Micromanaging boss takes issue with employee's process, employee maliciously complies by offloading all calls and scanning duties to boss: 'I am not her secretary'

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Ben Weiss • Writer and Editor
Apr 8, 2025 2:00 PM EDT

Sometimes, the only way to stop a micromanager is to overwhelm them. After all, these are the kinds of personalities who need to control the workflow of their employees, and if they're able to spend the majority of their time on the job doing that, then they probably don't have too much on their own plate. That's why the best way to get a micromanager off your back is to figure out how to make them so busy they don't have the mental and emotional bandwidth to bother you.

This employee managed to do just that by offloading their calls and other office responsibilities to their very particular boss following their constant bothering.

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    Cheezburger Image 10491348224
    via Daniil Onischenko

    The image does not depict the actual subjects of the story. Subjects are models.

  • Imagine being on a call with a client and having your boss suddenly interrupt the call to critique you as the conversation is still happening. Furthermore, imagine that you didn't even know that your boss was listening in on your calls. This became a pattern for the author of this story, who ended up handing off many of those calls to their boss, much to his chagrin, in order to prove a point: if you want things done in a way that will only satisfy you, then you should be the one to handle it. 

     

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    TLDR at end. I have a good boss but sometimes you have to teach them a thing or two. My boss is becoming from micromanaging ☐ the b
    via sixuldv8
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    Where I used to be able to do my job I can no longer do it with out constant interruptions of micromanagement. Boss has office near mine, if I handle a business call she listens and tries to control the call from his office. It is impossible
    via sixuldv8
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    for people to do more than one thing at a time. I can not listen to two people at a time when one is on the phone. One conversation depends on verbal skills only and the other is messed up trying to use verbal and non verbal.
    via sixuldv8
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    The customer should be served not the boss. I sort have dealt with this pretty well and cleaver. When I am on phone with someone and eavesdropping boss starts to try to control a simple phone call with "no don't do that, do Ask them _, who is that?, tell them "I become polite cover the phone and say to my boss I have this handled.
    via sixuldv8
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    If boss persist with the micromanagement I then cover the phone and say "Mr. Customer, can you please hold a moment, it is to loud and busy here to understand your needs, if it is ok with you I am going to transfer you to my boss with a private office."
    via sixuldv8
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    Boss then says "no, can't you see I don't have time for that call". I transfer the call that moment and walk away. Boss handles call which they wanted to do in the first place.
    via sixuldv8
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    Next time boss interrupts me on a call I cover the phone, say can you hold one second, and politely ask boss, "do you want this one", look at boss, and wait till their attention goes back to the desk when I then handle call.
    via sixuldv8
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    Now that I have broken that mind numbing habit boss has moved to different interruptions to my work flow. He is clever but I am more so. "Can you copy files from and scan them to me?" Over and over I hear this. Now you do things for
    via sixuldv8
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    your boss but when they run their own small business on company time they tend to take you on as an unwilling partner, asking you to do things they don't have time for, but then you don't have time for your job.
    via sixuldv8
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    Cheezburger Image 10491348992
    via Jonathan Francisca
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    Most of our documents are PDF and our company will not provide us the ability to edit stuff………………..so………………when I cant get my job done I wait till boss wants a document scanned to them.
    via sixuldv8
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    I wait for a one pager that I know they want to use electronically. I retrieve the file, 50% of the time is in boss office, I pull the page they want and I then scan the thing. But the end of the document
    via sixuldv8
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    goes in scanner first so the document will go to boss UPSIDE DOWN and not use able by them. I then announce "I am going on break, would you please return the document to the file" they get the file they can't use and I am not there for them to ask me to rescan.
    via sixuldv8
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    Bonus Revenge: Boss has to go to the scanner to rescan his document. Once he handles it he is obligated by company culture to return it to the file so I comply with his micro management demands and he ends up doing what he should have done in the first place.
    via sixuldv8
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    TLDR; Boss is micro managing, I give him more to manage when he micro manages. My work load diminishes and boss's increases, life is gooooood.
    via sixuldv8
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    CoderJoe1. This is called managing up and is a basic office survival skill that only a few people seem to have.
    via sixuldv8
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    well749mine. Dude, I've had times when I was new at a company and people, not even mgmt, actually asked me to get them coffee. I looked at them and said, "I'm not your secretary." Nip that in the bud right there and also command some respect.
    via sixuldv8
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    cheesepage I had an awful boss once. Learned early that part of my job was to manage him, so as to be able to manage my department without his interference. Put a small sign at my eye level where I worked:
    via sixuldv8
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    "Manage G." No one figured it out thank goodness. Reminded me to put in the few minutes here and there that would save me hours later.
    via sixuldv8

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workplace-stories work stories toxic-workplace job Professional At Work work Horrible Bosses company toxic-work-environment
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