workplace-stories

Retail worker ridiculed for wearing personal jacket at work, he gets even by following the employee handbook: 'My jacket isn’t corporate approved? Neither are any of the other ones here!'

Ben Weiss

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Manager instructs staff to maliciously comply with difficult client by only following their vague instructions word for word, prompting backlash: 'Why are your employees being so unhelpful?'

Ben Weiss

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Boss tried to turns assistant into his kids' after-school babysitter for no extra pay: 'He thought I would “see it as helping the team”'

JR Atkinson

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Boss calls employee ugly in front of his entire team: 'Everyone went silent and I just sat there not knowing what to say.'

Emmy Pratt

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Project manager conspires to make coworker look bad in front of management, coworker turns the tables around on her: '[Penny] hasn't tried that trick again with me'

Ben Weiss

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Irksome colleague uses the office coffee station as his personal ‘TED Talk’ summary stage: ‘He goes into detail like he is trying to recite the transcript’

Lana DeGaetano

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New employee monitors boss's schedule, asking for confidential information and requesting to join meetings with higher-ups, boss left baffled: ‘It's not something I’m willing to discuss’

Bar Mor Hazut

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Boss demands 24/7 "urgent" access to employee, interrupting the employee's evenings and weekends with tasks that could have waited: 'If I’m not answering emails at 10PM, I’ll wake up to passive aggressive messages'

Brad Dickson

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Essential employee resigns during meeting with "huge" client after being denied a raise and getting another job offer mid-meeting, client cancels contract: 'I accepted their offer, contract in my email within 5 minutes, digitally signed it within 10'

Brad Dickson

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Temp employee works until 3:00 AM, asks if he can finish work from home, boss refuses, sparking malicious compliance: 'Temps are not allowed to work from home'

Ben Weiss

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Workplace asks employees to work overtime for free, they all call in sick the next day: 'Manager is freaking out in the group chat about "lack of commitment"'

JR Atkinson

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Employee gets fired and replaced by younger, cheaper new hire, she lasts 3 weeks at the company: 'Now the company’s back to square one, scrambling to rehire'

Ben Weiss

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‘I put in my notice. I finish my work and MORE, and apparently I don't look busy??? I wonder what else they think of me’: Employee quits after manager embarrasses her for not looking busy enough, despite doing extra work

Etai Eshet

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'Suddenly they could rework the timeline': Manager demands team work unpaid overtime for a long-standing deadline, employees all respond by calling in ‘sick’, forcing manager to backtrack the timeline’s so-called ‘urgency’

Emma Saven

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New IT manager tries to "fix" working hours to accommodate different time zones, backfires majorly as employees point out labor law violations: 'Turns out the manager made a mistake here'

Ben Weiss

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Undervalued employee resigns during meeting with big clients, leaving execs red-faced: 'I had an offer from a competitor in my pocket'

JR Atkinson

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