15+ Employees who defied their bosses and still didn't get fired: 'Manager... wakes me up and sends me home. Didn't get fired'

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Remy Millisky • Writer and Editor
Nov 15, 2025 11:00 AM EST

If you've ever dozed off during work, only to snap awake as your boss entered the room, you're in good company — these people also had bad days at work that they didn't get fired for. 

Office workers know all about the 3 PM sleepiness that catches you off guard. One moment you're filling out a spreadsheet, the next moment you're snapping yourself awake as the boss enters the room. Oops! It's time for another coffee before you power through those last few hours of work. 

That's just a little tiny mistake that anyone could make, and to be honest, you probably wouldn't get fired for accidentally dozing off at your job. But some people accidentally slept through their entire 8-hour shift! And other workers did way worse things than that, and yet they still finagled their way out of any major punishments. For example, one person deleted an entire national database! They didn't get fired because they had a sneaky backup… whatever satisfies the boss! Keep scrolling to read a bunch of other additionally startling stories of people who made giant mistakes, got found out, and still got away with it. 

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  • 01

    'What was the dumbest thing you ever did on your job and still did not get fired?'

    Older man with gray hair in suit looks disdainfully at sleeping employee wearing headset
    via Getty Images For Unsplash+

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

     

  • 02
    In3briatedPanda I've heard a tech tell our service manager: 'I'm going to take the rest of the day off for my mental health and for your physical health!' He is still employed and I've stored that nugget in my back pocket.
    via u/In3briatedPanda
  • 03
    Narrow-Palpitati... There have been tons of times in multiple jobs where I've just wasted time or been on social media at work. Then suddenly something wasn't done, and my boss would ask why, and I'd say "oh man sorry I was so overwhelmed" and they'd always buy it.
    via u/Narrow-Palpitation22
  • 04
    t.. -Went to club on a Tuesday, ended up staying til the end at 4am -Got home at like 5am -Remembered I had to open the bank tomorrow at 7am, with a manager -Didn't sleep, got dressed and went straight there -Stank up the whole vault with tequila -10 minutes after the bank
    via u/tyrwlive
  • 05
    opened, I went to the washroom upstairs to puke, then proceed to pass out - Manager knocks on door, wakes me up and sends me home Didn't get fired
    via u/tyrwlive
  • 06
    Leading Guide693 My boss walked in with the ugliest hat ever. Being the genius I am I said "ah that's how you know you're the boss, you've been here for an hour and not one person has made fun of that ridiculous hat". I really don't know how I didn't get fired.
    via u/LeadingGuide693
  • 07
    D. During my first week on the Job my boss was introducing me to people in the different departments, we went in the main server room. As he was introducing me to the IT staff, someone came through the door and I jumped backwards to avoid being hit. My back hit the emergency shutoff button to be used in case of fires and the like and shutdown
    via u/Dervrak
  • 08
    everything cold. Took nearly three days to get the servers back up and all the data restored. I didn't get in any trouble for it because it was clearly an accident. In fact soon after they put a plastic box over the button that had to be lifted before the button could be pressed. To the day I left the company 10 years later, they called that box "The Ryan Cage" after me.
    via u/Dervrak
  • 09
    BanisienVidra Deleted an entire national inventory database. Luckily I had an unauthorised backup on a drive on my desk so I replaced the whole thing in 20 minutes.
    via u/BanisienVidra
  • 10
    Old_Sweaty_Han... Had an enterprise router down Accidentaly Reflashed the wrong Router..... took another 1500 customers down. Realized it and let my boss know that I was a moron.
    via u/Old_Sweaty_Hands
  • 11
    Boss laughed and said "thanks for taking responsibility for it, are they both back up?" "Yep" "OK good work but be more careful next time lol"
    via u/Old_Sweaty_Hands
  • 12
    PickleNutsauce In the early 80's one of my first jobs was working at a gas station that offered full service. Long story short. I filled a lady's diesel Mercedes Benz with gasoline. I felt like a moron, but fortunately I caught my error before she tried to
    via u/PickleNutsauce
  • 13
    start her car. She insisted that I suffer no consequence and paid for her own towing and repair. Turns out that this very nice lady was also a cougar lol.
    via u/PickleNutsauce
  • 14
    B. Big time corporate company. Flirted pretty seriously with the recruiter / HR lady at the job fair and got an interview and eventually hired. We continued to awkwardly flirt over the next year or two (she became my HR rep), so intensely we made a few other co-workers uncomfortable.
    via u/B***master9002
  • 15
    Jokes on them though - we'll be married 15 years in November and I still flirt with her all the time.
    via u/B***master9002
  • 16
    Employee in black shirt in darkened office leans head on hand, to her right an employee in red shirt and headset sleeps in chair
    via Getty Images For Unsplash+

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

  • 17
    Horror-Mud7552 Came to work hangover ended up falling asleep the whole 8hour shift
    via u/Horror-Mud7552
  • 18
    ricgreen1 Coworker (friend) sent a company wide email stating that he would be coming in after lunch. I replied to him. insinuating that he was finally getting circumcised. Started hearing random giggles, people coming up to me telling me "good one".
    via u/ricgreen1
  • 19
    To my horror I realized I REPLIED TO ALL. Went to IT to see if they could retract my email, they laughed and said Nope! I was so nervous the rest of the day, but nothing happened.
    via u/ricgreen1
  • 20
    aussydog Not me but a friend. I've shared this before so people might recognize the story. My friend worked for a consulting company that did work with companies for their automation in factories. At the time he was tasked with working at a beer manufacturing company, one of the largest in North America. Anyways, the task
    via u/aussydog
  • 21
    was something simple like swap out a temperature sensor and update the program with the new gear. Well buddy gets a little ambitious and thinks he knows a better way to optimize the code. So he deletes some stuff, re-codes some stuff, apply, save, clocks out and goes home. Job well done, right? Well no.
    via u/aussydog
  • 22
    Something he did to the code ended up causing it to no longer take reports from the temperature sensors. As a result I guess a few giant vats of fermenting beer over heated and the yeast died or something. Effectively he ruined somewhere in the neighborhood of 80,000 - 100,000 gallons of beer. He some how did not get fired. He got ripped off that job and immediately got
    via u/aussydog
  • 23
    sent to a different job in a different province. The job? Manning the water pumps at the bottom of a potash mine. He literally got punished by being sent to the mines. Fkn hillarious. ....but how he didn't get fired from the beer massacre I have no idea.
    via u/aussydog
  • 24
    Own_Grapefruit... Wrote "help me, I'm trapped at Little Caesars Pizza" in the top of a pizza box when I was in high-school and folding boxes at the start of my shift. It made it to the customer and he called the store. Everyone laughed and I was told I was lucky they didn't call the cops. Ahhh... 1996.
    via u/Own_Grapefruit_710
  • 25
    C-3Pinot not necessarily all on me--I used to work silkscreen and we used to do a bunch of frat/sorority t-shirt runs. The client supplied the artwork and my boss would create the positives to burn the screens. I printed about 300 of them. when the client came to pick them up and the boss showed her, we
    via u/C-3Pinot
  • 26
    realized they said "Some Dance to Rembember, Some Dance to Forget". the girl had made the error, my boss had recreated the error and I had looked at them for about three hours printing them and none of our brains had registered the misspelling. i think we gave them to her for half off
    via u/C-3Pinot
  • 27
    Woman in blue shirt and white pants holds laptop while sleeping on couch
    via Resume Genius on Unsplash+

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

  • 28
    mryotoad Not me (and I hope he doesn't see this) but a former coworker had a reputation but wasn't fired. Two of the memorable incidents that lead to the reputation: He was transporting an iMac upright on a cart, the kind that they used to have classroom projectors on.
    via u/mryotoad
  • 29
    Leaving the elevator the wheel dropped into the gap a bit and the iMac was no longer upright, or on the cart. Another time he was cleaning a laptop and grabbed a can of compressed air off the shelf. Sprayed all over the keyboard and screen before realizing it was WD-40. It actually made its way into the screen.
    via u/mryotoad
  • 30
    aussydog Downloaded torrents at work. I had just started at my job and I was still in college at the time. So I would be given tasks during the day and I'd come in super late at night to work on them. Since no one was there and the internet connection was pretty decent, I just took my laptop that I used for school
    via u/aussydog
  • 31
    and set it up to download movie torrents all night. I guess the company got notified by their internet provider and I got a stern talking to. My supervisor even wrote me up and put a "permanent letter" in my record that "could affect future advancement." At least that's how he put it.
    via u/aussydog
  • 32
    About a year after this all happened everyone except me got fired in my department including the guy who chastised me with the permanent record bs. 10yrs later and I'm still here and no one else is. I'm a department of one. I'm also full time work from home now so I can download torrents whenever the fk I feel like it! lol
    via u/aussydog
  • 33
    redgrognard 10 days into working for the Red Cross, I crashed into a moron trying to park on a busy street. Totaled their POS minivan, folded my truck's bumper into the tires. I was sober as a saint. Was forgiven. 90 days later, backed the Blood Mobile into a concrete post hidden by a bush. Forgiven. 6 months later, had a blowout on the highway, nearly rolled
    via u/redgrognard
  • 34
    a blood supply truck with a full load. Forgiven. Shortly after 9/11, told an idiot coworker to go apologize to the trees for wasting the oxygen: got written up & suspended for a week.
    via u/redgrognard

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boss workplace-stories jobs job bosses work coworkers slacking off workplace sleeping on the job
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