‘She makes me feel like a fraternity pledge’: Bossy coworker treats temp lab tech like a personal assistant, demanding non-work-related chores and favors

Author image for Etai Eshet
Etai Eshet • Editor
Sep 27, 2025 9:00 AM EDT

Some offices churn out future Nobel winners. Others just invent new ways to haze temps for sport, and a twenty-two-year-old lab tech gets to live the dream as a not-quite-pledge to a bossy twenty-four-year-old teammate who treats department chores like personalized initiation rituals. The workspace promises low formality, equal parts teasing and test tubes, and the kind of humor that hints at solidarity until it becomes a game of who-makes-whom-fetch-the-cake.

The lab etiquette this young temp was expecting is one that's supposed to keep things light, especially when there's no customer in sight, but the line between inside joke and unpaid assistant is always sharper for the person fetching crumbs. When job security hinges on likability, the rookie is supposed to laugh off "why are you always sitting" and pitch in with extra scrubbing, even if all the actual learning gets swapped for cleaning experiments and off-brand errands. The campaign escalates when a chair gets physically relocated, not maliciously, just a quirky bit, at least until everyone else starts whispering about boss complaints and a team lead quietly takes notice.

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  • Bossy coworker makes me feel like a fraternity pledge

    Gant chart Hon
    via Roman Samborskyi

    Image is representative only and does not depict the actual subjects of the story.

  • I (22) am a temporary lab technician and I am dealing with a bossy coworker (24) who is a permanent lab technician.
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  • The bossy one forgets to plan, then announces that the junior staffer gets a compulsory bakery pit stop and even critiques grocery store choices, all with a tone that suggests fate rather than delegation. There is no corporate workaround for this, aside from passive resistance dressed up as a polite, off-brand cake, and a steady reminder that being a temp is one thing but playing frat house mascot is strictly optional. In the end, nobody remembers who got the best cake, but everyone always remembers who asked for one like it was an order.

     

  • This coworker believes she has superiority over me even though she has only been with the company for less than two years.
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  • I do not work directly with her but she is on my team. When I first started and didn't have much to do and I told this coworker that I didn't have any work, then she would take it upon herself to delegate her dirty work to me.
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  • By dirty work I mean cleaning fixtures and stuff, nothing that would give me valuable experience.
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    Image is representative only and does not depict the actual subjects of the story.

  • After I realized she would do that, I stopped hanging around in her vacinity until I became more comfortable with everyone.
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  • Then, I was able to go into her lab and have jokes with her. From what I have heard, people that work in labs generally are less formal because they are not customer facing.
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  • That is the format of my team as you can joke with people (to an extent) and not be taken too seriously.
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  • This coworker in the past has joked with me that I am always sitting down in the lab and I have taken every joke lightly because teasing is common on my team.
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  • One day she sees me sitting and takes the chair from underneath me (I stood up so she can take it) and brings it to another lab to prevent me from sitting.
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    via YAKOBCHUK VIACHESLAV

    Image is representative only and does not depict the actual subjects of the story.

  • This is a bit more serious than light hearted teasing and I was slightly annoyed but tried to keep everything light hearted when confronted by other coworkers about the incident.
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  • I did not talk bad about the bossy coworker and insisted that it was a comedy bit.
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  • The other coworkers however did not like the situation and I have been hearing that her boss is working on the way she talks to and treats people and she has not made any comments about me sitting since.
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  • Tomorrow is one of our coworkers birthday and the bossy coworker forgot that we normally get cake for birthdays.
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  • While the birthday girl is in the room, the bossy coworker TELLS me "you're stopping at Trader Joe's and getting a vanilla cake".
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  • Me: "that's not on my way home from work" bossy coworker: "you don't have a bakery near your house?
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  • Don't get a Stop and Shop cake." Me: "I'm supposed to go out to dinner with my mom tonight" I don't remember what she responded with but she kept pushing that it was my responsibility to get the cake just because she delegated that task to me.
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  • I am not directly confrontational so I ended up getting the cake after work. But I also know that she is not my mother and cannot control what I do outside of work.
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  • I know this is not fair to the birthday girl but I ended up getting a cake from a different grocery store chain.
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  • If someone complains about the cake, it's going to look bad on me but at the same time, I didn't even volunteer.
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  • I was TOLD that I am grabbing a cake after work. I know that all of this may sound stupid but so is corporate culture most of the time.
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  • MelonElbows Man, you gotta stand up for yourself. Learn to say no. Learn to say "Hey Karen, you're not my boss, I'm not going to do what you want." And then ignore her for the rest of the day.
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  • canadianhousecoat Sounds like it's time to put your big girl pants on and say no....
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  • Swedish Meatwall Be an adult and stand up for yourself.
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  • Friendlyfire2996 You need a little spine polish.
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  • andyANDYandyDAMN Not in any part of that conversation did you say no
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  • Sexybrownsgr Time for a new job
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  • I_ship_it07 She clearly can control what you do... what a doormat
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  • Key_Armadillo_3395 Don't let her do this, it's going to make you miserable, stand up for yourself, I know you don't like confrontation but sometimes it is just necessary
    via Key_Armadillo_3395

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management boss workplace-stories hr manager bosses work PTO managers supervisor workplace Horrible Bosses work-life balance
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