the spin studio. I didn't have a locker or anything where I could store it.
    via u/Kristoff___
  • 16
    Sometime in around January I was at at uni for an interview weekend. My girlfriend at the time had come to pick me up and while she was waiting in the car, she was scrolling through my messages on my iPad. When I got in the car she showed me one of my chats and said why did you send this video to Bill? I had no recollection of sending any videos to Bill, since I did not speak to him outside of work beyond "I'm going to be late" or similar.
    via u/Kristoff___
  • 17
    I thought it was a mistake but as I scrolled further back up I saw that "I" had sent this same video to Bill a couple of weeks prior. Feeling thoroughly perplexed I clicked into the video and saw it was a video of me (20F) and my girlfriend (26F) on holiday in Thailand. I'd like to stress that it was not a s video, we were just joking around but we had just got out the shower and were both n
    via u/Kristoff___
  • 18
    At this point I'm still thinking it's some kind of big mistake as Bill is a nice guy with a baby at home. However, I look a little closer and realise that the dates/times of when "I" had sent these videos was at times I was teaching spin classes and therefore had left my phone unattended.
    via u/Kristoff___
  • 19
    Bill, being the sicko he was, had the obviously seen me put my passcode into my phone during all the times we had been sat chatting on breaks etc. and had memorised it. He had then taken the opportunity to scroll through all my personal photos and videos when I had left my phone unattended to go and teach classes. I'm assuming that he had deleted the video once,
    via u/Kristoff___
  • 20
    hence why he had sent it to himself again a couple of weeks later. He'd also deleted the chat history from my iPhone but hadn't realised it synced to my iPad (this was in around 2012 btw). I would only have been about 18/19 at the time when the videos were taken.
    via u/Kristoff___
  • 21
    Obviously I reported this to my manager and to HR but it was a bit of a minefield for them to navigate. I don't know what he told them but I imagine it was along the lines of saying I sent them to him of my own free will, how would he have known my password etc. It took a long while to get sorted but in the end he did get sacked, thankfully. The police also paid him a visit so I'm sure he had some explaining to do to his SO.
    via u/Kristoff___
  • 22
    Phat3lvis I had a bookkeeper that paid himself two checks every week. We did not catch it for a year.
    via u/Kristoff___
  • 23
    ClarkinPyxis I used to work for a company that is an HR nightmare. Several events occurred: 1. I was hired as a director of Quality/Regulatory so I come in and start sprucing up documents, policy and all the essential stuff. A VP of sales doesn't take to kindly to fixing the stuff they were lying (fraud) about and tells me in front of HR. "I'm going to make you so miserable that you quit this job" Still works there.
    via u/Kristoff___
  • 24
    2. Another sales guy went into a coma (health issue) and the higher ups decided that they could fire him to keep their insurance cheaper and not pay out his life insurance. Luckily HR pointed out the potential lawsuit, after they debated the cost of the lawsuit and whether they could win they kept him on until he passed a week later.
    via u/Kristoff___
  • 25
    3. When I left, I had my own company they decided they owned any IP I created when I was employed there. I had no contract and non competes aren't legal in my state.
    via u/Kristoff___
  • 26
    4. The C-level employees all were convicted of corruption in multiple countries and are in jail.
    via u/Kristoff___
  • 27
    AmazingPasso ⚫ I had a friend working a GM when HR thought it was a good idea to test everyone on the skill set needed for their department regardless of how long they were in their position. Long careers, 15, 20, 25 years were ruined because even though they worked there for a long time with a long string of great performance reviews, they didn't pass the test that measured what HR thought was required for the department.
    via u/Kristoff___
  • 28
    Say your a materials expert working in a design department. You may know barely enough in the CAD system to draw a cylinder. On the other hand, given a cylinder, you can whip out all the properties that cylinder would have if it were made from aluminum, cold rolled steel, fiber glass etc. You'd be out of your job because HR said you had to have a certain level of CAD expertise even if it wasn't relevant to your role in the design process.
    via u/Kristoff___
  • 29
    Glenn RealGood My company used to give branded gifts to our clients. One employee volunteered to drive one about and hour away, and he took another employee with him. What he didn't tell anyone is that he didn't have a license, his car was unregistered, and his brakes were bad. So inevitably his brakes failed while trying to stop at an intersection, and he totaled his car. Thankfully no one was seriously hurt, but he got into trouble when the cops came.
    via u/Kristoff___
  • 30
    Ladyughsalot1 My favorite was the dude who would have meetings with his boss via camera (he was remote) and while they discussed his (abysmal) performance, he would have n I women get up from his bed and walk around. He was told this was inappropriate several times. Continued. We fired him for fraud, a separate issue that was like a Tarantino film but gives too much away here.
    via u/Kristoff___
  • 31
    Evelyntothestars We had a guy in one of our stores submit a grievance to us about how we were discriminating against him because we were giving a female 7 months pregnant colleague some extra breaks (she had a medical note confirming the reasonable adjustments needed) so she could sit down for an extra 5 mins every so often because he was unable to get pregnant so could not take advantage of the same extra breaks. Didn't really know where to start with that one!
    via u/Kristoff___

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