'No one knew how Frank kept his job': 15+ Incompetent coworkers who kept their jobs no matter what

Author image for Remy Millisky
Remy Millisky • Writer and Editor
Sep 23, 2024 5:00 PM EDT

We can't all be top performers at our jobs. Some people will be the absolute best at what they do, though most will be somewhere in the middle. Then there are the people who are so bad at their jobs, so breathtakingly incompetent that it genuinely makes you wonder how they've kept their job this long. 

It doesn't make sense how some of our coworkers can continaully do a very poor job at their actual job, and yet remain tin he position and even get raises or promotions. Sometimes they're nepo babies, and if you're the boss's kid, the expectations are going to be pretty low. But others are just regular employees, according to the folks who replied to u/lcasey14's question for the r/AskReddit community. 

One person shared that their coworker often takes off Mondays. And Fridays. And sometimes both days in a single week. They can't fathom how this dude is still employed! Is he maxing out his PTO, or has he found a loophole? No one knows for sure… 

Up next, this IT employee didn't have to disrupt a retail store with their work, but a store manager refused to help until, "A cashier bursts into the room, panicked… lines are getting backed up." 

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    Cheezburger Image 10408158976
    via Vitaly Gariev on Unsplash

    This image is for illustration only, and the subjects are models; the image does not depict the actual subjects of the story.

  • 02
    Who's your "how tf have they not been fired?!" Coworker and what have they done to earn that title?
    via u/lcasey14
  • 03
    Captain_Coco_... Worked for a company that tested soil samples for mining companies. Each test had to be given 0.002 (within .0001) of a gram of a white substance (can't remember what is was called).
    via u/Captain_Coco_Koala
  • 04
    So the company wins a MASSIVE Contract and there is a lot of work to be done, too much for the lab so they start falling behind. The manager/accountant tells everyone that to speed things up you are to put 0.02 (within 0.005) of a gram instead (do you know how long it takes to measure out 0.002 of a gram??). But the results all come back WRONG and the
    via u/Captain_Coco_Koala
  • 05
    mining company wastes. $300m mining for copper(?) that wasn't there, and successfully sue us. 300 people lost their job, which was 50% of the companies work force. Manager who made the bad call didn't lose his job as he denied he told everyone to make the gram change, even though there were about 30 witnesses who said he told them directly.
    via u/Captain_Coco_Koala
  • 06
    I started work at this company about 2 years after this event; I have NEVER heard so much abuse and vitriol about a person as this manager, nobody in the company had any respect for him and treated him with absolute disdain. There were signs on the doors of some labs telling him he was banned from entering; people used to tell him to 'F off' in the corridor as they
    via u/Captain_Coco_Koala
  • 07
    walked past him. I tried to stay neutral but when I heard what happened ...
    via u/Captain_Coco_Koala
  • 08
    Snowtwo My boss at Walgreens. When she took the position from the prior shift she promptly canceled the overnight shift which was a problem cause that was when we got things like cleaning and restocking *done*. She then shoveled those responsibilities onto the evening shift but didn't increase their staffing
    via u/Snowtwo
  • 09
    numbers. Instead she *fired* people on that shift for having the audacity to use vacation time. So even though the store had a 'three employee minimum' we often had two, occasionally dipping down to one if, for any reason, the other person couldn't make it in (like being sick). Even if both people were in it wasn't a small store and they were expected to clean and
    via u/Snowtwo
  • 10
    restock it while dealing with the large amount of customers that only petered off around 9-10ish. Since the store closed at 11 that only left about 1 hour when had to get done, and there were still customers, just not as many. She then routinely ignored vacation time requests even if they had been filed months in advance, threatened people with firing
    via u/Snowtwo
  • 11
    if they didn't come in while sick, and harassed any employee who wasn't working with 100% uptime. So if you, say, took a moment to sit down cause you had been on your feet for 8 hours, or if you weren't facing the store despite seeing a customer blatantly coming up to check out, she'd get furious.
    via u/Snowtwo
  • 12
    It was next to impossible to avoid write-ups, her chewing you out, ignoring requests, and everything. At least if you weren't on her shift. Oddly, not only was her shift properly staffed *always*, but every employee on it got a favorable review complimenting their 'hard work' even if they were entirely inept. My bosses. boss worked at another
    via u/Snowtwo
  • 13
    Walgreens nearby and I got sent over to help with the Halloween rush. He was utterly baffled how the 'lazy and inept' employee had completely restocked the entire store and cleaned it and everything two hours before the shift was scheduled to be done leaving no work *to* be done. Even when I explained to him what was going on, he didn't believe me.
    via u/Snowtwo
  • 14
    When I finally moved away and had to quit, she asked how much time I needed off and said she could give me two weeks at most. I laughed and told her I was giving her a two weeks notice. My sole regret is that now, four years later, I had to move again and the only large employer in the area is a different Walgreens and I'm too scared to apply
    via u/Snowtwo
  • 15
    cause they'll probably have me on file saying I did a bunch of horrible stuff.
    via u/Snowtwo
  • 16
    rosesforthemon... When I worked in the nursing home laundry room, my co-worker literally refused to do the job she was hired for she actually -- told the supervisor she wasn't going to do it. Not just that, but she didn't do anything else, either. She spent more time on the smoker's porch than in the laundry room. She drove her friends home while she was
    via u/rosesforthemonsters
  • 17
    on the clock. She refused to pick up the soiled laundry more than once or twice per shift, even though she was supposed to pick it up four or five times. People would tell me that they didn't see her for hours at a time and quite often questioned whether she was actually there or not. She once called the supervisor and told her that she wasn't coming in to work that day because she
    via u/rosesforthemonsters
  • 18
    was too drunk. She was also working in the nursing home kitchen and would leave the laundry room to go work in the kitchen, because they paid her more to work in the kitchen. Even after she was told (multiple times) to change into clean scrubs before going in the kitchen, she would still wear the scrubs she had on while working in the laundry room,
    via u/rosesforthemonsters
  • 19
    then go into the kitchen to prepare food. This woman got the same evaluation score that I got and the same raise that I got, even though I was doing 99% of the work.
    via u/rosesforthemonsters
  • 20
    moot17 Sleeping on the job. Sleeping within half an hour of arrival, mid morning nap until lunch, afternoon napping. Sleeping through. closing time and left sitting to wake up hours after everyone leaves (people drive by and report the car is still in the parking lot two- three hours after closing.
    via u/moot17
  • 21
    False documentation that things were done that weren't, because of sleeping. Missing documentation of things. that were done, but forgot about, because of sleeping. Promises to customers with no delivery because they fall asleep after the conversation.
    via u/moot17
  • 22
    Niloco Frank. No one knew how Frank kept his job. Frank and I were both in tech support - fairly low level, but at least it was internal tech support rather than customers. Frank took either Monday or Friday off, every single week. He'd call in sick. Sometimes he'd take both.
    via u/Niloco
  • 23
    We didn't have anywhere near that much PTO or sick days, but he never got in trouble for it. Not clear if they were all paid days off or if they just gave him unpaid PTO after a while - but we assumed paid since nothing was ever mentioned and he never stopped calling in sick.
    via u/Niloco
  • 24
    You'd think it was nepotism or cronyism keeping him employed, but we never saw any evidence of that, and honestly he'd probably have. a cushier job if that was the case. Baffling.
    via u/Niloco
  • 25
    blackbubbleass a male manager (44) committed adultery with his female subordinate (20) by exploiting his authority. and the girl issued it to compliance department. it resulted the girl ended up moving her position somewhere branch. the manager got no consequences.
    via u/blackbubbleass
  • 26
    uarstar She's currently on leave sulking after she got written up from me reporting her. She's wildly incompetent, I've taken over part of her job while she's been gone and the issues I've found are astounding.
    via u/uarstar
  • 27
    She's also extremely unpleasant. She works from home 3 days a week because she's so unpleasant to everyone our boss doesn't want her in the office.
    via u/uarstar
  • 28
    WholesomeArm... So, I Knew a guy who caught 2 article 15s (the Army's version of a Super-Duper write up) back to back for fighting, one was a dude in his platoon, the other his PSG, he genuinely didn't give a and was surprised when finally, a year after his pattern of
    via u/WholesomeArmsDealer
  • 29
    misconduct they finally kicked his out. I was only there the last few months of his time in service, but his attitude before learning he was being kicked out and after were virtually the same.
    via u/WholesomeArmsDealer
  • 30
    e . He was inept, an and his work was embarrassing to be associated with. I think he must have used a speculum to maximize the effects of his ass kissing.
    via u/everyonemr
  • 31
    Omegaprimus A previous job the CFO was the CEO's brother so he had a get out of jail forever card. Few of the highlights. Would put himself into projects he was not a part of, and penalized the team by shorting deadlines just cause. Two examples of this that destroyed the company. project 1 which I was a part of. The project was to make
    via u/Omegaprimus
  • 32
    a self service kiosk for license plate renewals original deadline was from September till August. So the project manager assigned the needed development people, got the hardware people on board work began progress was going smoothly the stand up meetings showed great progress hardware passed testing everything was compatible, the back end
    via u/Omegaprimus
  • 33
    was coming around great, the front end needed a little work, the manufactured prototype was slated to be completed being built on March 15th so we would have an actualized system to test on. March 15 comes the prototype isn't quite ready it would be in on the 17th not a big deal since the deadline is in August. The stand up meeting on the 18th the CFO is there
    via u/Omegaprimus
  • 34
    "Alright, why in the is the prototype just now getting unloaded!?!! This goes live on April 15th". Literally everyone including the project manager turned at once and said "what in the are you talking about April, the contract states August" CFO:"Well | just changed it". So a month of scrambling ensues, the front end is kind of a hot mess, the back end has
    via u/Omegaprimus
  • 35
    some catastrophic issues that could cause the whole system to collapse. The April the 10th stand up this is expressed, the CFO said "not my problem, oh and we need to change several key components, as we are wanting the ability to use dumb card swipes" so now the hardware has to be changed, and the software has to change to accommodate dumb card
    via u/Omegaprimus
  • 36
    readers. The pile of that was there at April 18th was 10,000% the CFO's fault, like 3 front end devs quit at that point and 5 back end devs quit. A stable version of that system was around August, but the CFO shipped out in April cause he gets stuff done, he shipped a box full of dog . Project 2 this project was to be a full rewrite of the main software project deadline was 2 and a
    via u/Omegaprimus
  • 37
    half years out, the CFO pulled the SAME cramming it down to 9 months, that project lost the entirety of the back end team 4 times, and by that I mean there was no one on the team they had to hire all new people who had to figure it out because no one was there. That project eventually was scrapped entirely $7 million dollars.
    via u/Omegaprimus
  • 38
    pretty much set on fire for no god damned reason. Company got bought out the new company's first order of business was to fire the CFO.
    via u/Omegaprimus
  • 39
    B One calls in 3 days a week and is just an overall to everyone. She makes things more difficult than it should be. She goes to our supervisor anytime someone breathes the wrong way. Somehow she got bonuses just for doing her job yet when I covered for her that was the first time someone's room had been cleaned in months.
    via u/Bikinigirlout
  • 40
    One used to get treated with kid gloves by the former bosses that the one time she was written up for something, she took the day off afterwords. She has some emotional problems that no one wants to set off, me personally, I don't give a cause I'll just roll my eyes. She doesn't do any extra detailed work.
    via u/Bikinigirlout
  • 41
    Willing Public Worked for a large subsidiary which was a consistent money maker for its parent company. Parent Company decided their stock was too low and so mandated that our subsidiary lay off 100+ people. The boss of our CEO flew in to personally make the cuts along with his head of HR. The goal was mostly to cut older, higher earners
    via u/Willing Public
  • 42
    rather than focus on cutting dead wood. Felt particularly bad for one guy in his mid- 50s who was a stellar worker who had a kid in college. They also fired the guy sitting next to him who was a pretty recent hire who was an absolute moron and also wasted everyone's time in chit-chat (I think he was on the list because this was a brand new position). This moron broke down crying in
    via u/Willing Public
  • 43
    front of the corporate bigwigs and said how long it had taken him to get the job and he didn't know what he would do. The corporate bigwig fell for it and the moron kept his job! The cuts were already a morale killer, but keeping the moron just added salt to the wound.
    via u/Willing Public
  • 44
    auntbubble So I will say they eventually fired dude, but it took months. Dude would sleep in the shop. Feet propped up, arms folded over chest, chin down to chest straight sleeping. Multiple pictures were taken. He stole from the pantry, from housekeeping, probably from the maintenance shop.
    via u/auntbubble
  • 45
    He took the shuttle for joyrides and would put upwards of 40 miles on it a NIGHT. Went into the pool shed and slept. Adjusted his time to get more hours by never actually clocking in and instead using time adjustment forms saying he was there 2 hours before he ever showed up. Walked around on his phone constantly. Stood at the tv in the lobby watching football.
    via u/auntbubble
  • 46
    I was so glad when they finally fired him.
    via u/auntbubble
  • 47
    WhiskeyxWhisk... I'm a bank teller and I trained this girl about 3 years ago. She went through all the training modules (3 times) and still did not understand our teller system. Our system is so painfully bare bones it literally has a button for "deposit" or "Loan payment" or "cash check/withdrawal", etc. For the record, I've never had an issue with
    via u/WhiskeyxWhiskers
  • 48
    anyone else I've trained. There are some growing pains, obviously, but nothing. ever like this. Constant policy violations like straight up leaving cash around, having massive amounts of cash in her drawer, depositing into wrong accounts, even took money out of the wrong account, giving incorrect amounts of cash (even tho we literally have a machine that
    via u/WhiskeyxWhiskers
  • 49
    dispenses cash for us...). She's a mess. So anyway, she got a promotion recently to a banker position! That's wild on its own, but she also got supervisor capabilities. And when you have those, you can override yourself. So like if there's a difference, or a transaction needs to be reversed, etc., you can override it and override those who don't have
    via u/WhiskeyxWhiskers
  • 50
    supervisor numbers. She's already overrided herself 3 times. Once was to void a transaction after she had already given the customer a receipt. She said the date was stale dated bc they put 23 instead of 24. So she voided it and called the customer (business customer) to say you need. to come get this WHOLE DEPOSIT (13 checks + cash) instead of just letting the
    via u/WhiskeyxWhiskers
  • 51
    check go through, OR just depositing it without that particular check. The customer comes in days later. Customer and my other coworker are adding up these numbers. The customer is getting 1,000 and my coworker is getting 915. They deposit the checks and move on. The customer called an hour later and said we're getting a discrepancy bc there was cash in the original deposit.
    via u/WhiskeyxWhiskers
  • 52
    Well, I didn't take the cash out of her drawer originally. So she was over 64 dollars on the day of the original transaction. And then the next time she had her drawer out, she was over by 21 dollars. Equals 85 dollars. Which she should have been off the day of the transaction, not 64. None of us knew any of this because she can override herself.
    via u/WhiskeyxWhiskers
  • 53
    She either a) can't count or b) broke up the difference in 2 different days. Neither of those are good options. She's also been leaving cash around again. Fun stuff.
    via u/WhiskeyxWhiskers
  • 54
    xiviajikx Had someone do something. stupid to get hacked and lost six figures over a misdirected payment. Same woman six months later does the same thing for a large five figure payment. Only then after six months go by and the money couldn't be recovered they said time for them to go.
    via u/xiviajikx

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