Employee punished for underperforming for 1 day after over-performing for 2 years, stops doing the extra work they had been doing: 'I handle 40 cases, my daily requirement, and then I do NOTHING for the rest of my shift'

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Brad Dickson • Managing Editor
May 3, 2025 12:00 PM EDT

Going above and beyond in the workplace is a double-edged sword. On the one hand, you want to show your employer your aptitude and the fact that you can excel in your role—hopefully (but not always), eventually leading to a raise or promotion. On the other hand, you're just raising the bar for what your employer "knows" to be possible; any appreciation they might feel initially changes to simple expectation, and then any deviation from that new bar that you have set could result in negative feedback and disapproval. But when you're burning the candle at both ends to make it happen, you're just setting yourself up for some eventual burnout or failure.

After years of extra effort with little to no recognition, one minor dip in production from the bar that they themselves had set led to punishment, the basic expectation at the company where they worked was 40 cases a day, and they had been achieving 50-55 for almost two years at that time. After one day of 39 cases, which were particularly time-consuming and challenging to handle, they were reprimanded and made to attend a course on how to achieve 40 cases a day, a punishment that was absolutely laughable. 

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  • 01

    "Punishing me for underperforming for 1 day in 2 years? No problem."

    Hello everyone, I will try to be concise. BACKROUND I work at a company where I handle mid to high level complaints to managers, PR and legal. My daily requirement is 40 cases handled per day, there are some of my team colleagues that struggle with this, but I don't, and
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  • 02
    Cheezburger Image 10500933376
    via Getty Images For Unsplash+

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

  • 03
    I don't feel lazy to stop at 40, so I have handled 50-55 basically every day for the past two years. There is no bonus (or even recognition) for this, I just did it because I felt a friendly obligation to the company. Complaints can be a 5 minute resolution, or a 2 hour zoom call with our New York lawyers, it's a gamble really.
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  • 04
    THE EVENT Recently I had a day where I felt a bit sick and at the same time, had bad luck of getting only very hard cases that required more time, so I had 39 cases (1 under the requirement). I thought nothing of it, as my weekly average way off the charts, 50+ as usual. The very next day I felt better and went back to my usual high numbers.
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  • 05
    Come Monday, I had a "emergency 1-on-1" with my manager where I was informed that I had to attend a 3 day workshop/seminar on how to best meet requirements, because I "underperformed last week." My jaw dropped, and I asked don't they count the weekly, monthly, yearly numbers, to which I was told that the "daily requirement is 40, and this is standard practice, nothing we can do."
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  • 06
    Basically it was a workshop for underperformers who had 20-30 out of 40 cases daily, it was nothing hard, but I did need to drive there for 3 days after work and listen to HR guys giving bad advice (as they never actually handled the cases in real life) and I had to talk about what will I do to improve my numbers and "reach the 40", as they nonsense HR talk calls it. This made me lose hours and hours of my free time and I was livid.
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  • 07
    After it was over, I had a long think and I decided that I will do exactly that. I will "reach the 40" and that's it. THE AFTERMATH For the past few months, I go into work, I handle 40 cases, my daily requirement, and then I do NOTHING for the rest of my shift.
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  • 08
    I have had multiple 1-on-1's with my manager during this time, and I am constantly asked: "is something wrong", to which I naively reply "no, am in trouble, am I underperforming?" and then of course they say that I am 100% within daily requirements and that way I shut the conversation down.
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  • 09
    This is real life, so I can't really say a clever comeback or something like that, but I do keep "playing the fool" that has no idea what is wrong now, but I find satisfaction in knowing that they got used to my overachieving and are now suffering for the lack of it.
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  • 10
    Before Easter, they put up an internal ad for promoting another 2 managers, so my guess is how that is the number of people they will now need to pay extra, just because they lost me as an overachiever, and they lost me for no reason other than their own stupidity. Thank you all, I hope I did not bore you.
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  • 11
    Loko8765 They gave you a class on how to reach the 40, you are applying what you were taught... Also an example of bad metrics ill-used.
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  • 12
    Aussieomni You had to go AFTER work? They paid you right?
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  • 13
    SeaGranny I would have asked the HR person giving the talk so many questions about the hard cases you get and what to do when the companies lawyers have you on the phone for hours, do you just hang up on them after 10 minutes?
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  • 14
    Sq... I once got sacked from a job because I took too many sick days. It was a temporary contract so they could let me go at any time for any reason. Basic data entry stuff fresh out of university. I still remember sitting in the exit meeting with my
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  • 15
    manager staring daggers at the HR lady and saying "No, it's not about performance it's just policy and there's nothing I can do. In fact I checked the records before this meeting and out of the 280 cases closed by your four person team in the last month you've somehow done 250 of them."
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  • 16
    Pristine-Bluebird-... In the UK, I think that's known as "work to rule". Manglement at its finest! Perhaps it's time to file your own complaint with management about it!
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  • 17
    CoderJoe1 Nothing wrong with analyzing metrics, but once the employees know, the metric is all that matters and defines the business.
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  • 18
    Phenomenomix What company is getting so many "mid to high level complaints" that 40 a day is a target? If they can be resolved in a few minutes then I don't see how they're mid to high level complants.
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