tell us your stories of triumphing over work jerks

by Alison Green on August 12, 2021

Earlier this week a commenter shared this magnificent story:

My first job out of college was a sales job with a very overbearing, bullying boss (he made at least one guy cry while I was there). I am a pretty deadpan guy, especially when I’m nervous, and my boss had a huge personality and wanted all his employees to be the same.

Whenever we had a sales appointments we would have to go over our deal in front of all 25ish people in the company, and invariably he would get mad that I wasn’t “excited” enough. I might have been broke working a 100% commission job, but I didn’t like being bullied, so I would turn my excitement meter down to zero whenever I presented. I got the point where I basically sounded comatose. Then I would drink a ton of Red Bull before I actually met with the client boost my energy to close the deal.

Eventually we started to get along, but for a while this guy couldn’t figure me out at all, especially since I was eventually one of the better salespeople in the office. I didn’t feel too bad because I knew that if I hadn’t been a strong performer, he would definitely have relentlessly bullied me.

Clearly we need to hear more stories of times you triumphed over a jerk at work. Pettiness is fine. Pettiness is what we’re here for. But we will also accept non-petty triumphs, such as the person who got back at a boss who made him swap roles with the boss’s friend’s son and take a drop in salary of tens of thousands of dollars with a few days notice. All stories of triumphs over jerks are welcome.

Please share in the comments.

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    3. Gnome*

      I am in the ER awaiting IV antibiotics…. And just got on the wifi to see this…. Totally helping! I cannot wait to read these!

          1. Squirrel Nutkin*

            Good luck, Gnome! I hope you’ve got those antibiotics now and that you heal up and feel much better soon!

  2. Littorally*

    Ah, it’s so good to reread that epic quitting story. Two hours notice — reap what you sow!

      1. TiredMama*

        I like to imagine the OP calculating back pay with interest and lost retirement contributions for the previous four months plus something for embarrassment and calculating that into an hourly rate based on estimation of how long it would take to finish the big project.

        1. Autumnheart*

          I’m sure it was still a fraction of whatever it cost the company to finish the project with Nepotism Nephew in charge. On the one hand, must be nice to have someone who’ll be like “Here, have this amazing job without having to work for it at all,” but on the other hand, if I got magicked into that sort of position, I know I would dread going to work every day. Non-stop stinkeye all day long, and nobody believes in you and actively thinks you’re a jerk. That better be a really nice paycheck.

          1. Katrinka*

            Anybody who’s willing to use nepotism like that doesn’t care about what their co-workers think.

            1. CoveredInBees*

              Plenty of nepotism hires honestly think they’ve earned it. There’s the expression of: Born on 3rd base and thought they hit a triple.

  3. Forrest*

    Not actually a jerk 99% of the time, but certainly a triumph:

    when I was working as a medical secretary just after graduating, the doctor that I worked for came into the office as I was on the floor putting some files away in a low-level cupboard. He instinctively joked, “Oh, I do like to see my secretaries on their knees!” I just stood up, turned around and looked at him incredulously, and he went bright red, mumbled, “Er, um, I–” and backed out of the room.

    It was about the most poised I’ve ever been. I didn’t even say anything, just radiated “what the HELL???????” with every fibre of my being.

      1. Not Australian*

        I had an ex-boss who told his (gay male) secretary “I like my secretaries to wear skirts.”

        “Oh, I can wear a skirt!” exclaims secretary delightedly, batting his fabulous eyelashes…

        4. Where's the Orchestra?*

          As long as you have all the appropriate “underthings” go for it guys.

          Signed, the person whose male kilt wearing coworkers had to be told that they couldn’t skip the underwear. Yeah, that was a very uncomfortable conversation.

      2. Forrest*

        He was clearly horrified by the fact that he’d said it! There was a brief moment of, “oh shit did I say that” followed immediately by seeing the look on my face and going, “oh shit oh shit I DID.”

      3. Robin Ellacott*

        In my retail youth SEVERAL men made comments like that to me as I was stocking shelves. Only once was it a colleague, to be fair, usually customers.

    3. Chantal*

      OMG, the exact same thing happened to me when I was a young office worker! Except that I was so naive that I thought he meant it as, in a subservient position – rather than the more sexual-harassment way. Still a giant NOPE either way!

    4. Executive Assistant*

      Mine is similar, but this doctor WAS a jerk 99% of the time! He was an ER doc and I was the executive assistant to the CEO of the hospital. So the first incident was right before Hospital Week and we always did a themed t-shirt that you could order to wear. He had forgotten to place his order and came up to me in the cafeteria to complain he had missed the deadline. I told him “Oh I have extras!” He was still salty and said “well you probably didn’t order any triple extra sexy size for big guys like me!” I was kind of annoyed at this point so I just repeated back his words and said with a straight face “Yes, I actually do have extras in size triple extra sexy.” He laughed and then asked me if I was a “chubby chaser”. Inappropriate!

      I probably would have let that go, but then after I had delivered his shirt to the ER department for him I saw him in the medical records office on my way back to my desk. I poked my head in to tell him his shirt was waiting for him, and turned right around to leave. He stopped me and said “Hey wait, you probably want to hear who was diagnosed with gonorrhea! You’re single, right?” Um, inappropriate and illegal!

      My coworker convinced me to tell my boss. My complaint ended up being the straw that broke the camel’s backs and Dr. Triple Extra Sexy was fired.

      2. Dasein9*

        “[A]nd Dr. Triple Extra Sexy was fired.” is the most beautiful sentence I have read in a long time!

      3. MissBaudelaire*

        You’re nicer than me. Re: gonorrhea I would have said “Oh, I never planned to sleep with you.” and kept walking.

    5. laowai_gaijin*

      The silence was perfect. He had nothing to do in that moment except replay the words he’d just spoken and realize how utterly, thoroughly inappropriate they were. I hope he still wakes up at night cringing at that moment.

    2. Where’s the Orchestra?*

      Did that too…the other place is still trying to dig out from the hole other guy caused with a bunch of people leaving…as someone else said, play stupid games, win stupid prizes.

    3. Mainly Lurking (UK)*

      Me too: my replacement lasted 3 weeks. My replacement’s replacement lasted 3 days.

      After that, according to a contact who is still there (but thankfully not directly supervised by my toxic boss), there was plenty of drama, and eventually she was moved off the project team.

      1. laowai_gaijin*

        I once got a position through an employment agency as an office administrator. When I looked through the files, I found out I was the sixth person in a very short time to have been in that position. And there would be another very soon, as I quit after a week. Boss was a jackass, and I wasn’t really suited to being an office admin, anyway.

      2. Good Vibes Steve*

        They had to hire 3 different people to do the job I did alone, for which they refused to give me a pay raise and to stick “senior” at the start of my job title.

        I could have been convinced to stay for a lot less then it cost them to replace me, and I still get extreme schadenfreude from it.

    4. Alexis Rosay*

      Yes! My husband got ‘revenge’ after what he saw as an unjust firing (the company asked him to lie to coworkers and say he resigned because they knew people would be furious if they found out) by being successful at his next role and even earning an “outstanding employee” award that is given only once per year in his new company of 30k people.

    5. ceiswyn*

      Even better than that – two years later I got a phone call from a recruiter telling me that my previous employer had ‘had someone really good and they really regretted letting them go’. I really enjoyed telling him that I was now earning 10k more than the top of their offered salary range :)

      1. ferrina*

        I got passed over for a promotion due to nepotism- the person who got it had less than half the experience required, was missing key skills and basic industry knowledge, but she was BFFs with the grandboss. After she was promoted to be my boss, the first thing she said was “Just want you to know I have no hard feelings that you applied for my job.”
        Um…what?
        Well, I worked for her for a year and it was a nightmare. She had no idea what she was doing, complained constantly and offloaded her major responsibilities to me. Well, I took those responsibilities, EXCELLED at them, then used my accomplishments to rewrite my resume.
        Within one year, I took a position elsewhere. I handed back all the responsibilities she’d been avoiding for the past year. When she tried to counter offer, I laughed and informed her the company didn’t have the budget for a counteroffer– my new position was going to be paying me $10K+ what she was making.

    6. Wendy*

      Yep, I got laid off at the end of March. I’d been there for 5 years and my manager was a complete and utter jerk. He didn’t even let me say good bye to my coworkers.

      I start a new job in September at one of best employers in the city with a 25% raise and better hours. I never would have even applied for the job had I still been employed – it’s a really stretch for my skills and I didn’t think I’d even get past the first round.

      1. Bee Eye Ill*

        When I left, my boss almost left without saying bye. I think he was mad that I was leaving. I watched him go to the parking lot and get in his truck, then hesitate a minute before coming inside and giving me a halfhearted “so long” and a handshake.

        1. Tyche*

          This happened to me! I worked at Old Job for almost 12 years, it was run (poorly) by a couple. One of them called me from the car after leaving, probably at the insistence of their partner. The one who forgot didn’t like me very much but the other one did.

          1. Bee Eye Ill*

            It’s well known that people leave their supervisors before they leave their jobs, so I guess some take it personal.

        2. Vanellope*

          I had a similar experience! I worked at an accounting firm for three years, and when I left one of the partners did not say one word to me from the time I gave my notice through my entire last two weeks. He literally never spoke to me again.

    7. Sans Serif*

      Yeah, me too. Two departments were consolidated and given to one boss. She didn’t really want anything to do with the people from the new dept (including me) — and as each of us left, was not replacing them, refusing any possibility of promotions by making up non-existent rules (you can’t get a promotion for 5 years – wtf?), being condescending and rude. So our part of the dept kept getting smaller and smaller. We were the only ones with certain types of knowledge. She wasn’t really interested in learning that either. I think she thought whatever we did was trivial or easy. So comes the day my last co-worker from my old dept gives notice. I’m not worried because I know I’m about to receive an offer. My offer comes two days later. Giving notice and seeing the truth hit her that she was screwed was glorious. When I left, I took a lot of knowledge with me. I would have been happy to share it — if anyone had ever asked …

    8. WantonSeedStitch*

      Same! I left my old job (first non-temp job after school) years ago, with my confidence and my nerves so shattered that I was afraid I’d never be able to cut it in the Real World outside college. Then I got hired somewhere else at a higher rate than I’d made after three years at Evil Company, and have since managed to be promoted five times. Guess it wasn’t me, then?

    9. Speaks to Dragonflies*

      I did this too.The icing on the cake was that I was one of two that did what I did and it was a VERY busy time. They had to have multiple people that had been promoted out of my position step back down and cover what I did. Pay me crap and work me like a rented mule…Nope. Have fun filling those open spots with the craptaculer pay you offer.

  5. numerouno*

    my boss’s boss told a really awkward joke the first time I met him. I didn’t laugh but wasn’t offended by it, it was like a silly dad joke that you’d roll your eyes at if you heard it at the dinner table. but I wasn’t at the dinner table, I was at work, so I kept my face neutral and went back to taking notes or whatever I was doing before he interrupted with his stupid joke. A few months later he was back in town and came by my desk and loudly and magnanimously apologized if his joke offended me. completely without thinking I said there’s no need to apologize, it didn’t offend me, it just wasn’t funny. I heard my coworker gasp beside me because apparently nobody has ever told this guy he isn’t funny. he turned red but laughed it off but I immediately began job hunting because I thought my days were numbered. He was laid off shortly after that for reasons not pertaining to his humour and I have a way cooler boss now.

      1. Toodie*

        What I especially love about this response is that numerouno didn’t soften it with “I didn’t think it was funny.” That makes it so much better!

    2. socks*

      Unless there’s more context that makes this worse, I don’t see how making a dad joke makes someone a jerk??

      1. Liz*

        Maybe not, but “loudly and magnanimously” apologizing if “my joke offended you” usually does.

        1. ChemistryChick*

          Yeah, it’s not the dad joke that makes the guy a jerk. It’s that he responded that way to OP not laughing about it. And months later, no less.

        2. Properlike*

          It’s that whole assumption that an unexpected reaction = “I offended you” that I find… well, offensive? It’s always a big deal too, how they’re being the bigger person for apologizing that your feelings were hurt (and you’re clearly the “too sensitive” one that’s being accommodated.)

          I’m an adult. I might be frustrated, angry, mystified or even indifferent to what you said. Very rarely will I be “offended.”

          2. Violet Rose*

            This! I hate having offence projected onto me by the joke-teller, acting like now they have to walk on eggshells around me or something. No, bro*, continue as you were; there’s a wide gulf between “I find that funny” and “I find that offensive”, and I’m not gonna perform laughter if I didn’t find it funny?

            *I’m using “bro” gender-neutrally here, but I’ve only experienced this from men

      2. numerouno*

        I never called him a jerk for making a joke. nobody laughed at his joke, but he only called me out for not laughing. that’s what makes him a jerk.

    3. drpuma*

      When I was in grad school my classmates elected me to be one of a handful of ombudsman-type students who would meet regularly with administrators. At one of these meetings I looked straight at the director of our program and told him, “Whenever I see an activity is required I know it’s not going to be useful for me. Because if it would be helpful you wouldn’t have to require me to go.” He turned bright red but sputtered that he couldn’t argue with my logic. At the time I think I didn’t realize how angry I still was that my whole class had been required to attend an anti-climate-change presentation a few months prior that had been paid for by a major donor. Nobody even tried to pretend it was relevant to our MBAs.

      1. Frankie*

        Wow, they were literally selling MBA students’ time and attention to listen to nonsense. That’s horrible.

        1. Artemesia*

          My son in high school was doing his math homework during the morning homeroom watching of ‘Chanel 1’ — a morning 10 minute show that capitalist pigs forced schools to show in exchange for TVs in the classroom. The VP for harassing students saw him and insisted he needed to watch the show; my son told him he could not be compelled to watch commercials — lead to escalating stand offs which he finally won.

      2. MM*

        Oh god, I assumed “anti-climate change” meant like, fighting climate change, not climate denial, and I was like, “eh, doesn’t seem so bad…” thank goodness for the replies!

          1. Carol the happy elf*

            I had to train some Channel 1 employees, and some of them had the brass to complain about the nonprofit’s informational video at the start of each module. “It’s like a 5-minute COMMERCIAL! Can’t we just fast-forward past the &$&;#×>;-‘ COMMERCIALS??”

            Yes. They complained about having to watch commercials showing a history of the nonprofit organization.

            I mentioned the irony. They couldn’t have me replaced, because I was one of two certified trainers. The other one was my sister-in-law.

  6. The Other Evil HR Lady*

    I started my career in HR as an assistant in the HR department, and one of my main jobs was verifying employment for many, many applicants. Well, apparently, I wasn’t moving fast enough for the recruiter, even though I was spending every free minute getting the needed information, on top of other duties that our boss assigned to me.

    The recruiter, Lucinda, complained to our boss, Mandy. Mandy took me aside and found out that I was being given such a large workload from Lucinda, that not only could I not keep up with her demands, but I was also falling behind on the work that Mandy needed from me. So, Mandy told her to cool it and not to throw just any application on my desk, only applications of people who we were actually hiring. At least half of the applications she had me working on, were for people we had no intention of hiring!

    Lucinda finally cooled it, but was suddenly fired – with no real explanation from Mandy. Nor did I need one! I was glad she was gone, tbh.

    Years later, I found out from Mandy that Lucinda was fired for… um… running her own illegal business during work hours. Let’s just say that this business that Lucinda was running is not illegal in Las Vegas.

      1. Business Cat*

        This is a small victory, but I worked for a land surveyor as his office manager several years ago. He was verbally abusive and would frequently be incredibly rude and accuse me of weird stuff. The office was a disorganized mess when I found it and I spent a substantial amount of time reorganizing and making processes more efficient. Well I finally found another job using the experience I gained in my two years under his management. I handled fielding resumes for my replacement and we managed to find someone to start my last week. I spent the week helping to train her. During one training session, my boss sat with us and was talking with my replacement, and I took out my phone for a minute since I wasn’t involved at the moment. Well he took umbrage at that, and the next morning brought me into the conference room to yell at me about how disrespectful I had been etc. I took this quietly and apologized, but over lunch I decided I had had enough. I spent the remainder of the afternoon training the replacement on the last bit of information, and then went up to the boss’s office to inform him this would be my last day and why. He got extremely mad that I wasn’t finishing out my week and yelled at me that “he was good to me” as I walked away. I yelled back “I was good to you too!” And left.

      3. EPLawyer*

        Good thing I wasn’t drinking anything when I read that. Also good I work alone because I literally LOLed LOUDLY.

      4. Aggretsuko*

        Hahahaha, we used to have an employee who ran a boudoir photography business. When she quit she didn’t bother to remove that stuff from her office space….
        She worked in printing ID cards and the one day I trained with this woman to cover her once she quit, one of the machines was broken all day and she didn’t bother to fix it. This is because she was printing her boudoir business card on it and didn’t even bother to remove it….and after she found out I was “taking over” she quit even faster and left all her stuff behind. Like that. We laughed and laughed.

      6. WorkNowPaintLater*

        All the stars. Every single one.

        thankfully no one is in right now to catch me giggling….

    4. Hawkeye is in the details*

      Not the point of the story, I know, and I hope this doesn’t take away from it – it actually IS illegal in Las Vegas. You have to travel outside of Clark County to find the legal versions.

      But of course it still happens on the regular.

      (I am on the please decriminalize it for the health and safety of everyone side of the argument, but that’s not even an issue that Vegas politics has on its radar, unfortunately.)

      4. The Other Evil HR Lady*

        My hat off to you – you are correct. I’m in the same camp as you (decriminalize, make it safe), but the state where this happened is not even Nevada. My poor boss had tried to keep my innocent butt firmly out of the mess and only told me the full story when she wasn’t my boss anymore and I was not as innocent.

        1. Hawkeye is in the details*

          I hope you know I was not trying to step on your story! I just wanted to take the opportunity to clear up a common misconception.

          1. The Other Evil HR Lady*

            Oh, I got it – I wasn’t sure myself, and I remembered watching that show about the “ranch” (Bunny Ranch?), and it wasn’t IN Vegas, but was nearby… I just didn’t know how close/far it was. I should have ended it that the illegal activity isn’t illegal “NEAR Las Vegas,” LOL!!

            1. Kit*

              I knew what you meant, too, but yeah – I know enough folks working to decriminalize/destigmatize sex work that I even knew why! NV law prohibits brothels in counties with populations over a certain size – 700k residents, iirc.

              Then again, I’m the kind of definitely-not-innocent who mentioned that I enjoy the smell of leather, to which a coworker asked if that’s what was under my bed: “Oh, no, it’s in the closet, there’s not enough space under the bed.” I… think he thought I was joking?

        2. Mannequin*

          Holy cow, I was sure you meant she was running some kind of bookie operation! Hahahahaha! This is even wilder!

    5. peanut gallery*

      My understanding is prostitution is legal in most of Nevada but not in Las Vegas. But I have a feeling you don’t mean gambling.

  7. Ali G*

    I may have told this story before, but…
    My last job was awesome until I got a new boss, Jane. Jane had zero experience in what I did, but was competent in other things in the department and she was put in charge of the entire dept. No big deal. Until she realized that no matter her title, everyone was still coming to me because I could get stuff done for them, even outside vendors (BTW this was my job). She eventually started micromanaging me, taking away all my high level duties (I was a director with 4-5 reports) and marginalized me in the company.
    Jane is very competitive and thinks Keto is a hobby and that people care about her kick boxing lessons (we don’t). During the last “team bonding” activity she organized, the department was split into teams. It was SO obvious she put herself with the people she thought were her best bet to win and she also made a team of, in her mind, losers, so obviously this was where I was placed. I mean, it was a bunch of activities at an adventure resort and one of my teammates was wearing wing tips.
    Anyway, there were all types of activities, and you got points for how well and quickly you completed them. We were able to complete one activity on the first try that netted us 150 points.
    At then end when they tallied up the scores and it was down to the top two (my and Jane’s teams) I could see the smirk on Jane’s face. I had an idea that we probably had a chance due to that 150 pts, so I opted to watch her as the winner was announced.
    Well we did win and look of shock and horror on her face as our little band of misfits cheered and everyone else cheered for us was something I will treasure always.
    Take that Jane!

      2. SomehowIManage*

        Alison should start a side business selling script ideas to Hollywood—with shared profits to OPs

    2. Audrey Puffins*

      You have told it before, but it’s like a favourite bedtime story, I love to read it again and again and again

    3. Llellayena*

      I wonder if anyone ever taught her that when you form a team of people who are “best” in the same way that you are “best” that you end up limiting your collective skills AND ideas. The “misfits” are often the better team because they all come in with a different perspective and a different skill set and a good manager/team leader/coach can get more out of that diverse team than any homogeneous group. But awesome for your win!

      1. Mental Lentil*

        Yep! We have a tendency to hire people who are like ourselves, because we click with them in the interview.

        But really, you need to hire people who are not like you, people who will see the things you don’t see, and who will look at things from a different perspective. Proof positive, right here!

      1. Le Sigh*

        As I recall, this was also the plot of an episode of “Saved By The Bell.” But Zack Morris was 17 and fictional.

    6. Blarg*

      I have a similar but different story. I was doing my open water scuba training on an island known for being inexpensive so people from all over the world did their dive master/instructor courses there. The dive shops were in competition and sorta friendly. They all supported the same local charity. I was there for a big fundraiser, an Olympics style event with each dive shop’s staff and students competing, with each participant paying to play, that included a bunch of physical games and some trivia. My dive shop hadn’t fared so well in the physical contests. It was more the assemblage of international misfits. The trivia allowed unlimited participants (more $ for the charity). And all scores added to the total. When I realized this … I suggested we *all* play.

      And that’s how the small weirdo dive shop won the championship. We didn’t win a single gold medal. But we scored more points overall. And the trophy.

    8. TootsNYC*

      Not work, but a similar “winning on points when everyone thinks you’re a loser”

      I used to go to a week-long summer camp where were divided into teams and competed for points, including participation points: the classic sports, and things like whist for the non-athletic. Assigned tournament berths in the day, challenges in the late afternoon. There was a skit competition and a song competition. My team was at rock bottom, always; we were such sad sacks on the athletic field.
      Everyone liked to challenge us because we sucked so bad. So on Thursday late afternoon, our counselors suddenly realized they’d accepted so many challenges, that we had exactly enough people to not forfeit in each sport. Everyone HAD to show up to their sport. “It doesn’t matter if you suck at volleyball, it’s a participation point, and a forfeit will really hurt.”
      Thursday after the sports was the song competition; we had a pretty decent song for our theme. We would have VERY little time to practice between the sports and dinner. All the other teams had chosen their strongest sport to challenge us on, and the rest of their members would be practicing during sports time.
      At dinner, they announced the standings before going into the competition. On participation points alone, we were suddenly number two.
      We won the song. We all showed up to choir in the morning for 100% participation points. We came in second in the skit.
      We won–it is one of the highs of my life.

      (As we were cheering, my boyfriend at the time tugged on my elbow to tell me to sit down and not make such a fuss. I broke up with him on the drive home.)

      2. Lady Knittington*

        At university our halls of residence had an annual sporting competition. I genuinely can’t remember all the events, but I volunteered for table tennis. (No idea of the rules or how to serve, just know how to hit a ping pong ball).
        Our hall was the only hall to field a team, so I won the singles and doubles without ever touching a bat.
        Never underestimate the power of participation.

  8. Rachel*

    I took a job that was part-time, 24 hours a week, but the job description was never updated when it went from a full-time to a part-time position. I constantly faced questions from a manager who couldn’t understand why I wasn’t doing 40 hours of work in 24.
    After I took a few (unpaid) days off, when I came back we had a meeting in which he handed me the job description and asked me to highlight the parts I did well, then demanded to know why I wasn’t doing the other pieces. When I pointed out that it hadn’t been updated from the full-time job description, he told me it didn’t matter, I needed to start doing all of them. (Never mind that many of those things were included in his job description, I was expected to do it all.) He also mentioned that I didn’t do a good job of staying on top of my email inbox.
    I heard that he had complained to someone else about me not asking about taking the time off. I found the email where I had asked him if those dates were ok for me to be off (he’d asked me to send that information by email but never responded and when I asked for verbal confirmation, he said it was fine), and printed it to include with my written two-week notice, along with a post-it note on the printed email saying that he needed to stay on top of his inbox.
    After I’d been out of the job for a few weeks, I submitted a few anonymous tips to corporate about some of the things he was doing that were unethical at best, illegal at its worst. He suddenly “resigned” a few months later.

      1. Warby Parker*

        I used to have a colleague who was…not the most motivated person. But the work had to get done, so I ended up doing a lot of her work in addition to mine.

        Our job involves printing out a lot of paperwork. I figured out her copy code, and every time I walked by the copier, I’d log in as her and see if she had any queued jobs. If she did, I’d delete them so she’d have to walk back to her office and send them again.

        1. Me*

          I get the impulse but wasn’t that just shooting yourself in the foot? You already had to pick up her slack and then made it so that she has even less time spent on doing the work because she had to keep reprinting things?

    3. Chantel*

      “…printed it to include with my written two-week notice, along with a post-it note on the printed email saying that he needed to stay on top of his inbox.”

      The very definition of awesome. Well done, Rachel, well done.

    4. Cat Tree*

      I love it! Sometimes people miss emails I send, but usually aren’t rude about it. When someone is rude though, I will go back to my sent items folder and find the original email and forward it to them, pretending it’s just an innocent misunderstanding. People miss things sometimes and I’m always willing to help. But no one needs to be a jerk about it.

      1. ThisIsTheHill*

        100%. I had one guy that was notorious for sending “I wasn’t told about this” e-mails. One time, he sent an e-mail to my boss & cc’d his boss about how I didn’t share information with him about a project. Boss forwarded it to me & asked that I reply all.

        Having learned early in my career about keeping a CYB file, I took the three or four sent items pertaining to his question & added them as attachments (at least one of which was a forward from a previous time he’d asked), with a simple “please see attached” statement.

        His boss called an hour later to apologize.

        2. Karo*

          Those are the best emails to send. My company sent out a major announcement via our marketing email platform a few months ago and we got an email from Fergus last week asking why Llama Grooming Inc hadn’t received the email. I was able to pull the reporting and see that Fergus himself had opened the email 5 times, in addition to opens from others at LGI. Same vibes and it was *chef’s kiss* amazing.

        3. laowai_gaijin*

          That’s the type of guy you have to do the passive-aggressive “Per my last email” thing to.

          1. Katrinka*

            I am, apparently, a master at the “as I said in my [date] email,….” My co-workers all know that I keep all emails to remember when customers were sent invoices, notices, etc. (because I do find sometimes that they weren’t sent when they were supposed to be). I deal in facts and figures and I will bring the receipts.

      2. Laney Boggs*

        I love doing this. I work in email CS, and have to hound sales for everything, so I just do it preemptively.

        It feels good every time.

    5. Caliente*

      OMG- I hear a lot of “didn’t you get my email”? And I’m like I’m yeah I responded…I cannot tell you how many times I have to resend the same emails to my supervisors smh. So annoying.

      1. Watry*

        So much this, I have to spend minimum ten minutes of a morning telling our customers that they got an email two days to two years ago, and that no, you waited six months so we’re not waiving fees to reproduce what they got.

      2. Rachel in NYC*

        On the otherhand, if someone says it must have gotten eaten by my outlook, I’d believe. I swear I’ve had emails mysteriously disappear.

        Though that may have more to do with the fact that I rarely delete emails. My email inbox is like people’s old filing cabinets- stuffed with copies of copies of every email I’ve gotten at my current job. All organized by what it’s about.

        1. JustaTech*

          I have a boss who is notorious about not being great about staying on top of his email, and then saying ” I didn’t get it!”.

          Then one day he was having a meeting with one of my coworkers and they both just happened looking at his computer screen as a whole bunch of his emails were just deleted without anyone touching anything. (It was some kind of weird bug.) After that we were all a lot more willing to just re-send that email.

        2. Amaranth*

          I found that outlook was deleting some of my emails and replies when I checked it on my phone – I’m guessing a sync issue of some sort – and took that as an opportunity to stop checking email on my phone after hours and when out of the office. 100% less stress and totally supported by the company so that emails wouldn’t be lost.

        3. Where’s the Orchestra?*

          I do this too. I have been lauded a few times for my ability to find an email that everybody else in the group knew they got, but couldn’t find.

      3. calonkat*

        “We’d like to appeal this governmental decision because we weren’t informed of the deadline”.

        From me:
        “Here’s a copy of the 4 emails that went out with the specific date you missed in them, the program/form user guide with the deadlines (which are the same every year), a screenshot of the program you entered earlier data into that has the deadlines on the login page, a list of the 8 conference calls through the year (that you were on) in which I went over the deadlines, the group calendar with the deadlines in it, and the website with all related information with the deadlines on it.”

        The agency head “Yeah, I think they had notice…”

  9. Chantel*

    I do good work, develop good working relationships with my other co-workers, let my accomplishments speak for themselves, and otherwise make a liar out of the jerk who currently (and for no valid reason) has me pegged on the workplace rumor mill as a clueless incompetent. What I did to deserve her ire, I’ll never know, but quietly observing her making herself to be unkind and petty to everyone else is highly, highly satisfying.

  10. Valancy Snaith*

    I worked for The Worst Boss In The World, making minimum wage at an in-office sales job (the kind where I worked 8-4 at a desk, had a sales territory of 4 provinces, and handled sales of equipment worth a quarter of a million dollars). My province had just announced that the minimum wage was going up some minimal amount, like a dollar and a half or something like that. My boss said “Just because the province says I have to give you a raise doesn’t mean I have to do it.”

    Well, that was actually exactly what it meant. After a call to the Labour Board sorted him out, he decided he would cut our commission from 5% to 2.5% to “counteract this.” His other retaliation would be to block 97% of the internet, including, helpfully, some of the sites for equipment we sold, making it almost-impossible to do our jobs. So we retaliated by daily sending him lists of 50+ websites we needed unblocked, including our customers’ websites.

    The day I went to go tell him I was quitting because we were moving away was the greatest day of work I ever had there. He asked if I would be open to working remotely and coming into the office once or twice a week, and he was giving me a “fantastic opportunity.” I told him that since I was moving 3 hours away it would not be possible for me to come into the office once or twice a week. When I had been at our new home a month I got a job making double what I made there. It’s been five years since I worked there and now I make triple-plus what I made there. He is still, I’m guessing, a miserable, penny-pinching SOB.

      2. Robin Ellacott*

        Same! I give it to people recovering from surgery or something who need a happy read.

        1. tired librarian*

          The Blue Castle, by L. M. Montgomery (if you like Anne of Green Gables, check out Montgomery’s other books, and her short stories. Fantastic!)

    2. pleaset cheap rolls*

      Good story but I wish you hadn’t said why you were quitting – or laid some of it on him/working conditions.

      1. Katrinka*

        People like him either don’t believe you that they are at fault or don’t care. They have no intention of changing their ways, they don’t care if it will improve their company and increase revenue, they’re making what they think is enough by doing what they’re doing.

        1. MissBaudelaire*

          Yeah, I told a boss why I was quitting. He refused to believe anything was in his power to change. Everything was just ‘But that’s the way that it is!’ But it didn’t have to be. He, the manager, could have changed it. He chose not to because it was easier for him.

          Okay. Fine. Have it your way. There was a mass exodus when I quit, and it wasn’t because I quit. He rapidly found himself up shit creek without a paddle and was fired for things we had always suspected him of. He will lie though and say he quit because it was such an awful place.

    3. Mira*

      Seconding (fourthing? fifthing?) the user name love! That’s easily one of my favourite books, period!

  11. Timecanfly*

    I had a boss that loved to scream for people. She would sit in her office and yell my name very very loudly til I appeared at her door with my notebook ready to take notes. She also liked to treat people like you would dogs or children you’re trying to train- ignore negative behavior, reward positive behavior.

    One morning I was stressed with a big project and decided I did not want to be screamed for anymore. So I took a page from her book, sat at my desk, and kept working while she yelled my name repeatedly, stretching it from two to three syllables. Eventually, she came out of her office, looked at me and said my name at a normal volume. I turned, looked at her and said calmly, “Did you need something?”

    I did manage to get in a few more petty wins like that before leaving, but that was the one that I really enjoyed the most. I could tell by the look on her face she knew exactly what I was doing when I did that, and she stopped screaming for me, at least.

    1. Mister Lady*

      This is amazing, and I admire your nerves of steel! If someone was screaming for me, I would probably run to do whatever they wanted–whatever it took to make the screaming stop!

      1. it's-a-me*

        I would likely sit at my desk and scream back “WHAT? WHAT IS IT? I CAN’T HEAR YOU! COULD YOU REPEAT THAT?”

        1. kicking_k*

          Cat would be SUCH an infuriating boss. I don’t know how Kara never stealthily froze her coffee.

        2. Rebecca1*

          That was hilarious though because it was such a callback to the original Superman movie. Callista Flockhart’s imitation of Gene Hackman is FLAWLESS.

    3. Momma Bear*

      I had a screamer boss once, and after someone complained, she started calling on the phone. Only she talked so loudly that it didn’t help and I could still clearly hear her both over the phone and from the hall….

    5. FreakInTheExcelSheets*

      Oooh yes I had a boss that did the same! I was always so tempted to do the ‘snotty teenager’ and yell back “WHAT?!?!?!” but I somehow managed to restrain myself. I did, however, take to wearing headphones all the time – sometimes I was actually listening to something, but normally they were just for show. This boss (we’ll call her B) also liked sneaking up behind you to make sure you weren’t doing something you shouldn’t so wearing the headphones made her think she didn’t have to be as quiet and I got more warning (not that I was doing anything wrong, but she thought startling someone by tapping them on the shoulder was hilarious and always seemed put out if I didn’t jump/screech so I was determined not to react). I guess there is a little bit of triumph here as I later found out B and her boss randomly decided I didn’t need to be replaced when I left for a nearly 50% raise and my two peers (P1 & P2) could handle the workload. My leaving and this decision, which by the way would require working constantly-rotating split days since it was Mon-Sat that required coverage and you could only work 5 days in a calendar week (I got in trouble for this after *Z* messed up scheduling me so I only worked 40 hours each pay period but worked 6 days one calendar week and only 4 the next), caused my peers to both GTFO. P1 was so fed up she rage quit 2 months later when B wouldn’t agree to a set mid-week day off so she could take her mother to weekly doctor appointments (there was no reason for rotating days off since before I left if you were split that week it was always Wednesday off – I’m also mad I missed this because P1 is the quietest, sweetest person I know). P2, who I’m still friends with, had been planning on giving her 2 weeks a few days later but decided nope, I’m quitting today too. B went nuts screaming about how was she supposed to hire someone in time for P2 to train them and P2 just responded “guess you’ll need to figure something out” (this was B’s favorite response if you asked for help/overtime during our busiest period – we weren’t accountants but think tax season level of insanity that happened every September). Last I heard, since P2 still worked for the same company but was leaving for a corporate role across the country, there was a revolving door of replacements who only lasted 3-6 months. This went on for a couple years before someone finally looked at turnover and complaints against B. Sadly she was not fired but they restructured the org so she had no direct reports and lost her manager title – I have no idea if there was a pay cut involved but losing that title definitely would have hurt her more!

      1. laowai_gaijin*

        “Guess you’ll need to figure something out” – ooh, that gives me a happy little shiver!

    6. HC help*

      I did something similar with my former boss who didn’t scream, but would talk to us like children when she came into work in the morning. She would say “good morning, scientists, how are we today?!” in a very condescending singing voice like you would talk to a dog. She is the exact same age as me and I haaaated it.

      Eventually I decided I don’t have to accept being spoken to that way, so I stopped responding to it. Once she had that out of her system each morning, she would approach me and talk to me like a normal adult, and I would happily respond in kind. Just thinking about it still sets me on edge.

      1. Mongrel*

        “She would say “good morning, scientists, how are we today?!” in a very condescending singing voice like you would talk to a dog.”
        Did she at least have caramels in her pockets?

  12. Dr. Rebecca*

    I worked for a picture frame warehouse in my mid-20s, doing what was supposed to be “light warehouse work/mostly computer” but ended up being the opposite. I’m very bright, and very quick, and I became VERY bored as soon as I learned everything. I was the only order-puller, shipping/receiving agent, and their business was in the type of decline that stretches out over decades, so after the morning rush to get overnight orders on the trucks before they went out, I didn’t have much to do.

    The warehouse was full of saw dust, metal shavings, and chemical fumes, and it wasn’t climate controlled, so I was sick ALL THE TIME. Out at least once a month for sinus problems, for which I ended up needing surgery. Eventually, my ex-husband persuaded me to go back to school, and I quit between Christmas and New Years and re-started my undergrad in the Spring semester.

    What you need to know about this business is that it was a family affair. Staffed by father, son/daughter/daughter in law/daughter in law’s brother. If you were family, you got perks, benefits, time off, all excuses made for you. If you weren’t, you got ZERO. I got a call on my cell on the floor one day and had to leave because my dad had a heart attack. The next working day, a new rule was posted: no cell phones allowed on the floor (except for the faaaaamily…)

    So I quit at Christmas. They made it two months before they were on the phone BEGGING me to come back, if only for one week–no one else was as efficient, they were so far behind, they had problems hiring a replacement.

    It was a wonderful moment in my life when I got to tell them no, I had school work to do.

    1. ferrina*

      That really is the best. Watching them realize how much they actually took you for granted….

      1. Dr. Rebecca*

        Seriously with as badly as I was treated and as sick as I got, if the place caught on fire I’d stand on the top of the nearest hill to watch it burn. The nerve…

        1. Dr. Rebecca*

          Also, the GM who was the son of the family used to subtly hit on me, which was quite literally the only good treatment I got while I was there. His wife was the office manager. I hated every single one of them.

        2. allathian*

          You’re far more generous than I am. If that happened to me, I’d be tempted to hose the burning building with gasoline…

      2. JB*

        First thing to consider before getting rid of someone, are they irreplaceable? You may just be getting rid of the glue keeping everything together.

    2. Speaks to Dragonflies*

      It is such a unique, wonderful flavor to experience when the folks that treated you like crap come calling, wanting you to come back.

    3. MissBaudelaire*

      I love that. I love that so much. Tears are in my eyes with how wonderful it is.

      I remember quitting my last job, my boss insisted on being there when I left. I told him I didn’t care. He was there when I punched out. “Well, just remember, if you ever need a job again….” I think he thought I was quitting to just prove a point, like I didn’t mean it? Um, I had another job. I looked him dead in the eye and said “I’ll just go on down to the Wal-Mart.”

  13. SunnyGirl*

    I worked with a lovely woman, Timid, who was a touch shy, introverted but an extremely hard worker who loved to dot her i’s, cross her t’s and follow the rules and processes, which was good and necessary for her job. She was actually very bright and fun to talk to once you got to know her.

    Her immediate supervisor was, in comparison, a gregarious woman, Curly, who could veer into bullying and she used to get on Timid’s case. She once told Timid, a childhood cancer survivor who still suffered the effects of her recovery (migraines to start) to “get over your booboo’s” when a friend of Curly’s got breast cancer and apparently was a model patient. She was just not very understanding of who Timid was and could not relate at all to Timid’s careful, measured work personality. It brought out the inner bully lurking in Curly that was not publicly visible with previous owners of that job.

    Part of Timid’s job was to hole punch materials in order to file it in binders. She carefully saved all the confetti from the hole puncher, in envelopes, for months. I’m not sure what her initial plan was for the confetti but one day, she figured she had saved enough. Timid called me over to her desk and we brought out all the confetti-filled envelopes over to Curly’s desk, who was on lunch, and dumped the confetti all over Curly’s desk, in her desk drawers and in her shoes. It was everywhere.

    Then we quietly returned to our desks.

    Oi, Curly’s cries of outrage were delicious. And she never once suspected it was Timid.

    10. L.H. Puttgrass*

      Good thing I’m still working from home, otherwise I’d have a whole office asking why I’m laughing uncontrollably.

    11. Sunrise Ruby*

      I howled with joy after reading the paragraph about Timid’s revenge. I’m working from home, and I’m sure everyone who lives on my floor in my apartment building heard me!

    12. Librarian of SHIELD*

      I’m imagining that she was still finding little paper circles for months, and it makes me feel so happy.

    17. allathian*

      That’s fabulous!

      I’m amazed that Curly didn’t put two and two together the next time she saw Timid punching materials to be filed…

    18. witchesbruise*

      I said that I was going to do this when I quit my last toxic workplace but I never did. Always wishing that I had.

    20. Rena*

      On a less revenge-confetti note – We had a board game reception at our wedding, and had decorated the tables with hole-punch confetti in a bunch of colors. We had friends deliberately go through and put small handfuls of confetti into all the board game boxes we had out, and now it’s a very happy reminder of our wedding every time we pull out a game!

  14. GeorgiaB*

    First full-time job, fresh out of grad school, someone a few levels up from me (who I knew was good friends with my manager) sometimes sat at an open workstation next to mine. One day we were chatting about something, and he said something very condescending and ended it with Ms. [My last name]. I turned to him and deadpan responded, “that’s Dr. [My last name], thank you.” I never have the right comeback, but that time I did because that man never condescended to me again.

    2. Artemesia*

      The only times I use ‘Dr.’ are with dweebs like this. I did my career in the South and from time to time had to work with men who loved to say ‘is that MISS or Mrs?’ when I was introduced as Ms. It had that ‘are you some loser or have you actually accomplished the one thing women are good for, snagged a man’ feel to it — usually set with a kind of smug leer. To those men I always said ‘Oh you can just use ‘Dr.’

      2. Regardless of Personal Cost*

        I’m not a doctor, but I do enjoy telling those kinds of men that they can just call me ma’am.

  15. Anya*

    I had a boss who was a real all-around jerk: talked about himself like everyone was dying to know every detail of his day, teased and harassed assistants when he was bored in the most juvenile, condescending ways ever, etc etc. I was one of those assistants. One time, I was submitting his receipts for reimbursement when he let his train of thought take him in a million directions and kept asking me questions further and further from the task at hand that were simply unnecessary and I think intentionally distracting. When I got visibly flustered and couldn’t focus on his questions or my submission work, he came around my desk to stand behind my chair, grabbed the top of the back of the chair, and started pushing down on it repeatedly, making me bounce voilently in my seat. I was so outraged that I shot up out of my chair, turned, and YELLED at him to cut it out and that it was wildly inappropriate behavior and that I deserved to be treated with respect. I honestly don’t know what came over me and EVERYONE in the office heard, but he backed off – very startled – and never pulled anything again. I started getting more respect from everyone after that – shouldn’t have been necessary and its one of the reasons I left, but I still think about it proudly.

    1. TimeTravlR*

      Wow! Good for you. I once had a boss who was not a jerk, rest his hands on my shoulders while he was reading my screen as I was typing (not a normal thing but it was a huge rush). I didn’t even say anything but he took his hands away pretty quickly.
      The next day he said, “I noticed you tensed up when I put my hands on your shoulders, did I offend you?” I appreciate so much that he had enough self awareness to notice and to acknowledge. I told him I just don’t like anyone in my space (very true!) and he never did it again.
      I think I’d have responded as you did though if someone bounced my chair! WTAF?!

    2. Caliente*

      That is insane. Who even does this crap, tho I think I said that on another post lol. People are nuts!

      1. LavaLamp*

        A lot of people do weird things like this. I had a teacher in high school who liked to run his hands through my hair. It was weird; and I asked him to stop one day. He did, and my male friend started haranguing me that it wasn’t hurting me so I shouldn’t get to object. My teacher, who I later figured out only did it because I reminded him of his daughter, put a stop to that nonsense with a lesson about respecting people’s bodies and consent.

        1. KateM*

          Ew. I hope you dropped that friend after putting him to a situation when someone kept doing something weird to HIM.

          1. LavaLamp*

            Naw, he was just a dumb teenager, and he had the grace to look embarrassed after the lecture.

  16. Jester*

    I shared this in an open thread at some point but it’s a doozy. Seven weeks after starting a new job in a new state during a pandemic, my coworker accused me of abusing him. He had been moved to my location and had been told it was temporary. It wasn’t temporary and he was literally the only person who didn’t know that. So to make up a reason to justify going back to the old location he said I told him he wasn’t allowed to go to the bathroom, that I yelled and swore at him, that I was bad at my job, and uninterested in my job. I really don’t know what he expected because if what he had been saying was true, I should have been fired and would have been stuck anyway. Of course, none of what he was saying was true so I just reported every time he was a jerk and bad at his job. Anyway, after six months of episodes of bad behavior and getting everyone on my side, a position at yet another location opened up so I transferred and now he’s stuck doing two people’s jobs alone. He complains about it too to which I would like to answer, ‘Play stupid games, win stupid prizes.’ Every single person at my new location is 100x nicer and better at their jobs.

    2. melko*

      Years ago, I was in school part time and working as the bus driver and cooker for a brand new day care. All I heard about from Day 1 was “Too bad we can’t afford…” a cook the boss, the assistant manager, and the lead had all worked with before. I was constantly compared to her and always came up short. Several months later we’re open and our census is full with a wait list, I got back from my morning bus run and guess who was in the kitchen? Yup, Expensive Cook. I got let go 89 days into my 90 day probation.

      I was irritated, but applied for unemployment, managed to switch enough classes that I was now essentially a full time student, and moved on. A few months down the road, the assistant manager called me near tears, begging me to come back. Full time, part time, *any* time, cash at the end of the day, all under the table, unless I wanted to be employed again, in which case, she’d pay me OT to do the paperwork – could I start tomorrow?

      I finally got the rest of the story. Turns out Expensive Cook and Boss’ fiance were having A Thing and ran off to Vegas to get married. Boss had crawled into a bottle of gin and hadn’t come out yet, and Assistant Manager was left holding down the fort, trying to be all things to all people for 60+ kids. Telling her I couldn’t do anything for them was the highlight of the year, easily, and still one of my favorite ‘jerk boss’ stories.

      1. Lucien Nova*

        This story seemed EXCEPTIONALLY familiar to me for some reason and I’ve just twigged to why – I’ve read it in Etiquette Hell’s old archives! I’ve always loved the “no, now screw off” ending.

  17. kdizzle*

    I worked with a horribly strange woman during the summers in college when I filed medical records at a hospital. She would always complain to my boss that I wasn’t working fast enough (I promise, I was working fast enough). I tried my best to ignore her.

    One day, I was taking some trash out and noticed some medical records in the dumpster. “That’s weird”…I thought. They weren’t shredded or scheduled to be burned, just sitting in the dumpster intact. I brought it to the attention of my boss who said that definitely wasn’t right. They checked the security camera, and it turns out that the crazy lady was just throwing records away instead of processing them and filing them…per her job. She was fired. I don’t feel one atom of remorse over that.

    3. Where’s the Orchestra?*

      Agreed – she was likely violating HIPPA, and could have gotten the hospital sued. You did the right thing.

      1. ThatGirl*

        sorry if this is pedantic but it’s HIPAA, a “hippa” is a lady hippo (not really, just a joke)

        1. Lily C*

          I’ve found that mentally pronouncing it as Hip-aaaah! helps me remember that it’s a double A, not a double H.

        2. nothing rhymes with purple*

          Heh, they used that in our training, complete with a cute purple lady hippo sticker.

        3. Where’s the Orchestra?*

          I think I typed it right – but autocorrect on my phone has been known to swallow abbreviations from time to time.

    4. Clisby*

      Oh, gosh, this is Ignatius J. Reilly did in Confederacy of Dunces. I can’t remember how he got his filing job, but his bosses thought he was super-efficient at getting rid of the backlog of stuff to be filed. Until it turned out he was just throwing the files away.

      1. Marianne*

        oh goodness, you are so right – a definite Ignatius move! my favorite book, ever, I re-read it every few years. on a side note, did you hear the book was made into a play starring Nick Offernan (Parks & Rec) as Ignatius? it was delayed due to COVID, but I believe has plans to eventually show at a theater in Boston.
        Thanks for the morning laugh :)

        1. Theo*

          Actually, it already played in Boston in late winter 2015! Normally, I wouldn’t be so sure of this — but I was in the audience :D I’ve never read the book but quite enjoyed the play.

      2. JustaTech*

        Way back in the early 1980’s in Baltimore, the IRS moved one of their filing facilities to a new location. One day there was a heavy rain, a leak in the roof, and what do you know, the whole ceiling caved in, as hundreds of tax returns had just been stuffed into the ceiling.

        So some poor person has to call every one of the people who’s returns were ruined and ask them to re-file. By bad (or good) luck one of the first people they called was an investigative reporter for the Baltimore Sun, so then it was front-page news.

    5. EPLawyer*

      No wonder she complained about you not being fast enough. If they compared your time to do the job to how much time she spent, they would have known she could not possibly be processing the records properly in the time she claimed.

      Good thing you found those records.

    6. kdizzle*

      Thanks, all. This woman unexpectedly died less than a year after she was fired, and honestly, I did feel bad about that for a while. I was young and thought, “oh geez…I helped make her last months on earth extra painful.” With age and some perspective, I’m more solidly in the camp of feeling as though I did the right thing.

      1. Bibliothecarial*

        Since this was at a hospital, there’s a pretty good chance that somebody could have stolen patients’ identities or done something else unethical with that un-secured paperwork. You may have saved many people from dealing with identity theft or worse in their last months!

        1. Momma Bear*

          It’s highly likely that her actions caused problems for patients. I’m glad you gained perspective. She did it to herself.

        2. Seeking Second Childhood*

          I’m more angry on behalf of the patients who have lost their medical history because of her. Could you imagine coming out of remission, and the hospital has no record of your previous treatment?!

      2. Botanist*

        That seems to be an unfortunately easy thinking error to fall into- she definitely made her own last months hard by choosing to do such a blatantly bad and illegal thing at work. Not on you at all!

      3. Sparkles McFadden*

        Nope. She’d have gotten found out sooner or later. You just made it sooner and saved headaches for the hospital and some patients.

      4. StrikingFalcon*

        But you didn’t get her fired – she got herself fired by throwing out patients’ records. All you did was report something that needed to be reported (improperly disposed of records). Her getting fired is just the natural consequence of what she was doing. She could have avoided that by actually doing her job. The fact that you are the one who found the records doesn’t make this in any way your fault.

      6. Worldwalker*

        No — *SHE* did that.

        She made all the choices that led to her getting fired (and I’m surprised not prosecuted) — you just pointed out what she’d done.

    8. Siege*

      I worked for a major game company that makes a collectible card game. Call it Gather: The Magicening. The cards are localized in 9 or 11 languages, I don’t remember, but the main thing is that the printing process they use is designed so that for most of the languages they just need to change the second black – they do CMYK+K – and if I understood correctly, the 2nd black has the text. (Don’t ask me how they accommodate the mana dots, I was a temp in 2004, I don’t remember.) For the Chinese localizations – I think both Simplified and Traditional, but maybe only Simplified – they had to do some serious shifts in the art because they couldn’t sell card art with skeletons on it due to Chinese cultural beliefs, so they had second arts done for all the cards (a lot of them!) that had skeletons on.

      A print vendor who may have been lovely decided he was going to save time on the presses by doing the fastest switch ever from one localization to the other and he did this by not changing the CMYK plates for the Simplified Chinese cards, just the second black plate. I, knowing nothing of this person, nor what he was like as a person, but knowing that my job was to QA the cards caught that the art was wrong. The company had to eat the cost to reprint – many, MANY thousands of dollars – and fired the foreman as a result, which I always found a satisfying outcome even if it’s not revenge on a jerk because I don’t know anything about him and never met him. But it was like … you have ONE job. It is to produce these cards CORRECTLY, not get into speed contests. If you cannot do THIS JOB, then I cannot be super sympathetic to your problems.

      So if you played Simplified Chinese Gather: The Magicening in 2005 and there was a delay in your Betrayers of Kamigawa set, now you know why!

      1. Sparkles McFadden*

        Someday, I hope to understand the “faster is better” mentality. If you’re not blowing deadlines, what difference does it make if you got the work done fifteen minutes faster that the person next to you?

        1. Sola Lingua Bona Lingua Mortua Est*

          One of my favorite supervisors had to tell me a few times, but got through to me after about a month. “Sola Lingua Bona Lingua Mortua Est, I can explain late, but I can’t explain wrong.”

          On April 1st, she added “And I can’t explain you.” Neither one of us could hold back the laughs long.

        2. JustaTech*

          I’ve got two facilities full of people who think like that, for two reasons: 1) it’s the only part of their job they can measure or control (they can’t tell what the outcome will be, but they can tell how fast they did it) and 2) the sooner they are done, the sooner they can get out of their protective gear.

          I’ve spent years trying to get them to slow up just a tiny touch, or at least not take shortcuts, but it’s a losing battle.

          1. Siege*

            My understanding is that changing all five plates is messy and time-consuming, so he decided he didn’t want to bother.

      2. David*

        Ooh, thanks for sharing! I always like to read behind-the-scenes stories about the development and printing of, uh, GtM cards :-) but this one is more personal than most.

  18. Lorena*

    There was this time that this marketing manager at the company I worked for, decided that they would use an external photographer to take all the shots for the new website. At this point, even though I was the office manager for the company, I was also the official company photographer, as I had spent 3-4 years taking courses at College in Photography, as well as spending money on equipment. I also took all the photos at company events and employee photos for their profile on the website. She and I did not get along though, mostly because she had a habit of starting projects, procrastinating and then I would end up having to bail her out – not to help her, but because not doing it would be bad for the company.
    Anyways, the external guy comes in and takes the photos – they come back and they are so BAD. Like terrible. I ended up having to take all the photos anyways, and she ended up quitting before the site even got completed. Even now, many years later (and I’m no longer working there) – the site is covered in my photos.

    1. Bee Eye Ill*

      That reminds me of the time my employer wanted a new website and hired a graphic designer to make the layout – no code or actual templates – just a layout. I had to take that and build the whole thing from scratch based on their color schemes and weird floating boxes. When it was done, the graphic design people got all the credit.

      1. Seeking Second Childhood*

        I’ve seen that happen with document designs. It sucks and I’m sorry it happened to you too.
        Hopefully the web implementation has a prominent place on your resume, because it’s a thing to be proud of.

        1. Bee Eye Ill*

          I left there two years ago and they are still using the same site, so I guess it has stood the test of time. I don’t think they have anyone that knows enough to build another one like I did, and they sure don’t want to pay for a web design firm to actually build it.

  19. Teekanne aus Schokolade*

    Was at a networking event for journalists when I joined a conversation going on about advances in space flight between a colleague and a newly graduated (and very cocky) engineer who had been writing for us during his studies and who was now trying to land interviews for his dream job in aerospace but not having much luck.

    I write on tech trends (and have no background in engineering) and I made a remark about a new space program being tested by the large aerospace company Mr. Engineer most hoped to work for when he cut me off and said, “Yes, but you’re not really qualified to comment on something like this”. I just smiled and said, “You’re right. I’m not, I just parrot what I hear from my dad”.

    He rolled his eyes and said, “Oh yeah, and who’s your dad?”

    “Oh, the VP of engineering for *that large aerospace company*” and I turned to walk away as his face drained of blood.

    2. Llellayena*

      Oooooooo…..wow…..I mean some of this you can chalk up to fresh graduate arrogance and can be trained out, but really. I think I’d quietly observe him for the next…say…6 months and if it looks like he learned from the “anyone can be a network contact” lesson offer to forward his resume. But it’s a big hurdle, he’d have to show some serious attitude improvement.

        1. Autumnheart*

          I wouldn’t offer OR forward it, even if he asked. In fact I’d go home and tell Dad, “Btw, Condescending Jerk was a condescending jerk to me, so if you ever get his resume…” Let him wait 10-20 years to build his reputation because he blew it when he was a new grad. It’s not like there’s a lack of qualified engineers out there. Take a chance on someone who wasn’t openly an a-hole.

      2. Teekanne aus Schokolade*

        Haha I had actually already told Dad about him and had the all-clear to send his contact info but Mr. Engineer’s conduct at that event kind of killed it for me. Mr. Engineer apologized later that day and took me aside to ask about my dad and possibilities, etc. But by then I felt like he was only apologizing for gain. I moved from that company and am now curious as to what became of Mr. E.

        1. bopper*

          Engineer: Did you mention me to your Dad?

          You: No, I am not an engineer so I am not really qualified to comment on something like that.

          2. Nerdling*

            Engineer: Did you mention me to your dad?

            You: Yes, but I think if you knew what I told him, you’d rather I hadn’t.

          4. Analytical Tree Hugger*

            Early in my career, I had a sit down with my manager to discuss my first performance review in a new job. In the “needs improvement” section, he had listed my report writing skills as needing serious improvement. When I asked him about that, he pointed out a one-page report he had rewritten.

            Now, for context: The one-pager was an early draft I had sent him with the question, “Before I get to far, I wanted to check, is this in the right direction?” Instead of responding, he just took it on himself to rewrite it.

            More context: Just a month before that performance review conversation, I had completed a 10 page report on a deeply complicated and technical topic. No one gave me any input on the report, since no one on staff had the skills or expertise necessary to help. The entire team (including his boss and the person who would soon be his boss) had read it and everyone was impressed with both the report’s thoroughness and accessibility for non-technical people (i.e., all of them).

            Given all that context, I was too shocked in that conversation to say anything, so he submitted this performance evaluation saying how much work I needed to be up to par with report writing.

            Well, his boss and HR made him rewrite it, because they were like, “What? Why would you think Analytical Tree Hugger needs to improve his writing skills? His writing skills are great!”

            That manager stopped having direct reports soon after that.

      3. alwaysonefootoutthedoor*

        Yeah, no to coddling this kind of nonsense. Guy can learn from the school of life.

    7. I'mJustHereForThePaycheck*

      As someone that has worked in aerospace and with many of these kinds of engineers, this is beyond glorious. I’m honestly jealous that you got to hit back with that. What a fantastic win.

    8. AshK434*

      Meh…using someone else’s status to make you look good isn’t the triumph you may think it is. Sounds like you’re just a benefactor of nepotism

  20. 2cents*

    Years ago I had a horrible manager. He was brought in as sort of a consultant to try and fix some issues in our department. He scheduled a weekly meeting on Monday mornings – they had to be on Monday mornings because he enjoyed making us miserable by working throughout the weekend so that the presentation was ready on Sunday night. He didn’t do any work – he’d call us from the pool asking about our progress. Mind you, we’d abandon the presentation halfway through the meeting because it didn’t even address the real pain points so it was all useless. One weekend I simply didn’t do anything. Didn’t even pick up the phone. I got into the conference meeting a couple of minutes late for the Monday morning meeting and the only available seat was right next to him. God, just typing this makes my heart race. Before I even sat down he started berating me because I didn’t work that weekend. I calmly waited for him to finish and said, “I’m sorry, I was too busy getting divorced.” It was true, that weekend was when me and my ex-husband decided to split. You could hear a pin drop. A moment of complete silence and shock followed as I sat down and opened my laptop.

    He was spectacularly fired a couple of weeks later.

      1. Thin Mints didn't make me thin*

        On a related note, I called my then-boss once to say that I needed to take the next day off to file for divorce. “Oh, you can throw yourself into your work then,” she responded with no sympathy whatever. I hope karma has done something unpleasant to her.

      2. 2cents*

        He was fired a couple of weeks later after an investigation was concluded. It was glorious. I ended up working for another horrible boss for a couple of years but I’m in an excellent place now. No more horrible bosses for me!

        1. Sinister Serina*

          Oh man. This reminds of when I went on vacation and hired a temp receptionist to take my place for a week. My manager hated seeing me laughing with the temp and thought I wasn’t teaching her anything about my job. Sure, I can teach somebody to do my job and do it well in four hours.
          I go on vacation and come back and get called into her office-the temp didn’t do this, the temp didn’t do that-it’s all your fault for not telling her blah. Look, I left copious notes, I told her everything and sometimes they get it and sometimes they don’t but the office was not going to fall apart in a week, I promise. But she hated that I had time off and had a good time and had to yell at me about it. But this time, I took bout two minutes of it and interrupted her and said “I can’t do this right now. My dad is in the hospital, we don’t know what’s wrong and I’m waiting to hear from mom”. Her “Why didn’t you tell me? Me? Really, when? I walked out. Dad turned out to be fine, btw. Revenge was when her boss sold the company years later and she didn’t have me to pick on any more and the company I work for now actually values me. Imagine that.

  21. Waiting on QA*

    There was a guy I worked with that got hired a few months after me and was constantly competing with me over EVERYTHING. The only problem was, while we were both over achievers, he would rush through his tasks, getting them wrong and causing problems at least a third of the time. This did not endear him to our boss, and it was clear she favored me when giving higher level work. He was always trying to bring me down with him, blaming me for things I had no part in, telling our boss I wasn’t contributing, going out of his way to make me look bad, etc.

    Eventually he got so fed up that they wouldn’t promote him, give him more money (to his credit, we were woefully underpaid), or give him higher level work, that he left.

    Less than 6 months after he left, I got promoted to team lead and almost doubled my pay, while the rest of the department got gigantic market-rate pay increases. He doesn’t know any of this, of course, but I do get petty satisfaction out of it.

    1. TimeTravlR*

      Wouldn’t it have been great to run into him shortly after and be able to say oh so casually, “So much has changed at work? I got a promotion and we all got big fat raises! It’s so great, isn’t it?!?!?!”

    2. Seeking Second Childhood*

      It might even be more ironic if his exit interview’s reason for leaving was pay scale….and triggered a revamp of wages so Poole thank him for leaving. :D

  22. Wisteria*

    Usually, the way I triumph over a work jerk is to change jobs. :(

    Although, there was one time this guy was bragging about how he wasn’t going to do the thing I wanted him to do. It got back to me, as bragging does. I (metaphorically) waved the contract with the customer at him, which meant he did it. Not a great story, but very satisfying to me.

    1. LabTechNoMore*

      Usually, the way I triumph over a work jerk is to change jobs.

      Seriously. Even the petty triumph stories weren’t all that satisfying, because having blatant evidence right in front of our faces would just cause the Office Jerk to dig in their heals even further.

  23. Cat Tree*

    Ok, this is minor but still satisfying. I’m an engineer and work in manufacturing. Engineering is technically a support role; the Operations department that actually makes the product is the star of the show because that’s how the company makes money. So in toxic companies, there is usually a bit of a “rivalry” which is the most polite term I can think of to describe it.

    At an older job, my engineering group worked directly with customers (who were other companies). We wrote test protocols that they would have to sign off on, as well as our internal Operations and Quality. A big part of my job was getting 4+ people to sign off on these things in time to meet the customer’s deadline. Operations was notoriously careless and slow about this kind of thing. But our department wasn’t well-run or organized, and they knew they could always blame us for delays because we’re less important. Well, based on my previous experience I developed a system where I keep personal notes on the status of every document on my worklist. This is for my own sanity and it’s something as simple as “left on Bob’s desk Aug 12” or “with customer as of Aug 12” or “draft, waiting for XYZ to complete”. So one day a project manager was really wound up about a particular protocol because the customer really needed it ASAP. The Operations guy, Bob, claimed that he never received it from the Engineering group, basically saying that we were all lazy and behind and it was our fault. I was relatively new at the time and he had no idea that I kept these notes, so I replied to the email with feigned innocence and said that I left it in his mailbox on XYZ and could something have happened to it where I need to re-print it because surely he wouldn’t have overlooked it?

    So he was in a spot where he could no longer imply that it was my fault and he would have to make a direct claim that I was outright lying. That is a little too far for most people. He never responded to that email, but later that day the protocol magically ended up on my desk with his signature dated for that very same day. I didn’t stay at that place for very long, but after that he always signed my documents promptly and didn’t try to pretend that I was the slow step in the process.

    1. Cat Tree*

      I thought of another one that was similar. I was at a really, really toxic company (like so toxic that the CEO was asked not to return to a specific country). I found a problem with one of our products, and I needed to do a bunch of testing to fix it. It was not ideal because it caused a huge delay, but it was bad enough that I felt it was unethical (possibly illegal) to knowingly send junk to our paying customers. The CEO was constantly harping on me about speeding up the testing which just wasn’t possible. At one point she tried to pull rank and even said, “I’m not paying you to do this testing”. So I asked her outright if she wants to knowingly send a defective product to our customers. Feigning innocence to call someone’s bluff is apparently my go-to strategy, and it’s very satisfying.

      1. bopper*

        Remind them that at Morton Thiokol the managers overrode the engineers who said the Space Shuttle was not safe to fly.

        1. Cat Tree*

          It wasn’t quite as high-stakes as that, but we definitely studied that case in an Ethics course during college.

        2. Worldwalker*

          I still think the person who signed off on the launch paperwork should have been charged with, at the very least, negligent homicide. I can never un-see those smoke trails in the sky.

    2. Wisteria*

      Oh, I have worked in engineering at a manufacturing operation. Yes, I feel that pain. I used to have regular arguments with operations over signing things. Funnily enough, the company realized that there was a general problem with things not being signed off quickly enough, and they designated an empty cube as the sign off cube for people to drop off their docs instead of walking from person to person to collect signatures. Signatories were expected to check the cube at least daily. Sign off times got shorter, and I stopped having so many arguments.

    3. TimeTravlR*

      So many organizations and people are like this that I have learned to keep very good notes. People will someday learn not to try to throw my group under the bus because I will always have the ammunition. “Well, Bob, we submitted that to your group on [this date] via [this communication]. We’re waiting on your [response].”

      1. Cat mom*

        Yup, working with a backstabbing jerk was never an issue for me because I already kept copious notes, action items at meetings, results and more. Slippery people just don’t do well with receipts :)

      2. alwaysonefootoutthedoor*

        I work with faculty who think staff are servants and don’t hesitate to blame us for any & everything they break or forget.
        I track everything. It was really helpful when an exceptionally karen-ish prof pulled the ‘who is your manager?’ bit with me. I had receipts for the issue at hand, plus my dad died that day, yet I was non-stop working to help lazy profs set up resources for remote teaching (we went lockdown that same day).

    4. identifying remarks removed*

      Had something similar happen with a member of the sales team. I started working for the VP of Sales and I’d email each member of the team reminding them to send me their updated sales data each week ahead of the team meeting. Bert sent me his data at the last minute so I had to scramble to update the presentation. I asked him nicely to get the info to me on time next time. He did the same thing the next week. With the added bonus of letting me know I was just a secretary and he’d get me the data when it suited him. I had a good relationship with the VP as I’d worked for before and he’d recruited me. So I let him know that I didn’t get Bert’s data in time so his slide would be blank. When the time came for Bert to give an update on his missing sales slide he blamed me and said I hadn’t sent him the email and he’d taken it upon himself to get the data to me at the last minute. I said Bert I think you’re confused – I sent you the email at 3 pm last Thur and you opened it at 3.05 pm that day. Deafening silence and then the VP said never mind Bert I’m sure you won’t miss any more emails from my secretary.

        1. identifying remarks removed*

          He was the best boss I ever worked for – moved to 3 companies to work for him. I knew he always had my back and he knew I’d always get the work done.

    5. turquoisecow*

      I’ve had similar experiences. My department took direction from several other people, who would send us a bunch of tasks and then come back and claim that we hadn’t done them properly, or that we’d done them without authorizations. Lots of “you did X on Y date, as I can see from the time stamp in the system, why did you do that?” Lots of blaming us for errors type thing, and my boss saved all his emails but could never find evidence so was constantly getting thrown under the bus.

      Not long after I started he began giving me these tasks to do and I decided that i would follow his advice to save every email, but I’d be organized about it and categorize them in folders in Outlook. One or two “how come you did this?!” emails responded to with “you told me to, here’s the specific email in which you said to do that,” later and that sort of pushback stopped. They couldn’t throw me under the bus for doing what they’d specifically told me to do.

      Several years later after that dysfunctional place shut down I got my current job, where I miraculously have not had to have a CYA archive of emails, and they are also miraculously doing much better.

  24. The Circle Jerk*

    I worked with a horrid VP of Sales – arrogant, obnoxious, just a nightmare. We were in an internal meeting and he used the phrase “get in a circle jerk” with them (and even used the hand motion). Then smirked at me, the only woman in the room and the youngest by far. I’d had enough so (fake) innocently asked, loudly “what’s a circle jerk”? He tried to move on but I asked again “sorry I don’t understand, what is a circle jerk – if I’m negotiating the contract I need to know the terms”. Everyone froze. The ceo walked in and asked “so where are we”. I loudly said “well we are waiting for ____ to explain what a circle jerk is as he’s really worried about it being part of the contract”. It was absolute gold and a career highlight that sadly can’t go on a resume!!

    4. christine*

      You can’t leave it at that!!! What did the horrid VP say? What did the CEO say? Please don’t leave us hanging!

      1. The Circle Jerk*

        I finally just excused myself and left the room and let them regroup. I kept the poker face the entire time and to this day – I’ve never told anyone at that company the true story (it was years and years ago). The VP got fired shortly after – for expense related issues (his best line was “well you can’t get receipts for what you put in a g-string” – as he loved taking his team to strip clubs). This was in the 90s in a small tech company if you are wondering where HR might have been!

        2. Evan Þ.*

          “Well, if you can’t get receipts for it, you shouldn’t be spending it on the company dime.”

        1. mcfizzle*

          I truly believe this will prominently featured soon and become a timeless AAM gem, as well it should be! Thank you so much for sharing this!

    13. Teekanne aus Schokolade*

      You win AAM gold!!! Its exactly how Alison coaches to handle this type of thing!

    18. Blatherskite*

      ” if I’m negotiating the contract I need to know the terms” got my tea snorted up my nose. Priceless!

    19. bunniferous*

      I just read this story to my 63 year old husband. Who legit did not know what a “circle jerk” was.

      I have explained a lot over the years….thankfully in this case he was happy staying ignorant!

      1. Mannequin*

        LMAO because there’s an old punk band that’s been around since the 70s called the Circle Jerks, and their singer is now 65.

    24. Radical Edward*

      I raise my virtual glass to you. That was magnificent. Superb. Perfection. You could probably sell that story to a comedian (but there’s no way they’d enjoy telling it half as much!).

  25. Formerpublicaccountant*

    Not sure how much pro revenge this is – but here’s my story.

    I am an accountant and was still in “public accounting”. When I was a second year associate, I got saddled with a senior, who was pure evil and bat-shit crazy. I went from a “top” performer to having this crazy woman go out of her way to make me miserable, sand bag my reviews and do her best to prevent me from getting promoted to “senior”.

    She also conveniently assigned me to all of her work, because I am great at my job, then gave me reviews that did not represent the work I was doing. fun stuff.

    I complained to higher ups, no one cared, so I started job hunting. She said the only way she would ever consider leaving the hollowed grounds of our firm was if she could make $75,000. A sum, she surmised would be impossible to earn.

    Guess what salary I negotiated at my new job? that’s right $75,000. With 2 years less experience than her. I was promoted 1-week before I gave notice and left her high and dry to finish her tax returns by September 15th.

    Management was absolutely flabbergasted that I would quit. I have not seem her since, but I do run into some of my former boss’s bosses. There are no hard feelings.

    2. bopper*

      My spouse worked in a similar company and I have no idea why she would do that…promotions are perfunctory at that point (unless you are terrible)…you being a senior would not affect her as she would be moving on to the next leave or leaving the company (in an up or out culture).

    3. Mister Lady*

      Yikes! I don’t know how you manage to have no hard feelings with the higher-ups who ignored your complaints about this woman assigning you all of her work. You’re a more forgiving soul than I, and you deserve all the peace!

  26. Dust Bunny*

    Not me, but my former (now retired) supervisor. We work for a medical school library and a subset of our patrons are local big-cheese doctors, who tend to be a bit spoiled but in general are fine. There is one big-shot doctor, though, is massively full of himself and rude as heck.

    For the record, Supervisor was a mild-mannered sixtysomething native Midwesterner who slightly resembled Harry Truman and was always unfailingly nice to everybody. It’s not hugely important but the contrast was delicious.

    He called us once, Supervisor answered, and Patron made a sort of obscure request. Supervisor [I know this because Supervisor explained later why were always to refer this Patron to him and not handle him ourselves] followed up with a couple of questions to clarify and Patron, instead of providing useful information, repeated himself but. much. more. slowly. and then followed up by basically calling Supervisor stupid.

    Supervisor pulled out his most pleasant customer service voice and apologetically told Patron we couldn’t help him until he was willing to be civil, and then hung up.

    I think he did finally call back but Supervisor insisted on dealing with Patron himself in case Patron thought he might get away with abusing lower-level staff. I know we did some research work for him so I guess he behaved himself the second time.

    3. Teekanne aus Schokolade*

      Your description has me imagining Colonel Sherman T. Potter from m
      MASH as your supervisor! Not always mild mannered but always sarcastic :)

  27. Erin*

    John, my former boss, was one of those classic charismatic abuser-types: charming and a favorite of 99% of the people he interacted with outside our team, but he had a long-standing industry reputation of abusing the people who worked for him–explosions of anger, out-of-left-field threats of termination, undermining them or keeping them from advancement.

    He always had a favorite and a scapegoat. On our team, I was the favorite, which basically meant he’d treat me better than the other team members, but always with the implicit threat that it would be taken away if I stepped out of line. I did my best to protect the rest of the team from him–redirecting, talking him down, etc. I was exhausted, and constantly feeling guilty because I’d see how beaten down everyone else felt. Reporting to HR felt very risky because he was friends with the head of HR.

    Finally, he started scapegoating the youngest member of our team–pulling her behind closed doors to scream at her, threaten her, intimidate her. She came to me about it, and I coached her through her decision to report to HR. They, as expected, did nothing.

    Then, one day, I happened to be in a casual conversation with our boss’s boss. He made an observation about how our team seemed unhappy…so I decided to go for it. I told him what was wrong. I told him he needed to talk to a few team members in particular. And he actually listened. He even went to HR (which he also oversaw) and told them off for failing our team previously.

    Several months and an HR investigation later (during which worse stuff emerged), John resigned in disgrace.

      1. Erin*

        Unfortunately no. And it’s not the only issue people in the organization have had with him (routine casual discrimination against women being the main thing). We’re hoping there’s some accountability there soon.

    3. Radical Edward*

      It’s honestly depressing how often that (a lucky moment of private conversation with another superior or outside individual) is one’s only recourse… thank goodness you were able to take advantage of the chance and actually get a result!

  28. Bagpuss*

    love these!
    The only one I can think of was very early in my career when I had a truly toxic boss. He used to scream, shout and throw things, and lie to others about what had happened.

    Very early on in my time there, he came into my room, angry about something, and started shouting.
    I was totally shocked and said the first thing which came into my head, which was “I can see you’re really upset at the moment, wouldn’t it be better to talk when you’re feeling calmer?”
    He more or less stopped dead mid-rant and looked totally disbelieving, and turned round and walked out.

    Much later, after having seen his behaviour to co-workers, I realised that what he wanted/expected was that I would lose my temper and shout back at him, and then I would have been in the wrong and it would have become “Bagpuss yelled at me, she’s so unprofessional, but I will be magnanimous and forgive her” By being calm and apparently unimpressed (Actually really scared and and in ‘freeze’ mode) I think I took the wind out of his sails and he didn’t know what to do.

    He never screamed at me again but he continued to scream and throw things at the other staff members.

    I stayed there far too long (it was my second job after graduation, so I didn’t have a lot of experience, and it was a really tough market in my industry, but it really destroyed my self -confidence. By the time I left I was literally sitting in my car in the car park every morning feeling physically sick about walking through the door. It was horrible, but at least I got that one perfect moment!)

      1. Bagpuss*

        For some reason, the fact that it was completely unplanned and just my natural reaction pleases me immensely!

    2. Filosofickle*

      Ooh, yelling bosses do not fly with me. Early in my career I saw my boss yell at a coworker in front of all of us. Later I went to his office and calmly told him if he ever yells at me I will walk out the door. That I had this composure at a 23 year old woman in her first “real” job, still kind of amazes me. I don’t think I saw him yell again so maybe I had an impact.

      1. Not So NewReader*

        Refusing to take the bait and committing to going forward is really something, if a person can get themselves through it.

        Boss said asked me when I was going to “wrap up That Thing with my father dying and get back to work”. My weak spot is restraining Those Words from flying out of my mouth. I made myself sit there silently by promising myself that I WILL have the final say on this one. The next day I went to HR. Since this was something the boss had been scolded for one previous occasions HR took me super seriously, even questioning my exact reaction. “Did you yell?” no. “Did you cuss?” No, I did not speak at all. I thought HR was going to start drooling at the prospect of having a clear case against this person.

        I heard that when big boss got done talking to my boss that my boss was in TEARS. I dunno what went on there and I don’t care that much.

        The thing that grabbed me about all this is the knowledge that if I had yelled or cussed my complaint would have been less credible or something. Not everyone can hold their tongue. Not everyone even wants to hold their tongue- they want to say their piece and walk out the main door. The severity of the reprimand should not be based on the employee’s reaction, that is the reprimand should not be less because the employee responded poorly. Wrong is wrong and if the employee had not felt their back was to the wall the employee probably would not have reacted poorly. The boss’ accountability should not be on a sliding scale. I don’t know where this thinking comes from, I see it in many places, but we need to ditch it somewhere.

  29. not a doctor*

    This isn’t epic or even huge, but it does remain my most satisfying “take that!” moment:

    I made a huge mistake when I got hired at my first post-grad school job: I accepted an offer based on a vocal (but not written) promise of a promotion after X time and upon Y and Z conditions being met. Naturally, when the time came, they backed out. Worse, they essentially gaslighted me by saying that the original promise had never happened at all, that I’d made an incorrect assumption, etc., despite the fact that my boss had discussed the promised promotion so many times in mixed company that it was common knowledge across the entire department (and I had many people asking me what the hell was going on). They never gave me a particularly good reason for withdrawing the offer, except that I needed more training… which they were supposed to be giving me.

    I cast my net and managed to stumble into an offer doing the exact same job for another district. I still liked my place, and kind of wanted to see if I could still stick around for at least another year, so I requested a meeting with TPTB to ask just one last time about getting into the new role, or at least a timeline for the cross-training so I could eventually get there. They said no. No to cross-training, no to all of it.

    I said: “I’m sorry to hear that. In that case, I should tell you that I’ll be accepting an offer as Exact Same Role in Neighboring District, and you can consider this my two weeks’ notice. I’ll have the letter on your desk within the hour.”

    I’ve never been more composed, and their faces were PRICELESS. After a beat of silence, I thanked them, walked out, hastily called the other place to accept the offer, and wrote up my letter of resignation. In a bit of a dick move, I also ended up taking one of my two weeks out of my unused vacation, but 1) they didn’t cash those days out, and 2) they very clearly wanted me GONE after that.

    2. Sometimes supervisor*

      More of a :: flip table :: moment than a “take that” but reminded me of one of my first jobs. My job title was “junior teapot maker”. Over the two years I was there, my job role evolved to the point that I was doing something which was very much not “junior” teapot maker. I asked several times for my job title to be changed as it wasn’t a fair reflection of what I was now doing. Every time I was told they couldn’t do it, HR policy, hands tied, super sorry.

      Eventually, I found a “teapot maker” job elsewhere. When I resigned, I was very clear one of the reasons was this was a promotion in job title. Again, got told super soz, HR policy, nothing we can do.

      Take a lucky guess what job role they advertised for when recruiting my replacement? That’s right. “Teapot maker”. (I suppose the take that part would be that within three years of that happening I’d been promoted to “senior teapot maker” and then “teapot supervisor”…)

      1. Anon Y Mouse*

        I had a moment like this but not so satisfying. I had a part-time job which had more work in it than I could do in my assigned hours. I was always struggling with a backlog of tasks which with the experience I have now, I would have got help with sooner, but back then I thought I just sucked. When I left to go on maternity leave there was still a backlog.

        Mat leave in my country is long so they hired someone as cover. This person had already been working for us full-time on a temp contract which was due to end, so they were happy to take the cover job. They were good, and when I came back it was to no backlog and Cover Person (who had now left) was highly praised for clearing it. I felt dreadful about this because try as I might, I still couldn’t keep up with the tasks I was assigned. I started planning my exit.

        Some months later, when I was in a new job, I found out that Cover Person had been retained full time, and nobody had mentioned this. I think I could have cleared the backlog too, if I’d had fulltime hours to do it in…

    3. Lizzo*

      LOL I had a similar reaction after bringing ten pages of typewritten complaints to boss’s boss about favoritism, incompetence, and all sorts of terrible management practices on the part of my boss. I knew going into that meeting that Big Boss despised conflict, and sure enough, after saying my piece, he essentially said, “Your boss can do what she wants.” My response, “Cool! Please consider this my two weeks’ notice.”
      Based on what has happened since my departure, I am glad I got off the (slowly sinking) ship.

  30. Constance Lloyd*

    Ha, I mentioned this in a comment thread about professional clothing for jobs which don’t pay professional wages yesterday, but I can add it here and flesh out a few details.

    When I was a 22 year old bank teller, our dress code changed with one week’s notice. While I was able to purchase a $20 blazer from H&M to throw over all of the forever 21 dresses I was already wearing, male employees were expected to go from shirts & ties to a full suit. No budget was provided for these upgrades, nor did we receive a paycheck in the time between announcement and implementation.

    Shortly after this went into effect, my least favorite regular was at the window. He was a foul, spoiled 40-something who was very wealthy because his daddy was wealthy. He was verbally abusive and his behavior barely skirted the line of sexual harassment. As I was counting his money, two of my male coworkers walked by. He scoffed, and muttered, “Somebody needs to tell these guys there’s nothing worse than a bad suit.”

    I stopped counting. I locked eyes and, unsmiling, countered, “I feel like there’s nothing worse than making $9.00 an hour and being told you have to wear a suit to work.” And I held that gaze, unblinking and unsmiling, for an uncomfortably long amount of time, until he gulped out a brief, “Touché.” I then wordlessly returned to counting his money. From that day forward I was the only teller he would see, and he was significantly less miserable to deal with.

    Eight years later, I’m married to one of those guys in a bad suit. He’s now an attorney who wears jeans and T-shirts to work, and that suit still hangs in his closet.

    2. Mental Lentil*

      I love this story! The ending reminds me of a Reader’s Write stories from the The Sun.

      Thank you!

    3. A Girl Named Fred*

      Oh yay, you shared again! I saw your comment yesterday and loved it, so when I saw this post go up I was hoping you’d share again since it fit so perfectly.

      1. Constance Lloyd*

        It was so soon I almost didn’t! Then I decided an internet comments section is pretty low stakes, so why not :)

  31. nuqotw*

    I had a boss who just did not believe that women were capable in the same way as men. I wondered for a long time whether it was just that I was incompetent but then one of the few other women and I went out to coffee and talked about it. I was not incompetent, and neither was she.

    I had saved up a bunch of money and was getting ready to quit with nothing lined up because it’s hard to job search when you’re working 12 hour days. Then…the president of the company called me into his office one day and asked if I wanted to transfer to the department everyone under my boss wanted to transfer to. Why yes, yes I would, thank you so much. In two weeks, you say?

    Old Boss did not want to let go of me and kept putting work on my plate. The day I could finally tell him no was a great day.

  32. Alton Brown's Evil Twin*

    Worked for a consulting company doing turnkey network/hardware/software installations for big law firms. One place was a mess, they could never settle on requirements (big things and small things). We cycled through 3 different project managers during that time, and then the burden fell on my shoulders. They fired their wishy-washy IT director and we had to work directly with the partner who ran the IT and facilities committee (who was one of the reasons that they could never make any decisions). After a few more weeks, they cancelled our contract. Part of the contract terms was that we had to deliver to them all of our partial work product.

    I put a bankers box of documents together, along with a CD with the soft copies, set up a meeting to see that partner a few days later for the handover, and then on the appointed day headed downtown for our 10:00. I had 2 copies of the transmittal letter that listed all the documents we were turning over. I was sitting next to his assistant in the outer office, he came out, I indicated the box, and then said “Here’s the transmittal letter; I need you to sign both copies, and then I’m taking this one back with me.”

    He said – “I’m not signing anything. I don’t know that what you say is in the box is actually in the box.”. I replied “But you’ve been looking at these documents in various draft forms for the last 18 months. Surely you can flip through them and verify that these are the most recent versions you’ve seen.” He shot back “No, I’d need to have the IT department and the other committee members look at them”. I said “Look, I’m on overhead since you cancelled the contract. I have nothing else to do today. I’m happy to sit here in the outer office next to your assistant all day long while you call in anybody you want to look at these documents, but either I’m taking that box back with me at 5:00, or I’m taking a signed transmittal letter with me.”

    This was 20 years ago, and his billable rate even back then was probably $700/hour. He made a few phone calls, had a couple guys run in and out of his office, and after 30 minutes came out and said “Give me that, I’ll sign it.”

    1. PhyllisB*

      This is a personal story rather than work, but still valid for this thread, I think. One year the battery went out on my car (On Thanksgiving, of all days!! In a cemetery 30 minutes before they locked the gates!!) The next day I took the car into the dealership and told them I needed a new battery, and that this one was still under warranty. Well, the lady I usually dealt with was off for the holiday and the technician I was talking to decided to give me attitude. He started telling me he would have to “verify” that it was still under warranty (a 30 second computer check of the work orders, plus I had my original receipt.) Then he told me that they would have to put the battery on a tester and it would take “hours” to complete. (He was hoping I would just say never mind and pay for a new battery.) I just cheerfully said, “Oh, that’s no problem!! I have a book with me and no plans for the day!!” And made myself comfortable in the waiting area. His look was priceless. It wasn’t 20 minutes before my car was ready, and “No charge!!”

      1. COBOL Dinosaur*

        My story similar to this was when I took a car in for a flat tire repair. They called me back to talk about my car and said ‘your tire is done but look at how dirty your air filter is (showing me this prop dirty air filter they kept around)’. I looked at him and said ‘my car doesn’t take a square air filter’.

        1. EngineerDE*

          A shop I used to go to tried something similar with me. They told me my air filter needed to be replaced and asked me if I wanted it done. I declined politely as I planned to do it myself. When I got home, I checked it, and they’d done the replacement anyway and not charged me! I think that they probably changed it before they asked me.

        2. Beany*

          Hah! How did he explain that? “Oh, this was an example prop. Yours is just as bad, only rounder.”

        3. Where’s the Orchestra?*

          Ohhh, have any of you ever heard of “blinker fluid?” That is the thing the crummy shops in the Mountain region like to try and sell you on. I firmly remember telling a shop they could sell me blinker fluid when they could show me where on my car the blinker fluid reservoir was. And I refused to take just trust me, going to far as to walk into the garage portion with my phone out to take pictures of the blinker fluid reservoir. They backed down after that.

          1. allathian*

            I’m glad you got out of it, but I just wonder how many more gullible people they conned…

  33. KJo*

    In college 20+ years ago, I was an intern in an entertainment magazine’s promotional department. They were throwing a party to promote hot show in NYC at the time, complete with alcohol sponsor, and brought in the publicist of a famous photographer to help attract celebrities to the party. It was the same night as a hip hop star’s birthday party, so he was in competition to get famous names.
    He gave me a one sheet, which had a list of celebrities as “confirmed attendees,” to fax to a bunch of phone numbers. In reality, I think these celebs had only been invited, but I did as I was told, faxing this one sheet to tons of numbers with no idea who it was going to.
    At some point, he got a phone call from the agent of the “top” celebrity on the one sheet, saying that their client knew nothing about our party and why are we using that person’s name? So the publicist told me to stop faxing so he could amend the one sheet, which I did.
    A while later, I heard the fax machine going nuts – someone tried to send a fax without dialing 9. Figuring it was one of my faxes, I took a look – and the publicist had tried to fax back this celebrity’s PR person a note that read: “Sorry about the previous fax. An overzealous intern sent it without checking with me first.” Laying all the blame on me. Dude, I was just following your directions. I don’t know who I’m faxing!
    I took the fax to him and told him it didn’t go through, and why was he blaming me? He said, “Are you taking it personally? If I wanted to blame you personally, I would’ve used your name.” He was a class-act jerk.
    So party night comes around. I was working the coat check. He comes to me and says, “Anytime you see a celebrity walk in, come get me so I can walk them through the crowd for publicity.” We had a new confirmed “top” celebrity coming to the party.
    This celeb arrived toward the end of the night. He stood there with his handler, looking around (he had a court appearance that morning for a drug charge, I believe, so I guess he wasn’t in a party mood). Did I tell the publicist? Hell no At least, I didn’t until after the celebrity left. The publicist looked crestfallen, I felt vindicated, and decided I never wanted to work in this field, which is why I’m a librarian.

    1. Beth*

      After Big Celeb had left, you could have told the jerk publicist, “I didn’t flag you because I didn’t want to be overzealous.”

    2. cncx*

      Tangential but related, i always tell people if they need to blame me, then blame me, but tell me first so we can get stories straight. I work in IT and a coworker wanted a day off so she blamed her “excel problems” but she bounced 5 minutes after she sent the email announcing her “excel problems” to the CFO, blaming me
      Had she really just wanted to bail and blame her computer, i could have come up with a computer issue way more creative that didn’t make me look bad.

  34. WavyGravy*

    Things were getting progressively worse at my last job, including piling me with way more work than was feasible (80+hrs a week for no real reason), and forcing me to work with the biggest glass bowls because no one else could handle them, oh and a salary reduction and perma freeze when I was already paid significantly under market. After giving several polite heads up that this was not going to work long term and being told “deal with it,” I quit. I said I was just taking time off to deal with family and health issues (semi true) but I also was about 99% sure I had another job locked up to start in 2 months (and I did!)
    They lost it and offered me any amount of money to stay, perks, etc. I said no, and because of how truly abusive some of the bosses were, I informed HR I would send them everything on my list when I left but I wasn’t comfortable speaking with them again without HR present. I sent them their projects at 5p on the day I left and immediately shut off access to my email.
    After I left, they lost many more people of with even more on the way. Several people called me and said my leaving with nothing lined up was the sign they needed and each of them has a better (more $, better hours, etc.) job now.

      2. Harriet Vane*

        Oh geez! I was thinking why are they saying “glass bowls” instead of “chocolate teapots”??

  35. anon for this*

    I had just been hired by a large medical school you’ve definitely heard of for a role that turned out to be quite different than my impression of it during the interview process. I was trying to make the best of it, but a few weeks after my start date, I got the flu. BAD. Like, I had a 104 degree fever and could barely speak. My boss and the faculty member I was supposed to be working on a project with LOST IT. Like, you would have thought the office had burned down rather than an employee who was still being trained was too sick to work.

    I didn’t know what else to do, so I came in as soon as I could stand upright (I still had a fever), and was berated by my supervisor for missing work. The faculty member (a pulmonologist) simultaneously yelled at me for being out and sprayed lysol at me while covering their face with their sleeve for clearly being sick at work. The next few days/weeks are a blur, but I do remember my supervisor yelling a lot, the faculty member trying to hit me at one point and making me run up 10 flights of stairs after them even though I could barely breathe. There was other stuff too, but that’s the worst of it. I ended up with pneumonia, and both my supervisor and the faculty member (may I repeat, a pulmonologist!) were very put out by that.

    I didn’t know what else to do, so I talked to the manager who had hired me, even though I didn’t directly work with them. I came at it from the angle of, “I want to be successful in this role, but I’m encountering x and y and I’m not sure what to do, do you have suggestions?” Manager was horrified and asked me to please document everything while they looked into it, and email it to them by the end of the week. I had a background in compliance so that was easy enough to do.

    Well. Little did I know that both my supervisor and the faculty member had both had numerous complaints against them but not enough had been documented to take disciplinary action. After I emailed manager the log, the next thing I knew I was meeting with the Dean of the school, the department chair, and the provost about what was going on. They were all appalled, said they would handle it, and offered me a slight promotion under a different supervisor. I actually had gotten an offer from another department at that point that I chose to take instead (they offered to give me good references even though I hadn’t been there that long at that point), and I was out of there less than 4 months after I started.

    My supervisor ended up getting demoted, the faculty member faced some sort of serious disciplinary action that I wasn’t privy to, and I got a big promotion and a raise and ended up working with an awesome boss for the rest of my time at the school.

    1. Wisteria*

      “I want to be successful in this role, but I’m encountering x and y and I’m not sure what to do, do you have suggestions?”

      This is great wording, and I am going to steal it.

  36. SleepingSatellite*

    I was actually going to share mine as a good news letter with you at first, but maybe it’s better in this context.

    Put it simply, thanks to the management in place, my old team was toxic beyond repair. And I knew that from AAM that I couldn’t fix it, this was one of those places where you like to dream of finding a job that will ‘show them all’, but the reality is much harder to achieve because of how bad things are and the damage it does to you. One of the coworkers was a total frenemy who was in a senior role, and took complete advantage of me at my lowest people pleasing self. Passing off my knowledge and ideas as their own, downplaying my effort, calling me a pushover yet taking complete advantage of my low self esteem at the same time. All while maintaining a ‘friendship’ outside work at the same time. I can recall this person planning to visit me at my home at a pre-arranged time of 12pm, only to arrive at 230pm. This person then tagged along while I picked up my kids from school, gave them dinner and got them ready for bed. They didn’t leave until almost 10pm and you can imagine my partner’s reaction!

    Fast forward a few years later and this person ended our friendship after I didn’t take their side in a dispute of their own making. During a year of lockdown I was able to work on myself and find an amazing job opportunity. I applied for it with a healthy mindset and used the fantastic advice and tools shared by Alison and everyone on this site. I didn’t set out to get a new job that would ‘show them all’, but I did! The coworker did try to reach out and make amends but I was determined to leave all the old drama behind and I have no regrets about leaving that bridge burned. And now I think I can say I definitely have closure!

    1. Sick of Workplace Bullshit*

      Congratulations! And no, you didn’t burn a bridge, you constructed boundaries. Good for you!

  37. nonbeenary*

    A tale of petty revenge: This is a little nepotism-y but–when I first got hired with my company a couple years ago, I was working out of a small regional office. Manager and coworkers seemed nice at first, but things slowly started to get uh, weird. It’s a very long story but to shorten it: Manager was trying to push me out bc she wanted a relative of hers to have my position.
    After a very bad meeting with Manager where I tried to negotiate for my hours back (she’d cut me from 25/wk to 9/2k with no warning and some very flimsy rationale), and Manager made some uhhhh not great comments about my gender identity and work ethic, I called my dad.
    My dad is the vice president of the company.
    He’s very close with the president of the company.
    By the next day, I had a new manager, new position, and was work-from-home until I was able to move and transfer to an entirely different office (where I learned that my previous manager had basically not been letting me do ANYTHING I was supposed to be learning how to do–and yet she had complained that I was lazy and didn’t do enough????).
    It embarrasses me a little bc I know I wasn’t, like, an AMAZING employee and probably didn’t deserve to have anyone go above and beyond for me the way they did–but it turns out I wasn’t the first employee Manager had treated poorly, so yknow if my Super Nepotism Powers helped her see some consequences and helped my coworkers out, then I’m fine with it. And now that I’ve actually been allowed to do tasks, I’m able to do what I was hired for: Lightening my colleagues’ workloads and making things easier for them.

    1. Ally McBeal*

      While I understand why you’re a little embarrassed about the nepotism thing, I do think it’s hilarious that Manager attempted nepotism without (apparently) knowing that the person she was trying to force out had a family connection much higher on the company food chain than Manager.

      1. nonbeenary*

        Actually the hilarious thing is, she DID know about my dad, as he’s the one who passed my resume on to her. Idk what her reasoning there was: “I’m gonna do a nepotism, but surely the literal VP of the company, who helped get his child hired at my office, will not interfere in MY nepotism with HIS OWN nepotism, right??”

        1. Mental Lentil*

          Wow, this is really not nepotism then. She was doing an absolute terrible job and was fired for that.

          1. Mongrel*

            I mean it is, no other new employee would have been able to call up the VP like that and have the complaint acted upon.
            What it is is a rare case of nepotism being used for good.

        2. LadyHouseOfLove*

          I’m guessing the Manager thought you would be too shy about using your connection like she was trying to use hers. That backfired!

          She does not sound like an intelligent person.

          1. Amaranth*

            I wonder if Boss might have thought VP was ‘passing on for a friend’ not ‘this is my kid, teach them but Here Be Dragons if you aren’t a good boss.’

  38. Not Weird Weird But Like Exciting Weird*

    After 5+ years in the Teapot Support Services department, my grandboss fired me for what she considered a personal slight after 18 months of gaslighting and a weak PIP in an attempt to drive me out. [That is its own AAM letter.] My boss—who was a mere cudgel for grandboss—told my coworkers that I would never work for their department again. Which was true. However, since I was good at my job and built up professional goodwill throughout the company, people simply funneled work through different departments so I could freelance for them.

    A year to the day I was fired, a manager from the Teapot Creation department asked if I could finish out another person’s contract and work onsite for several months. I accepted, partially because it was a steady gig and good money but admittedly because 1. grandboss and boss couldn’t do or say anything about it because 2. their department supported my new department. So in a small way, they were now working for me.

    Any time I saw either of them, I would smile broadly and make pleasant small talk. It killed both of them. I was fully protected from their games and BS. The bullies could do nothing, and everyone else knew the score.

    1. #Null*

      I was once hired to replace the sole bookkeeper, Sheryl, for a firm, but she didn’t know it. I was hired through an agency, and the toxicity of this woman was palpable. She was quite accustomed to using her tongue and it was very sharp. She tried her damnest to get me to quit. I cried A TON. In retrospect, I don’t know why I stayed on, but I did.

      We needed to hire a temp to help for a week at the beginning of each month, and the one agency the company had used for ages refused to place anyone with us because of Sheryl’s abuse to the previous placements. They were direct about their reasons.

      I waited 11 months for this woman to be terminated. I took absolutely no pleasure in her termination, but she was absolutely besides herself when she learned I was taking her job and she was fired.

      Then we had a very awkward lunch where it was suggested me and two other ladies go with her to lunch…

      2. Not Weird Weird But Like Exciting Weird*

        Eleven months is a LONG time. I’m sorry you went through it but am happy there was a satisfying ending.

        I waited for them to fire me because I did not want anyone to take away my pride in my job and my work ethic. I knew I wasn’t doing anything wrong; in fact, a coworker and I did our jobs and my direct boss’s job since she had never worked in the Teapot industry before. She was specifically hired for her “people skills,” of which she had none. She kissed asses above hers and refused to listen to any or her direct reports, who had more industry experience and only wanted to help. At least six people told me that they specifically mentioned her incompetence in their exit interviews. Of course, nothing was done, and she was pushed into lateral positions before finally getting let go—THIRTEEN YEARS after her start date. Really.

        She fired a coworker who was a giant in the Teapot community a few months after I was canned (in my PIP, I was “strongly encouraged” not to talk to him because he had a “bad attitude” and it would reflect poorly on me; eff that!) and then showed up at the party we threw for him at a local bar. And the week after that, she called to asked him to freelance. Really.

  39. Bee Eye Ill*

    Just remembered this one – Not a boss but a mid-level “senior” type guy I worked with was a huge a-hole who tried to shift blame to people for random things, loved to fudge his time cards, overbill clients, etc. The type who constantly talked about how busy he was – you probably know the type. Walking chaos.

    So this guy takes a 2-week vacation – first real leave he’d taken in over a year – and things were so quiet and smooth around the office that the boss finally realized how much trouble he’d been causing – and fired him the day he came back from PTO.

    2. KateM*

      So that’s why they say not to take time off fearing that others will find out how well they can do without you.

  40. mcfizzle*

    I had a really toxic coworker who left for another department within the same organization, but then was pushed out (he fully deserved it). Unfortunately, with some major changes in management who didn’t remember him, he reapplied back to my department about 3 years later. I warned my boss about how terrible he was, and… boss hired him. Dude was 15 minutes late his first day – no explanation, no apology, just slowly sauntered in. It only went downhill from there. We’re salaried, so no clocking in or out, and he would always come in late, leave early, and take a long lunch. The “work” he did was organizing his kids’ sports team, planning vacations, and talking a lot of trash (including about me). I know it’s petty, but I started tracking this, as it was egregious. Boss was “talking” with him all the time, but dude was not interesting in changing his behavior.
    Finally we had a big, formal, scary team meeting with the grandboss (also the CFO), boss, and members of the team. Dude is correctly called out by management, loses his cool, and *very* passively-aggressively shouts out “well, SOMEONE has been trying to sabotage me since day 1!!!”. I knew he was talking about me though I never, ever have sabotaged anything – he did that all by himself. I realized he was counting on me to respond… and I didn’t. If he couldn’t be bothered to say my name nor look at me, I wouldn’t give him the satisfaction of responding. So I just sat there, calm and cool. Oh.. that moment was beautiful. No one responded at all, and this heavy, awkward silence just hung there for about 30 seconds. He then screams it again “SOMEONE has been trying to sabotage me the whole time!!” Again, no one acknowledged it at all.
    Grand-boss found me afterwards and commended me for how I handled myself. Dude was forced to resign about 2 months later.

    1. Sparkles McFadden*

      Laughing to myself imagining “I said…SOMEONE has been trying to sabotage me! Hello? Can anyone hear me?”

  41. Texas Librarian*

    In college, I worked at a large video chain (this was early 1990s). When I started, we had a wonderful manager and then she got transferred and we got Jeff. Jeff started harassing the female assistant managers, although not me (I’m female). It so happened that the chain sent random employees a survey to fill out (by mail) and I was one of those employees. The survey was geared to very positive responses, so I added my own narrative, with specific examples of how he was harassing women. About 2 weeks later, the district manager was in with Jeff and the harassment stopped. The two assistant managers somehow knew it was me and were so appreciative.

    2. Teekanne aus Schokolade*

      First thing i thought was “Texas Librarian must have worked at Rose Video!” Love me some Schitt’s Creek!

  42. Search Me*

    This was about 15 years ago, so email systems were a lot less intuitive and had a lot less storage. To archive old messages, you literally had to put them on a different server, so you had to access the archive server to search for an email there.

    My job at the time was experiencing turnover and drama. I worked there for several years with perfectly solid reviews, but it became very clear that I was being pushed out and at the same time was regularly told that I was a terrible employee. It went on for about 6 brutal months as I tried to find anotoher job or fix the broken one that I had. Then I got a new job.

    I gave my two weeks. Knowing the bridge was well and truly burned, as I completed the remaining work on my plate I transfered the emails to the archive server. By my last day, there was not a single email in my inbox. Now, my managers had access to my email and they had access to my archive. I found out later that they couldn’t figure out what I had done. They searched my folders and my trash and couldn’t find emails they knew I had sent. They did not search the archive server. to be honest, by the end of my tenure I wasn’t working on anything significant, so my act of responsible rebellion was more of an annoyance than anything else. But, it allowed me to take back some of the agency that had been beaten out of me.

    1. Not Proud Of Myself*

      I once quit on the spot (and it was a truly toxic environment that deserved every bit of my no-notice termination) and one of my last actions was to mark all email as read. I wasn’t trying to be malicious, but it felt delicious knowing that they were going to have to scramble to piece together what was needing attention.

  43. Crisy*

    My old job had a rule that only 2 people could be off for vacation at any given time. This meant that senior staff usually claimed holiday weeks at the beginning of the year and no one else ever got them. One year, I was alerted that 2 people had put their names on the team calendar for the week of Christmas, but had not actually put their requests in. Meaning they did not have the week off. I quickly requested the week and told another coworker to do the same. That’s the only time I had Christmas week off working that job. And what a glorious week it was!

  44. Another health care worker*

    I work in the field of substance use/mental health.

    My former boss sent an email to a group of our company’s corporate clients and investors all about my report, “Alex.” The email told a heroic story of how early young Alex was in her own recovery when she first came to us, including specifically saying she had only been sober 30 days when in fact it had almost been a full year. (Length of sober time is a very big deal for people in recovery, which my boss knew.) Guess who wasn’t copied on this email? Alex herself. So I forwarded it to Alex, who was pissed and who confronted Boss about the inaccuracy…not to mention that she was never asked for input or consent before the email *about her* went out. Using her first and last name, the whole 9.

    My boss irritably told me she was “surprised” that I forwarded the email to Alex. I brightly said that I assumed she would want to see it, since it was a public communication that was all about her. Alex and I both left within a few months of each other.

    2. PhyllisB*

      Good for you and Alex. My daughter works in substance abuse, and that would never fly with her.

      1. LF*

        It took me a few reads, but I think Alex was an employee, not a client.

        (But you’re not wrong, of course!)

  45. Elizabeth*

    I had a manager who wasn’t terrible but was mostly clueless. He first decided that the four women in the department would share an office while the two much newer male hires would get their own offices. Next, he invited us to a team building dinner at a local restaurant, to which none of our spouses were invited. Except the day of the dinner he announced that his wife would be joining us.

    I was torqued. I started by stopping cleaning up his political messes. He was constantly offending people and I was usually the one to sooth the ruffled feathers. I quit doing so.

    Next I went to the head of HR with the office issues along with emails he sent to us from his personal email that could best be described as off color. I asked that someone at least explain to him why what he was doing was wrong.

    About two weeks later, his boss announced that we would be hiring a new manager, and he was moving to an individual contributor role. His trajectory took a severe downward spiral after that, as HR told every manager who we hired to talk to me about the history. And I would lay it out for them. He eventually left because he saw that he would never be trusted again.

  47. Sam*

    I worked a part-time customer service/admin job in a small office while I was in college for three years. It was a really great job with wonderful coworkers until we got a new manager as I started my final semester of college. During the semester my schedule did not really overlap with hers, but after I graduated I worked full-time in the summer to save up money before starting grad school in the fall.

    The manager was terrible and my coworkers already had warned me but it felt like she was trying to make me quit. She would give me useless tasks like literally alphabetizing paperwork from years ago that was already organized. Meanwhile, she gave new people more difficult tasks without any direction, then yelled at them when they made mistakes, and made me redo their work. She never had me complete the tasks first or even train the new folks.

    One time I worked the evening shift with only one other coworker, who was a sixteen year old who had just started that week. Our boss gave her the keys to lock up the office after the shift. The next morning, she yelled at me because my coworker had not locked the office properly and that was somehow my fault because I had been there for three years (but was not given the key?).

    I knew I was leaving soon so I just shrugged and worked my final weeks. Now in my country, every employee works on a contract and my yearly contract ended in August, shortly before I was moving for grad school. On the last day of my contract, I just left my keys and badge on my desk. When I didn’t show up the next day, she called me and I ignored her call. My coworkers then informed her that my contract was not extended (because she forgot!) so I assumed I no longer worked there and had already said goodbye to them. She got really mad and when I heard I felt so petty but so good.

    Six months later my former coworkers, at least those who were left because many had already quit, went to HR as a group and demanded she’d be fired or they’d all quit. She was gone two weeks later.

        1. Where's the Orchestra?*

          Don’t know about all regions, but at least where I live (Mountain Region of the US) the person locking up must be a Legal Adult due to some policy somewhere. So for us, the 16 year old wouldn’t legally be allowed to have the keys to lock up (an 18 year old would be allowed though).

  48. Hour by hour*

    When I was in grad school, I was working two part-time jobs during the summer break from classes – one in the morning, and one in the afternoon. I was trying to save up some money, so naturally I crammed every minute I could with work. As part of that, I agreed to any extra evening/night shift that my afternoon boss offered me – which ended up being a LOT, since my coworkers there were not the most reliable. Of course, after working 14- to 16-hour days, for 6 days a week, for nearly three months straight, I got sick. I ended up needing to take almost a week off to recover, which was all the more difficult because I didn’t qualify for PTO at either job.

    Once I finally recovered, my afternoon boss pulled me aside my first day back in the office. He lectured me for nearly an hour about how irresponsible it was of me to take a full week off sick, how I had really left them in the lurch, and how I would need to “grow up” and “be professional”. I was so tired and worn down that I very nearly cried, but after I was released from that nightmare to go back to my desk, I started getting mad.

    Instead of doing my work that afternoon, I ended up creating a very detailed spreadsheet and report of every single instance from the last few months where I had picked up a shift, stayed late, or other wise gone above and beyond what I had officially been hired for. Before the end of my scheduled shift, I dropped off a printed copy at the boss’ office, and told him, “According to my math, the extra shifts I’ve picked up at your request over the last several months is more than five times the amount of time I took off while I was sick last week.”

    The next day I was in, he apologized to me for what he said, and gave a very nice little speech about how much he appreciated all the extra hours I had covered. Which was nice of him to do – but I still turned down any extra shifts for the rest of the time I worked there.

    1. T J Juckson*

      Bravo! Nobody dares argue with spreadsheet!
      I recently made, what I referred to in my mind as the “spitesheet,” to counter a complaint by my boss, complete with completely superfluous tacky graphs.

      1. Hour by hour*

        It definitely taught me the value of having hard numbers at my disposal! That boss wasn’t a bad guy, overall, but I think actually seeing all the numbers laid out in front of him was a bit of a surprise.

        1. Analytical Tree Hugger*

          Berating someone for missing work because they were sick makes them a poor manager, at the very least. In my book, though, that also makes them a bad person.

  49. Viki*

    TLDR: Sexist colleague is a jerk to me in meetings, talking over me. I make him lose his long desired promotion as well as steal his department goals (by just being that good at the job)

    I had a colleauge, T. T is a man. We were hired on the same date, same position (Cat heders Policy analysts). T acted like he was my team lead. He constantly interrupted me, talked over me and repeated my ideas to our leadership team in meetings, after telling in the same meeting why it would not work. T was highly ambitious, wants to be SM of cat herders policy analysts. Nothing else will do. He talks down about the other teams, about how stupid you have to be to work for them.

    T and I do not get along. But we were both the high performers on the team I was asked to take an interim management role for our highly specialized team, I declined because I don’t like managing, and would prefer to be an SME. T got the role, I went back to the SM told them exactly how T could not/would not manage me due to his sexism, which was noticed and commented upon by leadership before (remember those meetings?)

    T did not get to keep that position, as the team is a strong mix of men and women and other women on the team had complained as well. However, T had already set his signature, announced it to the company at whole etc. etc. He then had to walk it all back.

    Four years later, T is in management but for one of the teams, he talked down about. I still work on the team, except I’m now the SM of the Cat Herder’s Policy Analysts (oops).

      1. Analytical Tree Hugger*

        SME = Subject Matter Expert

        SM = Not sure about this one. Maybe Supervising Manager?

      2. Cheerfully Polite Grey Rock*

        SME is usually subject matter expert, I am not as sure about SM but given the context I’m guessing it’s Senior Manager.

  50. Veryanon*

    The job I had before my current job was a complete sh*tshow. I was promised many things (in writing!) during the interview process that just evaporated as soon as I started there. The company was sold after I had been there for 2 months, and I was notified that my job was being eliminated. Two months after I started.
    The worst was that my manager was a complete nutjob screaming banshee who would often pace around the office muttering to herself. If anything went wrong, even if it was someone else’s fault, she would physically stand at my desk and berate me in full view/hearing of everyone else (thanks, open concept office environment). She did this to everyone.
    The first time it happened, I was so shocked that I really didn’t know how to respond and I just sat there, then crept off and cried in the ladies room. I should note that I have been in the workforce a long time, over 20 years when this incident occurred, and had never previously cried at work. I vowed this would never happen again.
    The next time she decided to berate me for something that wasn’t my fault, I held up my hand and just said “I’m going to stop you right there. I can’t understand what you want when you scream at me like this. If you want me to fix the problem, you’re going to have to calm down and talk to me rationally.” I figured I had nothing to lose at this point as I’d already been told when my job was ending and was actively searching for another opportunity; the worst she could do was fire me, which frankly would have been a relief. She was shocked enough to stop in mid-rant, and then proceeded to describe the problem in a more normal tone of voice. Afterwards, everyone in the office made a point of congratulating me on felling the beast.
    I left that job a few weeks later, and was able to give her my notice ON MY BIRTHDAY. Best birthday present I’ve ever received.

  51. ChemistryChick*

    My first non-retail job out of college. Boss was a massive jerk. Misogynistic a-hole to the max. At first I didn’t realize that things he was doing constituted sexual harassment, bordering on hostile work environment; I just knew he really irritated me.

    Things came to a head when he claimed that I and a co-worker didn’t respect him. Well, no, we didn’t because he treated us like garbage (we were both confident women who didn’t take his crap). Eeeeverything came out at that point. How he’d talked about another co-worker’s chest even after being told to stop. How he made jokes about another co-worker’s sexual orientation (with the co-worker right there with us) and continued to laugh even after we told him it was inappropriate. The list could go on, but those are the worst two I remember off the top of my head.

    He was removed from the supervisor spot and moved laterally to work under the CEO on projects. Which, in hindsight, was BS, but hey at least I didn’t have to deal with him anymore, right? Thinks went on for a bit, he continued to suck at his job and for reasons I can’t remember, either didn’t get a bonus that year or it was lower than he wanted. So he walked. A few weeks later, I applied for and got the job he vacated. Impressed the CEO and multiple others with my skills up until I left for a better opportunity.

  52. different username to avoid linking to my usual one*

    I developed and teach a sophomore-level science writing course at my college. It’s actually open to all majors as long as you’ve completed the (couple of science courses) prerequisites; and I’ve had pretty much every science/engineering discipline represented over the years, as well as math and even IT administration. My students are amazing, and the range of backgrounds and interests makes the course an absolute thrill to teach.

    Over the years, a handful of people outside my department have, without consulting me first (or even looking at the course description) “decided” that my course is perfect for a variety of paired-course arrangements, freshman-seminar status, etc (it is not suitable for any of them) so I’m accustomed to having to explain what should be obvious. But I was still taken aback by the adjunct in the English department who came to my office to “explain” to me, based on his extensive experience in tech writing, all the reasons why my course was “inadequate.”

    Him: You don’t do enough writing in the course!
    Me: Oh? When did you look at the syllabus? [knowing full well that he would not have seen it]
    Him (stammering a bit): But…but…your course doesn’t work for engineering majors!
    Me: Really? I mean, I guess you couldn’t know this because you wouldn’t be able to access enrollment information, but it’s actually a pretty even split between the folks on the engineering side and the folks more on the life sciences side.
    Him (getting angry): But…but…STEM stands for science, technology, engineering, AND MATH!!
    Me: You’re right! And actually one of my best students from a couple semesters ago is a math major, and her final project was incredible.
    Him: But…but…your course doesn’t serve the students!!
    Me (no longer willing to respond “neutrally”): Stop. You have clearly not read even the course description, let alone the syllabus. You are not qualified to tell me anything about how the course that I developed and have taught for years falls short. Get out of my office and do not bother me again.

    He tried to stammer other stuff, but left. Thankfully, I haven’t heard from him since. More thankfully, I’m pretty sure that was the last time anyone tried to appropriate my course!

    Why, yes, I DO have the temerity to hold a PhD in the physical sciences while female; why do you ask?

    2. Tau*

      That is epic, and also – as someone who did a maths PhD and read a number of papers in the process of that – my god, your course sounds fantastic and I’m kind of jealous of your students now.

      (The closest I came to a STEM writing course in undergrad was the one that taught us how to use LaTeX. I mainly ended up leaning on my experience writing fanfic to write my thesis – it was more useful than I expected but still not ideal!)

    3. Where's the Orchestra?*

      As the daughter of an Engineer (Chemical, and now retired) thank you for your writing course. My dad spent the last several years of his long career trying to teach baby chemical engineers how to communicate with non-engineers (he was specifically asked to to this by the company he worked for). I was occasionally shown some of their writing – oh my word, gibberish from my kindergarten students at times was more intelligible than what these PhD’s were producing (and, sorry in advance if this seems sexist), and without fail the worst of the worst dreck always came from the male engineers. . . .

      1. cncx*

        Same same, the last ten years of my stepfather’s career were literally spent teaching whole adult PHDs and Postdocs how to write papers for journal submission. Woo wee some of the stuff he got as first drafts :)

    4. Vesuvius*

      As someone who has OFTEN been on the receiving end of this type of sexism (and is in a field where half the people in it, engineers included, think that technobabble is comprehensible), thank you for both teaching this and not putting up with his BS. I cannot tell you the NUMBER of times I have read a geologic report for an assignment, and have had to run it through my own edits to understand what the writer is saying. These are reports published by IRL licensed professionals. Many of whom think it is “obvious” what they are saying is correct. (Cue my eyes rolling out of my head.) And the number of men who pull this BS…sighs.

      Great put-down and very satisfying to read!

  53. atgo*

    I’m a product/project manager for software. I was working at a site you probably use every day, where we were looking for a new vendor for some critical infrastructure. The tech lead and I, both women, were vetting vendors alongside the non-technical internal client, another woman.

    We got on a call with this guy who was unbelievably condescending and misogynist. At one point he actually replied to a technical question with something like “alright ladies, you don’t need to worry about that.” I was so glad we were on the phone because I’m sure if we’d been in person it would have been accompanied by some creepy hand-on-knee and a knowing wink. This guy was so slimy.

    So I responded that he hadn’t addressed the question, and doubled down with a tirade of technical jargon, getting really detailed about the specifics of what we were asking. Then my tech lead jumped in to elaborate.

    And then, silence. The guy obviously had no idea what to do… It was clearly unimaginable that we might know what we were talking about, and wouldn’t be charmed by his slime. The next time we spoke to this company, he brought along an engineer who did 99% of the talking. What the slimy sales guy did say was very careful – he was obviously (appropriately) embarrassed.

    My non-technical colleague still talks about the smack down to this day.

    1. Elizabeth Bennett*

      YYYYYYEEEEESSSSSSSSSSSSSS

      My story isn’t nearly on par with yours, but was satisfying. At lunch in the breakroom with three male coworkers; one was so quiet that I forgot he was there. One was kind of a big mouth, but mostly harmless. I forgot what prompted the conversation, but big mouth said that basically while he respects women and all, there are just some things that men do better than women.
      I had been cramping that morning, and wasn’t feeling my best, so I piped up, “I’m about to have my period. Can you do that better than me?” And he was so grossed out he couldn’t recover his argument.
      Dude to my left is laughing his head off and the quiet guy that I forgot was there, later told the laughing guy he didn’t see that coming.

  54. Apathetic Agnostic*

    As a student worker, I had a fellow student who was obnoxious about their religious beliefs, or rather the lack thereof. This student was aggressive about their atheism, constantly being antagonistic towards our peers who were religious by trying to argue with them about why their religions were wrong and loudly going on rants about why people who are religious are unintelligent. I was never a target of their attacks, as I am also not religious, however I did not agree with their actions. Right before I left that job, I used their information to sign them up for every “contact me with more information about your religion” service I could find. Catholicism, islam, even things like scientology – if there was a mailing list they were on it. I don’t know what ended up happening, but I like to imagine their fury as their inbox was filled with informational pamphlets and their phone inundated with spam calls.

    3. allathian*

      Ouch. I’m a secular humanist and have absolutely no patience with people who are obnoxious about other people’s religious beliefs. That said, I think that religion is and should be a private matter and I don’t think it should be discussed at work unless you’re discussing some form of religious accommodation with your manager/HR. Members of minority religions should also not be expected to discuss their religious beliefs at work as a matter of informing the majority.

      I profoundly despise proselytizing in all its forms, and that should definitely be banned at work. This includes atheists berating believers for their religious beliefs.

    4. Selina Luna*

      I’m a fairly staunch atheist and I also think this student was being a jerk. My personal rule is, I won’t bring up religion at all until someone starts harassing me about there’s. Not just telling me about it, but actually harassing me about it. Once it reaches the point of harassment, I feel like they’ve earned a little assholery in return.

      1. Kaitydidd*

        Same. I will, however, also answer direct questions. An older man at work once went around doing a spiel about Jesus as he relates to Jack o lanterns. Part of it was candle light shining out like Jesus’s light through… holes? I don’t remember. It was a decent metaphor. He asked me, “do you have the light of Jesus in you?” I said, “No, I don’t think so.” He stared at me slack jawed for a moment and then jumped back into his script. I don’t think he expected the little 20 something girl to deny his god right to his face. It’s also worth mentioning that we worked for a state agency at that point, so honestly the religious proselytizing was extra inappropriate.

  55. MissBliss*

    This is small, so maybe not quite a triumph, but it’s always meant something to me. I spent 2.5 years in my first job in my current field. They hadn’t had someone in my position in a few years, and the position morphed because I brought a lot of skills to the table, but the salary didn’t really keep up. I’d been there a couple of years and I was thinking about the future – I wanted to stay there, because I loved the work and the people, but I wanted to advance (and make more money).

    I went to them with two proposals: keep my tasks the same, but take this most basic one off my plate and let’s get someone else to handle it, and pay me more, OR, I’ll keep half of my responsibilities, take on new higher level work that would allow us to meet strategic priorities, and pay me more. My boss supported me but was on her way out. The powers that be were furious. So I, very sadly, left (on good terms). I told them, for the money they were paying, they could get someone brand new to the field (like I had been I started), but if they wanted someone with even half my skillset, they’d need to pay more. They did not listen.

    They went through three replacements for me in less than the time I’d been there. I heard about it every time. The most recent time they listed the position, they finally raised the salary. That successor has stayed for a while, thankfully, because the work really is important. But if they’d just paid the really, in reality quite modest salary increase I’d requested in the first place, I’d almost certainly still be there, they’d have spent less money on training and recruitment, and they’d raised more revenue because turnover does awful things to a fundraising department.

    I now make double what I made at that first job.

    1. Siege*

      Hah, I have a similar one. When I went into web development, I became the person who knows a little about a lot, and usually enough to get by or figure out where to look for more. So I’m high value, because while on paper I’m a graphic designer and web developer, in practice (and very clearly on my resume) I’m a junior full-stack dev who does graphic design and editing/writing. People don’t seem to realize that they shift your workload, and therefore the company, to accommodate those extra skills. The downside is that tech, at least when I was seriously working in it about 10 years ago, wanted deep knowledge of like one thing.

      So I’m at a horrible misfit of a job. There is a reshuffle of responsibilities that means I end up doing parts of another person’s job (the way the organization ran was apparently “if I like you you can have what you want” and the coworker whose job I took over part of had stopped speaking to me months earlier because she found my personality “stressful”. We literally sat next to each other and she wouldn’t talk to me.) which I’m not trained on, but never mind, I guess I’ll figure out how to schedule a Chinese documentary crew in media opportunities all over the got-damn tri-county region just because the State Department says we can do that. I’ve already added event planning to my web developer, database admin, graphic design, editing, full-time job, why not add media coordinator to my position??

      After it was over I went to my boss with, essentially, nothing left to lose to discuss a change in responsibilities or title or pay or SOMETHING because I was tired of being expected to work 60 hour weeks for 40 hours of shitty wage (they paid $15K under comparable non-profits, so about $100K under comparable private companies). Instead of getting a change to my job description I was put on a PIP because I didn’t like getting to work at 8 AM and sometimes came in at 8:30 when we had no fixed start time and supposedly I flipped off my colleagues all the time. When I was fired, I noted that they were making a mistake they would not be able to recover from because no one with my skillset was going to work for their wage and they weren’t going to get two unicorns in a row, so the company would be out of business within two years. It took four, but I was right, and a large part of it was their inability to replace me causing them to take on major financial commitments to maintain their web presence, etc.

      Whoopsie.

  56. FaintlyMacabre*

    I’ve shared this before, but it still warms my soul when I think of it:

    Several years ago, I had a temp job in a ridiculously dysfunctional workplace. It was a large factory and I along with two other coworkers did office work there. In my head, I dubbed them Micromanager Mindy and Do-nothing Delores. (For this story, know that while she drove me insane as a coworker, as a human being I actually liked Micromanager Mindy.)

    Do-nothing Delores did not like me or Mindy, largely because we actually knew how to do our jobs, did our jobs, and didn’t cover for her when she frequently slacked off of her job. She was a giant suck up, and would bring in treats for everyone in the factory, but always mysteriously ran out before she got to me and Mindy. I could go on, but you get the idea.

    One day, Jim, the grand boss comes in. He’s holding three strips of ten raffle tickets in his hand. The office was having a raffle for charity and there were some really nice prizes- electronics and cash and gas station gift cards. Jim addresses the three of us, saying that while he wanted to support the raffle, as the grand boss it would be inappropriate for him to win anything and therefore had bought the tickets for us.

    Even as Mindy and I are getting out our thanks, Delores has already snatched a strip of tickets from Jim’s hand and walked away without saying anything. (In my memory, she goes off into a corner and hunches over them, crooning, “Preciousss, my preciousss,” but that is probably not what happened?) Jim, Mindy and I exchange a three way eye roll and then Mindy and I make an elaborate dance out of choosing the two strips of raffle tickets left. “Please, Mindy, choose which tickets you’d like.” “No, no, I insist you choose.” “I couldn’t possibly take away your choice. You simply must have your pick.” This continued until Jim more or less threw the tickets at us and walked away, no doubt regretting all the life choices he had made that had led him to that point.

    All week, Delores natters on about the prizes she wants and complains that Jim *only* bought her ten tickets. Mindy and I get in some high intensity eye rolling excercises. Finally, the raffle occurs and the prizes are distributed. Mindy and I both win gas certificates. Mindy also wins one of the higher end electronics. Delores gets diddly-squat. And every time she complained, we reminded her that she had the first pick of tickets. It was beautiful! Never have I enjoyed putting gas in my car so much as when I was using that certificate…

    1. Analytical Tree Hugger*

      Ha! If I were Jim, I would be mildly exasperated by the two of you, but also deeply amused.

  57. Malicious Subject-Lining*

    Oh I have a good one. When I first started at my current job, we had one process that needed to be sent off to another department. About two weeks after I finished training, my boss had a sit-down meeting with me because the subject line in my emails to them was “not formatted correctly”, and instead of telling me, the new employee, they asked my boss to discipline me.

    Naturally I was NOT HAPPY since no one had even taught me that it mattered, and it’s not like the content of my emails was bad or even that there was missing information in the subject. Plus, they send emails to us that don’t follow those rules exactly! So, for the rest of the time I’ve worked here, whenever I respond to or forward emails involving that department I edit the subject line to make sure it fits their very important rules. It messes with the conversation views in Outlook when a subject line changes and I always cackle thinking about the mild annoyance I must be causing.

  58. Susan Sto Helit*

    I worked as a cashier at a book store chain during college. One colleague was assigned to the floor but was supposed to back me up as a cashier when the line got long. She usually did not back me up, leaving me to deal with long lines by myself. She also would take the glue that magazines use to adhere the labels and would throw it in my hair. One day, a famous singer/songwriter, who was playing a concert in our city, came into the store, and all the employees were a-flutter. This colleague, for the first time, actually went to a checkout station, and at first I thought she was actually doing her job in backing me up, but then I realized she just wanted to be able to ring up the famous singer. However, he ended up coming through the checkout line twice and he came to my station both times, proving that pure hearts (mine, obviously) are rewarded.

  59. BPlusvsBMinus*

    Small thing:

    During college (US), I was a student worker for the English department. Most of my job was making copies. One day, I was asked to make a graph of the grades for the big research paper at the end of a class that all freshman had to take. I was to compile the data by teacher and by whole grade (papers were graded A, A-, B+, B, B-, etc). I clarified that they really wanted me to do this by whole grade (A, B, C) and not by +/-, etc. Nope, whole grade. As I compiled the data. I could clearly see that some teachers were going to look heavily weighted in different grade groups (a professor giving out more A- and maybe 1 A, looks like they’re giving out “all As”). Having worked in the department for several semesters and witnessing professors “behind the scenes”, my spidey sense said this would be an…interesting meeting when this data was reviewed.

    A couple weeks later, I was asked to re-do the data, broken down by plus/minus. I was not at all surprised. At the time, I felt smug that the whole grade thing was a fail. But now I wonder if the whole grade plan was an intentional blow up — knowing full well it was cause some chaos reviewing it.

  60. Susan Calvin*

    I don’t know if this will be particularly exciting to read, but I still think of it fondly, and I think it netted me my last promotion:

    We’re a software provider for large industry clients (think SAP or Oracle, but more specialized type of software), and were currently pitching a concept for a fairly large project with a not very tech-forward client. Now I’m not sales, but I was already in the lead on a limited pilot project we’d done with this client a year earlier, and had already be-frenemied their IT manager, who was good at his job but the walking definition of Napoleon complex. Most stakeholders involved in this process were very hesitant, because they’d had several failed project in a similar vein before (and I do think some of them were just low-key technophobes), but we did our homework – prepared an in-depth presentation with case-by-case examples, nice illustrations, did several dry-runs and preparatory role plays.
    The day of the presentation comes (remotely, because this is in 2020) and I go through my slides, fend of several smaller butwhatabouts, and get through the most complicated part of the concept without stumbling, and open the floor to questions. Of course IT Napoleon zeroes in on the last part, points out several things adding to the complexity there, and states his doubt that we could adequately address them. I mute myself for a second to adjust my headset, take a deep breath and crack my shoulders, and proceed to lay out the entire logic, in excruciating detail, covering every concern they have ever even hinted at, and speak for what feels like another ten minutes – steamrolling over any attempts to interrupt me before I’m done.

    Once I have finished, I feel like I’ve run a marathon, and there is a beat of silence silence on the call. “Well. I guess that sounds right then.”

    1. Analytical Tree Hugger*

      Oh, I ADORE the visual of you preparing to lay the (well-warranted, professional and technical) smackdown…

  61. Oryx*

    My ExJob was working as a librarian at a small career college with a VERY small library. There was enough room for my desk, several computers, and maybe three bookshelves (the college focused on online / digital resources).

    Occasionally due to spacing issues, classes would be scheduled in the library. They were always small, maybe a handful of students, so everyone had a computer and despite my best efforts the library was underutilized as it was, so there was never a concern about them disrupting studying students or what not.

    Well, one of the teachers who had her class there was very chatty. With me, with the students, anyone. But it was a tiny space and you could hear everything. So, one time she has her students in there and they are taking a test and she would.not.stop.talking. Her co-teacher was in there and Ms. Chatty would not stfu. While her students are trying to take a test. She also had no sense to even whisper, but talk at regular volume. The lack of self-awareness was unreal to me.

    So I very politely but firmly suggested that perhaps she and her co-teacher take their conversation outside the library so as to not disrupt the test-taking students.

    She gets all offended by this and asks to speak to me in the hallway and just lays into me about how dare I undermine her during her class (even though a) she wasn’t teaching, she was gossiping and b) she was in my library) and I had no right to do that blah blah.

    Now, what she didn’t know was that I had been in my two weeks and this was my last day at that job. So I just passively stood there while she yelled at me, not saying a word or reacting in any way. When she was done, I smiled and said “I promise, that will never, ever happen again.” She acts all triumphant believing she’d won, and goes back into the library. Her students finish the test and everyone leaves.

    A few hours later as I was finishing up my day, I sent out an all-staff email about how today had been my last day and I wished everyone well. I only regret not knowing what her reaction was when she read it.

  62. Not me*

    I had a boss who was dynamic and incredibly forward-thinking. But she was also egomaniacal and completely intimidated by anyone else who was competent. So none of her ideas ever came to anything because she always sabotaged anyone who could actually get things done. Although I reported directly to her, everyone in the organization went to another of her direct reports for everything, thus isolating some of the true bananas. Well, I was very competent in my job but because I was fat, she was not intimidated by me- she truly believed that I had no chance of a successful career because of my weight. So she decided she wanted to ‘develop’ me so I would be more successful. She would say things like ‘I know you can’t wear nice clothes because of your size but you have to wear X jewelry and Y shoes’. She would assign me to a work trip and when I would arrive it would be a makeover or a manicure. I checked with Other Direct Report who said my appearance was fine- I was neat and professional and clean. Designer shoes were not in any way a job requirement. Fast forward a few years to when she was fired by the board and replaced by Other Direct Report. She applied for a job at one of the top organizations in our industry (a BIG step up from our organization), confident that no one else in the world could possibly get the job. She left our organization bragging to everyone about how she was going to NewPlace and we were all stuck at Old Job. Well, I quietly applied for that job, used Other Direct Report as my reference, and have been successful and happy here at NewPlace for quite a few years while Old Boss is currently unemployed.

  63. cheeky*

    I worked with a real jerk coworker who was relentlessly awful to me and many other people in my group. He was an aggressive guy with a nasty attitude and would argue that his direct reports were doing their jobs wrong and insist that they follow his (incorrect) rules. I complained about his behavior to our (numerous) supervisors over the years, but even when the guy was rabidly picking fights with me in meetings in front of everyone, nothing ever happened to the guy because I had bosses who simply didn’t see the behavior as a problem. My MO in interacting with him was to minimize interactions unless strictly necessary and just let him hang himself with his own rope.

    Well, it took several years for this to catch up to him, but a few years ago, he went to an unofficial company golf tournament, in which everyone was apparently sh*tfaced by 9 am. He was riding in a golf cart when the driver hit a bump and the cart tipped over on its side, crushing the jerk’s leg and breaking his ankle badly. He ended up needing two surgeries and was off of work for 6 months, recuperating. This alone gave me a good dose of schadenfreude, but in his absence, the productivity and morale of his work group shot way up, and my (then new) boss took notice. A very talented coworker came to her and said that he would leave the group if he was forced to worked under the jerk. So my boss decided that the jerk could not come back to the group without a major modification of his role and put him on a workstream he had never done and would have to learn from the bottom up and would therefore not be in charge of other people’s work while he was training. She figured this would make him want to leave the group, and she was right! He was gone within 2 weeks of returning from his leg injury. It’s been harmonious in my group ever since!

  64. Wing-N-Wing*

    My undergrad math prof hated me. I got an A in the class first semester. First day of second semester, she told me, “I had to give you an A last semester because your grades supported it, but I don’t really think you’re an A student or cut out for this career.” Rough feedback for a science major! (I was too young, startled, and naive to report her.) Sure enough, I got a B second semester. But didn’t take her advice to change majors, just changed profs for my remaining courses. We rarely crossed paths the rest of my time at university.

    Payback came 3 years later. The way they ran graduation, they didn’t just announce your name and hand you your diploma, they rotated through all the faculty and someone read a little blurb about every single graduating student. Well, wouldn’t you know that the way it fell out, professor snarlywitch was the one reading the accomplishments for my group? So she, personally, had to announce to the assembly that I, her not-worthy-of-an-A-student, graduated magna cum laude, with a triple major in math, physics, and chemistry, and accepted into the national honor society and the math honor society. My parents said she was absolutely white and shaking. She retired the following year.

    1. Nanani*

      That’s such a horrible thing to say to a student!
      The “weedout” mentality can’t die fast enough.

      Yay for you and yay for karmic timing

      1. Cedrus Libani*

        Some professors are ferociously territorial about who’s “good enough” for their program. I ran into one – barely scraped a B in her course sophomore year, while dealing with what turned out to be an autoimmune disorder. Didn’t interact with her much, either then or after. But the few times I did, she made a point of singling me out in front of an audience, wondering why I was wasting her time and mine by not quitting. (I wasn’t her only target, either – she was well-known for this behavior.)

        At graduation, she sidles up to me and my parents with this obnoxious little smirk-grin, and asks what I will do after graduation. I’ll be a senior groomer at Famous Llamas, Inc., I replied. The professor looked sour. You stayed in the field. Of course, I said. My internships at Famous Llamas went great, and after I trained their whole team on mermaid hair-dying last summer, they decided to hire me at the senior level. I’m super excited about it.

        Professor rolled her eyes. We both know you’re only a Grooming major because you couldn’t handle the work in either Animal Sciences or Cosmetology. Which was a lie. Yes, I’d switched majors repeatedly, but I had good reason. The perils of being interdisciplinary – I’d gotten multiple scholarships that required me to have a specific major, and I’d had to get creative with the paperwork in order to collect them. Also, if she knew about this…I certainly hadn’t told her. She’d been nosing through my records. NOT COOL.

        Pro-level revenge time. “Mom, why don’t you tell her about my scholarships?” My mom, bless her sweet summer heart, could brag about me until the heat death of the universe. She happily launched into an explanation of all the things I’d won – Sheep Council here, 4H there, Future Hairdressers of America, and how Grooming was such a new field but I was such a talent that they wanted to support me even though I wasn’t precisely what they were looking for…you get the idea. Professor stood there for several minutes of this onslaught, looking grumpier and grumpier, until finally stomping off mid sentence.

        *chef’s kiss* Thanks Mom. One of my favorite memories from college.

    2. LabTechNoMore*

      Is it bad that I could immediately guess the major when I read what your professor said? Chemistry department faculty are a special kind of hell.

    3. Where's the Orchestra?*

      My dad had one of those teachers in High School (why are you bothering to take chemistry – nobody from West Virginia understands chemistry – real peach of a teacher). He got his revenge though. . .never mess with a person who has lots of bootleg chemistry experience in the family (moonshiners know a lot of bootleg chemistry if they are successful; otherwise at best your brew tastes bad, worst you are poisoning customers).

      The teacher ended up spending an enormous amount of time trying to explain how a student had access to the supplies and the time to make Nitrous Oxide (aka Laughing Gas) accidentally in their chemistry lab class. Apparently it wasn’t a large quantity, but because of the age of the school building the whole school had to be evacuated for the day. And the police and fire department were called to deal with the “Chemical Incident” as well. No students were harmed, and my dad didn’t get in trouble – it was the mid 1960’s, the teacher was the one who took the heat. And he learned a very valuable lesson – never mess with a budding chemist.

  65. Anon for this*

    I worked at a non-profit org that primarily served a vulnerable community of color, and for some reason (pushover wimp of a CEO, mostly) we had a super racist and grouchy VP. He said derrogatory things about other cultures, forbid his front-line employees from speaking their native language in the office (even though it was the primary language of our clients) and was a general horrible bully. I was one of the other VPs at the tabnle with this jerk, was the only white VP who was actively trying to learn our clients’ language, and tried really hard to be an ally for our marginalized staff – so we butted heads constantly, and he was incredible dismissive and demeaning of my efforts and me as a person.

    A few years into the gig, the state decided they would make anti-racism training a priority for contracted agencies. I jumped at the opportunity and co-developed a day-long training with a colleague I adored – and we even offered the entire thing dual-language! I got amazing feedback from staff who attended and we were super proud of it, and folks from other agencies who came to hear it asked us to come to their agency to train. It was a big success! The racist VP, however, forbid any of his staff from attending, called me “a stupid bleeding heart liberal idiot” in meetings in front of the CEO, and got extremely hostile with me.

    So my colleague and I worked with our state regulatory agency, and eventually we got our curriculum certified to be the mandated anti-racism training for agencies like ours – which made us the statewide trainers. The state folks announced they would make the 8 hour training mandatory for 100% of staff in agencies like mine for the following year. When I hosted the next session that he was legally required to attend, I made a special seat just for him at the front of the room, with a little seating card and everything, and made him sit front and center for the whole 8 hours. Watching him chew his own face off during that training is one of my favorite memories of all time.

  66. Nell Fenwick*

    I have two that still bring me joy…

    First is a follow up to a question/update that has been previously been posted (update is here: https://www.askamanager.org/2018/12/update-since-i-gave-notice-at-work-my-boss-has-tripled-my-workload.html)
    At my new job after toxic job, my boss was really wonderful and super supportive as I worked through the after-effects of my toxic job. About 3 or 4 months in, New Boss and I attended a local industry event, where we promptly ran into Old Toxic Boss. They’d never met, and Old Toxic Boss started introducing himself. New Boss just looked him straight in the eye and said in a knowing tone “Oh, I know EXACTLY who you are” and then walked away. Old Boss looked utterly stunned. It was so marvelous and petty and yet perfectly polite.

    #2
    Same good workplace (post toxic job). We had rented out some items to a company in our same field but across the country. In the shipment on the way back, some things were damaged. The other company got very difficult to deal with regarding the cost to replace the damaged goods and it all got needlessly messy. The folks we were dealing with at this other company were all men and the reps from my company were all women and there was definitely more than a little bit of misogyny to how they were reacting to the situation. Eventually, we decided the time/energy we were putting into the problem wasn’t worth the monetary value of the damage and let them off the hook. However, even after we had given them their way, I got back one of the pettiest emails I’ve ever received that ended, I kid you not, with “We will remember how this played out” (again… we had agreed to NOT charge them for the damage that was clearly their responsibility per the contract). Well, another co-worker found this resolution hilarious, so the next day, we come in to find a poster-sized print out of Snidely Whiplash with the line from the email on it. To that day, the poster is still in my (now former – I’m in a different role/dept, but same company) boss’s office and is now covered with post-its of other petty, overly dramatic things people have said over the years.

  67. Alexis Rosay*

    I had a coworker who typically would only be present at work for 3-4 hours a day. She lied constantly, never finished any work, and set false expectations with clients that the rest of us had to clean up after. Once she didn’t show up to work for multiple days in a row without saying anything, and a family member called our office trying to find her—apparently she hadn’t told them where she was either (according to her social media, she flew to another city to party over the weekend and decided to just stay a few extra days).

    The problem was, she was super charismatic and clients loved her almost no matter what she did. The other problem: she was collecting a full time salary to do no work at the same time as our company was almost bankrupt.

    The last straw was when my boss tried to confront her about her behavior (way too late), she sent an email to the whole team accusing us of hating her because she “cared more” about the work than we did.

    One of my coworkers threw a dinner party and invited everyone on the team except Bad Coworker and our boss. At the dinner party, we hatched a plan: we would refuse to set foot in the physical office as long as she was employed—WFH was unheard of in our company at the time. We presented the plan on Monday, our boss caved immediately and two weeks later she was gone.

  68. Keymaster of Gozer (she/her)*

    Pettiest thing I’ve ever done at work:

    I once managed a database. People planned projects for the firm in it. I often coded reports and front end bits for them. I worked for IT, they worked in different departments, never had a problem with any of them.

    ..except one. She was convinced that I was her PA, or something. She’d regularly demand I walk across the road to her office to do errands/answer her questions in person etc. She was fairly high up enough in that department for my boss to want to keep her happy. The reports from the database were NOT good enough for her one day – she demanded a printout of ALL data in the database. Tried to tell her that this would be pointless without some kind of ‘only for year X, only for projects relating to her department’ search.

    Nope. She demanded it all. AND I better bring it by hand over to her because it was raining and she didn’t want to get her new shoes wet.

    Anyone who’s ever managed a database can guess how many reams of paper that poor printer went through but once I was done I gathered them up and went out into the rain.

    In England, during a thunderstorm downpour.

    The LOOK on her face when I unceremoniously dumped a colossal amount of soaked printout on her office floor was one I treasure. ‘What am I supposed to do with THAT much data?!’ she screamed. ‘I don’t have TIME to look at it!’

    ‘You asked, you got’ said the very soaked and much younger Keymaster and went back to her office.

    (Never got any reprisals and she did continue being an ass up till she was fired for slapping a coworker)

    1. Keymaster of Gozer (she/her)*

      (Although I do recall having the printer break shortly afterward which did add to my workload…so didn’t come out entirely on top!)

        1. Keymaster of Gozer (she/her)*

          Yeah, about 2 years later she got told by another manager in a meeting that she was wrong about something and she straight up slapped them round the face. She tried to blame ‘personal issues’ but HR wasn’t having any of it given they’d had loads of complaints about her attitude in the past. So she went bye bye.

    2. NoviceManagerGuy*

      …I think I would take a backup and import the .bak file into a text editor, then print a ream of gibberish.

      1. Keymaster of Gozer (she/her)*

        I’d totally do that today! This was…ohh so long ago so I didn’t think of it. (Think Windows NT 4.0 era)

    4. KateM*

      You should have covered yourself with all those reams of paper so that you wouldn’t have been so soaked!

      1. Keymaster of Gozer (she/her)*

        Wasn’t capable of balancing a huge box’s worth of paper on my head :p

  69. ThisIsTheHill*

    I was a committee clerk for a state senator. That meant I was responsible for ensuring that we followed all of the Open Meetings Act/federal/state rules for public meetings. We had a set schedule, specific day & time each week. A senator with a bone to pick with my boss either didn’t show or showed up late. She publicly, on camera, blamed me for never notifying her about the meeting. Mind you, these are publicly posted, with e-mail & back-up paper invites to committee members – which my boss pointed out in support of me.

    This was back in the pre-laptop days, so I couldn’t pull up the calendar & show that she & her chief of staff both were sent & accepted the notice.

    The next week, I added read receipts. Printed them all off, even for the committee members & lobbyists who weren’t giving me grief. Printed the Outlook responses, screenshot of the calendar, everything possible. She had the gall to try it again, so I quietly handed all of the paperwork to my boss & let him rip into her. It was glorious.

  70. K.E.*

    Some years ago, I worked as the assistant to a politician who bullied me relentlessly, and I discovered through the grapevine she’d been doing exactly the same to a series of young, and in some cases quite vulnerable, female staff since being elected a decade prior. Do bear in mind she was an MP for a party set up to support worker’s rights…

    While working there, I helped contribute to the formation of an independent investigations system for the legislature (not in the US) which was in the process of being set up at the time. After I left, myself and four others made an official complaint through the system, and she was the first politician in our country found through the new system to have been guilty of bullying her staff.

    She had stepped down as a representative by the time the story came out unfortunately, but still, an article in a national newspaper about what a bully you are can’t have been fun! Revenge is a dish best served long after they think they’ve gotten away with it…

  71. PolarVortex*

    My company very much has a bro culture aspect to it, which is improving a bit as the years go on but was a real pain in the seat cushion a few years ago. My director at the time was a big bro, who favored all the other bros and the women who played into the bro culture. I am pretty much the antithesis of that culture, and was in a role that managed people and practically ran half the department on the day-to-day level but was not allowed included in future planning. And due to my folk-metal-head personality, he didn’t have any desire to include me like he did others nor did he include my counterpart Diana (a woman who could care less about bros).

    One time, he and his bros planned out an entire department change. It was to be revolutionary. (Spoilers, every change we made was supposed to be revolutionary and never has been.) It was announced to me and Diana, and all the underlings, 48 hours before implementation. Afterwards as the VP is hanging about and people are chatting, the director asks me and Diana our thoughts, and we start listing off questions about various positions/duties that were not mentioned in this revolutionary change. Just a never ending list of things we couldn’t not have in the future state. It was rather satisfying to see his bug eyed look. Not to mention Diana and I looked like heroes when we then started spitballing solutions to each idea and managed to cobble together a plan to solve most of them so we could still implement in the 48 hours.

    From then on while we weren’t included in initial planning, he never failed to include Diana and I in the late planning stages to at least catch the gaps. I have so many stories of Head Bro and the dumb things that went on in that dept but I still feel smug as heck about proving in front of all and sundry that Diana and I the real power in that dept and that Head Bro and his cohort had no idea about the actual running of the teams.

    1. JustaTech*

      Ah yes, the ever popular “let’s change everything and not ask the people who do the things”. I’ve seen that on several scales from the “why would the building that receives temperature sensitive material need a full-time shipping/receiving person?” (I was able to ask the innocent question and get the nipped in the bud) to the colossally stupid “why do we need a scheduling department, that’s what Outlook is for” during an M&A. (Turns out our scheduling is so complicated we had to build the industry-leading software, and the overlords had to hire everyone back at higher salaries *and* let them keep their severance.)

  72. SwampWitch185*

    This is just petty. Our office building had a very wonky kind of partial geothermal heating system where it took the temp from outside to level the temp inside. It was -15 outside and something with the thermostat broke and it was almost 90 degrees inside the building. Opening a window only made it hotter inside. We had this one coworker who was always complaining of how cold she was and would snuggle up on the male employees including our manager and director, sometimes sitting on their laps. She always did a dying swan act about being cold no matter what the temp was outside. She brought in space heaters and started a small fire. We had to do sexual harassment training ALL THE TIME because of her. It was literally a daily thing. They didn’t fire her for harassment though. Small town hierarchy and what not.

    The thermostat broke the day we had some new interns come in, and we were in the conference room for a meet and greet coffee hour. We were all just sweating like crazy making sauna jokes. She came in wearing her duffle coat, sweat running down her face, doing her chilly Willy routine for the new interns, of which there were a lot of younger men. Everyone was uncomfortable and it was really evident she wasn’t joking. One of them looked right at her after she gave her “omg I’m so cold, you guys” act and said “wow, you need a lot of attention, huh?”

    She took her coat off and went back to her office. We didn’t hear a lot about her being cold anymore after that.

    It was awesome.

    1. Murfle*

      One of the uncommon instances where an intern’s still-developing sense of professionalism can be a force for good. Holy cow!

    2. Hawkeye is in the details*

      That is not petty! That is amazing. And kudos to the junior employee who said it!

  73. Magenta Sky*

    I was working as a temp in a lab that built one of the first successful neutrino detectors. The staff consisted of the professor in charge, and her grad student assistant (who were a couple of stories of their own), and a bunch of temps doing the grunt work. They cycled through the temps regularly because that’s the nature of the work.

    One day, a new guy shows up who is a bit obnoxious from the beginning, moaning about how oppressive the government is, etc. About day two or three, he starts trying to recruit people into the local KKK using a “we have to protect our country from fascists” sort of “logic,” and is fairly (verbally) aggressive about it. In southern California, mind you, not exactly a hotbed of conservative white supremacism. I pointed out to him (this was in the 80s, before the fall of the Soviet Union) that the KKK was most *certainly* financed by the Communist Party in the Soviet Union as a subversive group (which was true).

    For some reason, he didn’t show up after that. (And nothing of value was lost. He was a crap worker on top of everything else.)

  74. Mary Smith*

    I had a boss that was a real bully and would lie/throw her staff under the bus as much as she could. She would ask me to do things that were illegal even (which of course, I refused). I hated working with her and would go home and cry a couple of times a week.

    One time, she asked me to submit a purchasing form “by the end of the day, no matter what you have to do to get it done.” The person on my staff who usually did the form was on vacation, so I did my best and submitted it. Apparently I made some mistakes (not shocking since I didn’t know what I was doing, but nothing really major). It apparently made her look bad, so she decided to formally reprimand me for it. She pulled me into her office with the HR manager (who knew how much of a nightmare she was too, but couldn’t do anything about it).

    I walked in and told her I wanted to talk to her quickly about something when we were done with whatever she wanted to talk about. She said ok and then proceeded to reprimand me for 45 minutes. After exhausting herself, she literally slumped in her chair from the exertion. I waited. She got her second wind and then got a curious look on her face and said “Oh, wasn’t there something you wanted to talk about too?”

    “Oh yes,” I opened my folder, “I quit” and slide my resignation across the table. Her eyes literally bulged, her mouth dropped open, and she shook her head in shock. She tried to ask me about my new job and I wouldn’t tell her anything, so she finally ended the meeting.

    On the way out, HR asked me to follow her back to her office. I did, she closed the door and….busted out laughing and said “That was epic!”. She knew what a nightmare the boss was and she thought what it was hilarious how much I shocked her.

  75. anonamama*

    My first job out of college as an office admin. My job was to order office supplies. Our bookkeeper would ask me to order things as she ran out, so sometimes I was ordering her things 4xs a month. Eventually our boss asked me to just place one supply order a month to streamline costs and time. Bookkeeper was not thrilled. And would send endless emails CC’s thing boss claiming I had not ordered her items etc. I would respond to just her because I thought it was silly she would pull our company CEO into these things. So eventually she just looked like a crazy person always emailing me and CC’in him until one day he finally responded to her telling her to knock it off and not include him in petty matters anymore.

  76. Seen it.*

    This was my favorite work jerk moment in my life.

    I used to work at a University, and every year there would be budget crunches, and the faculty would have to decide where the cuts would come from.

    Most of the faculty loved me. I provided their IT support and I knew all of my users well. Most of the time, I’d worked with them enough to know exactly what they needed to get back up and running.

    However, one Professor in particular didn’t like me, and so every time budget constraints would come up, he’d say something to the effect of “The University offers central IT services, and they’re very good and very responsive. We don’t need to have our own IT person.”

    Officially I wasn’t supposed to know this, but I was close with a number of the faculty, and they’d shared his rant with me. I never said anything about it, just kept doing my job though.

    Finally, it was my last day at work. I was packing up all my stuff and moving to my new job. The professor who was always talking trash came running down the hall, stops in front of me and tells me he has a huge emergency.

    He’s about to give a grant proposal in front of a bunch of House/Senate members, and none of his formulas were showing up! The entire presentation was worthless, as all the math to prove anything wasn’t displaying.

    So I told him (his name was Richard, and he always wanted to be called Richard). I said “Well Dick, I’ve heard that the University offers wonderful central IT services. I’m sure if you call them now they’ll be with your shortly. Have a nice day!”

    He turned beet red, spun around on his heel and slammed his door shut.

    The best (or worst) part of it was I knew exactly what was wrong. He’d used some random Japanese font that allowed him the characters he needed for his formulas. I had a copy of the font sitting on a flash drive in my office. I could have fixed his problem in 20 seconds, because I’d seen it before. I think the first time it took me days to figure out.

    As far as I know, he had to cancel his grant proposal.

    1. anonymous 5*

      This warms my cold, cold heart! (Also I hope that your last day at that job was the segue into either a great new one or a fulfilling retirement…)

  77. Nannerdoodle*

    This happened when I was 24, and it’s probably the pettiest thing I’ve ever done.
    I worked in a department where all the regular employees were micro-scheduled (to the minute) for their whole day to make sure everything got done at the times it was supposed to per agreements with the clients. We had a 1-2 person buffer each day in case people got sick, but their rule was basically “don’t call in sick unless you’re dying or in the hospital” so people wouldn’t call in for “little things”. The buffer people would check the messages in the morning to fix the schedules, and the lady in charge of call ins would also check the messages because she couldn’t give up control of it. She was a jerk and severe micromanager, and made the call in rule (we called in and left a message to a voicemail since no one wanted to monitor that phone at 5am) that when we called in we had to say our name, the date, and the very specific reason we were calling in. She wouldn’t accept just “sick” or “have a cold/flu”. She wanted “I’ve been vomiting for X hours and had diarrhea” or something similar. I hated this. I also almost never got sick. The first time I got sick, I only said “had the flu” or whatever vague thing it was, and she gave me a written warning for that. She said that I needed to be as specific as possible when I called in sick. She wrote several other people up for this as well, so most people didn’t like her.
    Many months later, I got my revenge. I got SICK. Vomiting every 15 minutes like clockwork. I couldn’t keep anything down. And I knew I’d have to call in. So I chugged a bunch of gatorade shortly before the end of that 15 minutes, and called the line as soon as I could feel it coming. I said “I’m Nannerdoodle, it’s ‘date’, and I’m calling in because I’m sick. As far as details go,” then I vomited. Loudly. Horrifically. And I’d kept the phone close enough that it definitely picked up the sounds. When I finished I said “sorry about that, I’m basically stuck next to my toilet” and then hung up. I had the presence of mind to text the person who was the buffer that day who would listen to the message and tell him not to listen unless he could handle the noises.
    I didn’t hear about the fallout until the next day, when I went back into work. The buffer guy told all our coworkers about my message, because he thought it was the funniest thing he’d ever heard. They were all waiting for her to listen to it. Turns out the micromanager had a very weak stomach (I didn’t know this). She listened to my message on speakerphone in her office with the door open (another issue, but it just makes this story funnier), and as soon as she got to the “good part”, she turned a shade of green and sprinted out of her office to the bathroom. And then had to call in sick.
    The call in rule was changed to just needing to say you were sick, no details necessary. I became department legend.

    5. Baffled Boi*

      Why on earth would she ask for all the gory details if she can’t handle the sound of someone throwing up over the phone???

      1. SnappinTerrapin*

        She was apparently never warned to “be careful what you ask for, because you might get it.”

      2. Nannerdoodle*

        Apparently she was fine with the embarrassment people felt having to list out all the details, but assumed no one would ever make her listen to them. Which to be fair, most people wouldn’t wait to call in until they were actively vomiting. She just underestimated how petty I was.

  78. the case of the pineapple scented air freshener*

    This doesn’t involve me but happened at Oldjob.

    This one place I worked had a very strict perfume policy. Meaning it was not allowed at all. Employees were prohibited from wearing any type of fragrance. Which I won’t lie is not a bad thing. I personally don’t love perfume and to be next to someone in an office isn’t great. Anway… it was mostly because one employee (Jane) claimed she had a terrible allergy to fragrance. Jane went as far as bullying others for their choice in shampoo, hair spray and deodorant claiming she smell everything they wore. She asked HR if they could please stop people from using scented products at all, like deodorant. Jane even wanted people to stop using hair spray. HR basically said sorry we cannot and will not do that. HR’s solution was to move her desk from the person who she said she could “smell” the most.

    Well this only made things worse. The person she was moved next to had terrible allergies. She blew her nose all day and sneezed a lot. This made Jane bully her for sneezing. She would spritz a homemade essential oil blend her general direction anytime she sneezed (please don’t ask me why EOs were ok). Eventually this led to them getting into a screaming match, in front of the entire office one time. The lady who sneezed had enough of Jane. Jane was sent home for the day.

    Fast forward a few weeks later. The entire company is given Pineapple scented car air fresheners as a gift. I do not know why this happened with all the “scent drama”, but it did. We instructed to not open the air fresheners in the office. The next day Jane claimed she could smell the air freshener in her desk somewhere (she did not take one). They had maintenance come bleach her desk and overhead compartments. She still smelled it. They put fans all around her desk to “air it out” and then bleached it again. She could STILL smell it. Eventually someone found an air freshener stuffed in a crevice of her desk. Jane walked out that day and never came back.

    Apparently the lady that sneezed stayed late everyday. They never caught who did it, but I’ll let you form your own conclusions.

    I am not sure if this is triumph story or not. While I totally respect no fragrances at work, Jane often took it too far.

    1. Recruited Recruiter*

      I have an acquaintance who sounds just like Jane. She tried to sue her (former) employer for refusing her “ADA” demands for no fragrances of any kind in the workplace. They offered to ban perfume/cologne, but she demanded that she not be exposed to even people in clothing that had been washed in scented laundry soap, and that they change all the cleaners to unscented “natural” cleaners. In a SCHOOL!

    2. Thin Mints didn't make me thin*

      My friend worked for a terrible, horrible, no good, very bad boss. Reprimanded her for not wearing pantyhose on a 100-degree day, that kind of thing.

      She got a new job. Someone (I will neither confirm nor deny involvement) suggested that on her last day she leave a tuna sandwich far, far, in the back of a bottom drawer of his desk.

      I never heard how it all turned out, alas.

      1. Sparkles McFadden*

        Pro-tip: If you have a drop ceiling, put the tuna sandwich up there. No one things to look up in the ceiling.

        1. Jaid*

          I managed to persuade maintenance to put a picture of Ceiling Cat in a vent.

          The vent/ceiling tile had warped and they were taking their sweet time to replace it. I put a picture of Ceiling Cat on the wall underneath it. When they came around to make sure they had the right measurements for the replacement tiles, I pointed out the picture and asked if they could…

          And they did! So now I can look up at the vent and see a kitty looking down at me. :-)

  79. Heading out the door*

    My manager was awful in many ways, but one was she wouldn’t respond to any form of communication and was rarely at one of the sites. Knowing she never read emails, I started emailing (knowing I wouldn’t get a response) and including some along the lines of “here’s what I propose. As it’s the busy season, I don’t want to take up your time unnecessarily. If I don’t hear back by xxx I’ll go ahead with the proposed action”. I was able to do whatever i needed to do to get things done, and had a written record that I’d run it by my mgr.

  80. Librarian of SHIELD*

    Mine’s a jerk customer story.

    At a library where I used to work, the children’s help desk was placed just outside the children’s area, so right on the border with the adult section. I was working the children’s desk one afternoon helping a kid find books for his school project, and a man in a suit came up behind him to wait for help. After about a minute, he called out “some of us don’t have all day, sweetheart.”

    Now. I am not usually the person who comes up with a zinger response in the moment. I generally freeze, sputter, and only think of the perfect thing to say hours later. But this day, the lords of sass were apparently on my side, because without even thinking I answered back “Sir, I am not your wife, your daughter, or your partner, and it’s inappropriate for you to speak to me like that. I’d be happy to help you with whatever you need as soon as I’m finished with this gentleman.” Then I turned to the kid and told him we would go find the book he needed and we headed to the shelves.

    When I got back to the help desk a minute or two later, the guy was gone and I never saw him again.

    1. Hawkeye is in the details*

      That is epic! And a great model of behavior in front of a child.

      By the way, I have to say, every time I see you post here, I can’t help but wonder if I know you on Ao3!

        1. Hawkeye is in the details*

          Then there is another SHIELD fan who works in a library! I wrote a fic for them once. :)

  81. Alex the Alchemist*

    Last year I started a part-time social media and communications job at a startup after I graduated with the intent to go full-time after my evaluation. When the time came to negotiate my full-time salary with my grandboss, he offered me about half of what a full-time job in that field would actually pay, with the excuse of, “You can’t just EXPECT to make a living wage.” I kept going there because I needed the money but kept job-searching. During the final month of my stay there, my immediate boss quit because of the way I was treated and almost everyone in my grandboss’s direct team had left for higher-paying jobs. The best part? Now I’m working at a job doing the same thing with half the hours and twice the pay of that job, and I haven’t seen any social media or communications updates from my old company since I left. AND my current boss actually values work-life balance and tells me to meticulously track my overtime.

    Moral of the story: Don’t work for a startup, even when you believe in its mission.

    1. Anhaga*

      “Don’t work for a startup, even when you believe in its mission.”

      Start-ups aren’t all bad! Working for a start-up that isn’t, I’d amend this to, “Don’t work for a star tup that tries to tell you that start ups shouldn’t have to function like normal companies.”

      They will start as they intend to go on. If the start up is treating employees like crap from the beginning, that is not going to change when their balance sheets are in the black.

  82. UKgreen*

    A colleague kept stealing my work – copy-pasting stuff from documents I’d written, and claiming PowerPoint decks as her own.

    So I embedded my name in everything I made – in the footer or the slide master, in a tiny white font. Then when she claimed the work was hers in a meeting I asked for the mouse to ‘point to something’ and ‘accidentally’ highlighted where it said ‘documents created by UKgreen on date’.

    Petty? Hell yeah!

    1. Despachito*

      That was genial!

      (I find stealing others’ work particularly heinous, so 3 times kudos for you!)

  83. Irish girl*

    So this isn’t an office job story. I referre soccer games on the weekends for extra cash and have been doing it for over 20 years since I was 14. I had been assigned a 3 game set in which i was supposed to do 1 as the center official and 2 are the line official which is typical and i can do with no issues. On that morning the ref coordinator told me that 1 of the other refs was not going to show up and that i would have to 2 games. Ok, no problem i can handle that. Well the 3rd person never showed so i was stuck doing all 3 games by myself with no help. At the time I was 23. The ages for the games were 15, 16 and 17 year old boys. Not exactly slow paced games and there is no time in between them for me to rest, go the bathroom or eat so the last 2 games were late getting started with just me. Parents weren’t happy but not much i could do other than my best in the situation.

    I managed to get through the 15 and 16 games with little to no controversy but the 17 year old game started off with the coaches pissed at me that i was late and by myself. Again not my fault or something i could control. We start the game and i was exhausted and it was a tough game and everyone on the field expected that i could see everything that normally my ARs would be responsible for. The parents were horrendous in yelling at me which in turn made the boys yell at me. I told the coaches at half time to deal with the parents and they didnt. There was a situation where the ball may have gone over the goal line but there was no way i could call a goal without my AR in the situation so hell broke loose. I finally blew my whistle and called the coaches on the field and said either all the parents leave and go to their cars or i was leaving as i was not going to take the abuse anymore. I went to the sideline and sat down and drank water. Needles to say the coaches kicked all the parents out and I restarted the game to a quieter field and managed to make it through the rest of the game. It felt soooo gooood to kick those parents out and showed the kids on the field that i wants going to take their shit without repercussions. I called the ref coordinator to explain what happened before i wrote my report. Needless to say the teams got a fine for their behavior and abuse.

    1. KD*

      That is amazing. I play rec sports and without the refs we can’t play. I once tried out reffing. It didn’t go well. I have great respect for those who make it possible for me to play even if I don’t always agree with them. And I certainly wouldn’t have handled the situation as well as you did at 23!

    2. Alton Brown's Evil Twin*

      I was at my nephew’s parochial league basketball game. These were 7 year old kids, the head ref was an older guy, overweight, walked a little slow – but he knew basketball. One of the fans was giving him a hard time for calls and his appearance.

      The ref blew his whistle, got the ball, pointed at the offending fan and said “You. You’re out of here. You’re embarrassing yourself in front of your family and your neighbors.” And stood there glaring until the guy got up and left the gym.

    3. Nannerdoodle*

      Oh man, this reminds me of when I used to ref hockey. Important information: I was a teenage girl when this occurred, which is super rare for hockey refs. I also braided my hair and tucked it into the uniform, so between the helmet and loose shirt, you couldn’t see my long hair at all or see any defining bodily characteristics that could have told you I’m a girl.
      Hockey parents are insane and scream at refs over basically every call. And when they’re exceptionally bad, they wait at the end of the game for the refs to walk out of their special locker room to yell at them some more. After one rivalry game, where I had the most controversial call (other closest ref agreed with the call I’d made), parents were waiting outside the hallway for a bunch of guy refs to come out. This was pre-phone video recording being widespread, but I knew I could call the ref coordinator and get his voicemail. I did so right as I walked up to the parents. I asked them who they were looking for, and they unleashed the worst stream of vitriol I’d ever heard about the refs, because they assumed they weren’t talking to one since I’d changed out of my uniform. I never told them I was a ref, but they figured it out when all the fans were banned from the stands for the next few games.

      Another story about reffing, coaches can only say so much to dispute calls before they get kicked from the game. We were in the first game of a single elimination tournament, and somehow two of the best teams were against each other, so the best the losing team would be able to do in the tournament is win the consolation bracket (like 9th place overall or something). Both head coaches got several warnings in the game (warnings go away after the games, but get enough and you’re ejected), but neither had gone over the line yet. After the game while we were all still on the ice, the coach of the losing team came up, shook the other refs’ and my hands and very calmly said to me “Now that the game is over, that was the worst called game I’ve ever watched, but makes sense because you’re a girl” and followed it up with a few very sexist things I will not repeat.
      I said “I’m sorry to hear that, and am letting you know that due to your comments and this being your 3rd warning of the game, you are ejected from the tournament.” I’ve never seen someone turn that shade of red. And his team didn’t win the consolation bracket.

  84. Lizzie*

    So mine was more of an indirect triumph, but still sweet all the same! I know I’ve mentioned this story in comments before but…my first job out of college I worked for one boss. Who then finagled working from home before it was even a thing. I think, since it wasn’t a thing, the powers that be assumed that since she wasn’t IN the office, there was nothing for me to do! So they assigned me “help” another group. No explanation as to what, or how much time, etc. I’d be doing for them. It ended up being essentially two full time positions. I was tired, stressed, and burned out. This went on for months! Then one day I was told that we had bought out a smaller company, and there were two people, me and someone at the other company, and one job, and unfortunately, they chose her.

    I was upset but actual happy as it was hellhole and I was so over it. My WFH boss was PISSEED as she had not been consulted in this AT ALL. the triumph came when this new person started Monday morning (I was told Friday afternoon!), given this one horrible task I had to do, with almost no explanation, and told to just figure it out.

    Tuesday morning THEY walked out, never to be heard from again. The kicker is I found out from my WFH boss, who “thought I’d want to know”

  85. Twisted Lion*

    I worked at a call center and had the boss from hell who continually harassed me for various reasons. I only worked this job because it was in a small town and my husband was in the Air Force and it was the job I could get. One week, I had to go out of town because my best friend’s mother suddenly passed away. When I came back, in a team meeting, she gleefully informed me that I would be working ALL of the holidays for the remainder of the calendar year (it was March). While I was gone she had the other reports put in for the ALL of the holidays and she said I “had” to work July 4th, Thanksgiving, Christmas and New Years etc because I don’t have kids. I just nodded and let her feel triumphant and then when she was done gloating about how I should have put in the hours if I wanted them or it would be selfish to take those holidays away from people with children, I informed her I was putting in my notice as my husband had received orders for a new duty assignment.

    Her surprised Pikachu face was beyond satisfying.

    1. Lady Ann*

      Reminds me of when I worked in a place that had to be staffed 24/7. The rule was everyone had to work 2 holidays a year, they’d put out the holiday list at the beginning on the year and you’d sign up for your two holidays. There was a ton of turnover so I’d sign up for more minor holidays at the beginning of the year and ended up never having to work on Thanksgiving or Christmas. I’m not a total jerk, though, so I definitely did my part (for example, one year I worked Easter morning, a double shift on the 4th of July because nobody else signed up that day, and 2nd shift on Christmas Eve, which wasn’t officially considered a holiday but still a shift nobody wanted to work). My boss (who was a jerk for other reasons) told me “next year you HAVE to work Thanksgiving or Christmas because it’s not FAIR that you never do it” even though at that point I was literally the most senior person on staff, having been there for four years. So I happily signed up for both at the beginning of the year…knowing I was finishing grad school in May and I would be leaving the job in June, which I did.

    2. Sparkles McFadden*

      Oh ugh. At my first job out of school, I was told that, as a single person, I was expected to work all of the holidays. OK. Then my boss would assign extra work to me “to lighten everyone’s load.” OK, I’ll do what’s assigned. When we got to the point where I was doing three times the work of everyone else, I went in to the boss and made my case for what my raise should be at the one year mark. Boss replied “Raise? You’re not getting a raise. There are people with families here. They need the money. You don’t.” Being young, I blurted “The next time I come to your office, it will be because I’m quitting.” She laughed at me.

      I started job searching immediately and got something in two months. It was a particularly busy time, so when I appeared in her doorway holding a sign that said “I am giving my notice today!!!” Boss just said “No! No! You can’t quit! We have too much work!” I said “Yes, I am giving my notice and I will now do my ceremonial ‘I quit” dance’ and I shimmied away after handing her my official resignation.

      A little childish but I was only 21.

      1. Jackalope*

        I hate that argument so much. I spent my 20s and 30s as a single person. I know that’s cheaper than, say, being a single parent, but you know what? I too wanted to eat, and have a roof over my head, and electricity, and so on. And I didn’t have a backup if something happened to me.

      2. Bagpuss*

        Yes – fortunately I haven’t ever come against the ‘signle people should be paid less’ argument in my work life, (although I have met a lot of people who don’t get that being single is far more expensiv than being part of a couple) but I have come against the ‘single people should be expected to work holidays’.

        When I was fairly junior, my boss and the other person who made up our immediate department both had children. I was single and didn’t.
        There were two major times I pushed back.
        (i) I had booked time off, about 9 months in advance, for my grandma’s 80th as we planned a big family party. The time off fell during school half term . About 2 weeks before, my boss realised that I had the time booked so she could not book it, and tried to bully me into cancelling my time so she could have it. She threatened to cancel it if I wouldn’t, and tried to guilt-trip me about the fact that she needed to be with her children when they were off school. I told her that I needed to be with my entire family who had been planning this for months, and that if she cancelled my leave, since that was against our organisation’s policies, I would raise a formal grievance. She backed down, but she moaned about it for months afterwards.

        (ii) Same boss. We had one day a week when our department stayed open late to offer a free drop in advice session. When I started, I was told this was covered on a rota basis, so I would have to do it once every three weeks. OK. Then my boss decided that she shouldn’t have to do it, because she needed to pick her kid up from school, and that my coworker shouldn’t be expected to do it as she had a kid, so I would have to do it every week. I said no, I was willing to do my fair share but I wasn’t prepared to take on their responsibilities as well. She decided the drop in session could be moved earlier so no one had to stay late.

  86. J Quitskies*

    I had worked for a couple years in a role with an absent-but-micromanaging boss. You know, the boss who never had time for your questions or to meet with you, or to actually give you the evaluations you were supposed to get, but when she was actually there in the office she’d interrupt your work to try and micromanage the colors of the paper you were printing handouts on, or what font you used in a slide deck (even though she’s a VP). I was unhappy in this job because I was hired to make changes but realized very quickly nobody actually wanted the changes. Although I’d have energy at each of our events, strategizing meetings, and attended professional development where I learned how to better use data to boost our results, the atmosphere of nobody else caring and wanting everything to stay the same was a drag and I grew to hate it. I was always praised for my work, though, because I DID do a good job.

    We were faced with low numbers and they decided to hire someone to add to my currently understaffed dept of one, but higher than my level. I didn’t have the experience of turning things around during a recession like they needed, so it didn’t bother me at first, but I was completely left out of all the interviews and hiring discussions, which was weird and unprecedented. My boss stopped responding to my emails when I needed her approval to book events or make purchases. The week before the newly hired director of my team was to begin work, she took one task we’d agreed a year ago was not a priority and did not actually produce results, and started asking me why I wasn’t doing it regularly. I explained what we’d discussed before and reminded her we’d said I wouldn’t do that while we didn’t have more staff and I had bigger tasks on my plate and it was for down time only, but she started demanding it be done by an impossible deadline. I realized what was happening because I’d seen her do it to someone else before – she was trying to get me to quit or find a reason to fire me before my new senior-level colleague was to start. They most definitely couldn’t afford us both.

    I decided to leave ASAP. I spent that last week (in which she was working from home) with a booked calendar of fake client names so I had time to tie some things up with real clients, emptied out my office, interviewed at temp agencies, and prepared emails to clients that I would send on my last day. Because she never cared about my attempts to collect and use data to inform our decisions, or any of the client resources I’d created from my own initiative (even though they had come to rely on them), I removed all my hard work from the server. I left the minimal amount of info that could help our clients out without screwing them. My favorite part of the week was shredding all the documents and resources I had produced and already printed, *right in front of everyone*. I would casually walk into the large office area where my colleagues and the shredder sat, start a conversation with a co-worker, toss a few things in the shredder or recycling, take more things out of cabinets while chatting and just keep destroying everything, and nobody noticed what I was doing because it looked like I was just doing a massive re-organization. I left them with just a list of clients, their contact info, and updates on each of their current statuses. Everything else they would have to re-build from scratch (I did not violate any intellectual property rules here by keeping my own creations because they didn’t have any).

    I went home that Friday, opened a beer, and emailed my resignation effective immediately. I started a temp job that Monday that turned into a permanent job right away and really boosted my career. The company struggled for years with their inability to adapt and make any changes as the market around them changed, and they recently closed.

    1. Princess Trachea-Aurelia Belaroth*

      My principal is like that, absent but micromanaging. As the school year is about to start, I’m having to interact with him more as he wanders around, commandeering preparations and snapping at people. He’s really good at turning excitement for a new school year into dread.

  87. The Prettiest Curse*

    This is completely petty and was very low-stakes. Our offices at a previous job got extremely hot in the summer – we were on the top floor and there was no AC.

    Our ED was a micromanager and something of a bully, but since she didn’t supervise me and also took a liking to me, she never bothered me … but over time, I got really annoyed by the way she treated people.

    Due to the heat, I would sometimes use a couple of squirts of a foot refresher spray that contained eucalyptus so that my feet smelled less sweaty and awful. (Trust me, that was an office with much worse smells than my foot spray … the fridge, for one.)

    My area of the office was sparsely populated and the windows would be wide open when it was hot, so nobody ever noticed or said anything … except for the ED, who would stop in her tracks while wandering past my desk and ask me if I smelled anything strange. I always said that no, I couldn’t smell a thing. Petty satisfaction achieved!

  88. Cheesecake Baker*

    So this is a story of both triumph and reconciliation. This was while I worked part-time as a server at a restaurant. A co-worker of mine, Katie, lived in a fourfold with a really great apartment becoming available in the building. Another co-worker, Vanessa was first interested in the apartment as well as I. Vanessa spoke with the landlord about it. I spoke to him after and told him in the event Vanessa was not interested in the apartment I would take it. Vanessa went MIA on him. I called her and left a VM that I needed to find a new place ASAP and if she still wanted the apartment I would back off and look for something else. I never heard from her, the Landlord never heard from her, so he called me and told me it was mine if I wanted it, so I met him, signed the lease, gave him the deposit, etc.… Once that happened Vanessa was furious with both Katie and I, and told another co-worker she wouldn’t speak to either of us anymore. She was popular at work so a lot of people took her side and ostracized me over it. Work for a month or so was pretty miserable, so I decided to make Vanessa a cheesecake. I brought it in on a day I knew we’d both be there and asked if I could talk to her for a moment, and told her I made her a cheesecake and then left as that was the end of my shift. I found out later that Vanessa had cried over it, and felt awful about what happened and that she was just embarrassed about it. She made things right at work and told people that it was a mistake on her part, and my work life got better instantly, and we’re still friends to this day. So moral of this story, if your co-worker acts like a jerk to you, make them a cheesecake. lol Oh and that apartment was one of the BEST I’ve ever lived in lol.

  89. NoMoreOffice*

    I used to work at a horrible place with horrible, two-faced management. I started being very vocal about the fact that no one outside the owners family and the GM made a living wage, even in our rural area. That started a conversation among staff about unions. That’s when I started getting assigned menial labor far, far below my skill set. I saw the writing on the wall and started looking for a job. They found out and came up with a BS reason to fire me, then contested my unemployment claim by saying I had actually quit. I was able to prove that wasn’t the case and eventually found a slightly less crappy job, but I still had a lot of friends who worked there. Two of these friends, are a married couple. Half the couple got fired for a very legit reason, but the way they went about it was absolute crap, which pissed the other half of the couple off. He handed in his resignation a few days later, along with a copy of the GM’s criminal record. She had a felony conviction for embezzling from an elderly man who she had by hired to care for. That would seem to explain why so many orders from “China” never made it to the warehouse. Owner completely blew it off.
    Less than a year later the company hand to lay of 3/4 of their employees and almost had to fold entirely because there was no more money. Vendors hadn’t been paid in months and were getting mean about it. Rumor has it, the GM had stolen a SIGNIFICANT amount of money from the business. And the owner was warned about it and still didn’t even bother to look at the books. That was two years ago and nothing has ever given me so much satisfaction as seeing the perpetual help wanted sign in front of the shiny new office they built before the hammer came down and seeing the owner sell his fancy, shiny, vintage cars one-by-one, just to stay afloat. Last I heard, FedEx wouldn’t even pick shipments up from the warehouse anymore because they were so far behind on paying the bill.

  90. Rainer Maria von Trapp*

    I was selected to be on a “pilot team” at my school. There was heinous hostility and quite a bit of cruelty towards the selected team (honestly, it felt like I was IN middle school — not teaching it!). The two most vocally cruel people kept finding Pilot-branded pens in their mailboxes for the better part of the school year. Small, petty victories.

  91. Renee Remains the Same*

    My last job ended in a train wreck. Too long to get into. There was a charming sociopath as our VP, an inept Director, and a lot of high school drama. It was a political minefield and I did not navigate it well. After the charming sociopath was fired, the Director applied for and was rejected for the job (this was the second time she attempted to grab the VP spot). A new VP came in and pretty quickly started cleaning house. I attempted a clean slate, but quickly became #3 on her list and after a few months realized I was on the verge of getting fired. One of my colleagues was promoted over me and I now reported to her. Then we scheduled a meeting to go over why I was terrible with HR, my newly-installed manager, the Director and the VP.

    The day before the meeting, I was verbally offered a new job and was told I should get the official written offer by the end of the week. I wasn’t telling anyone until I had an official acceptance letter. So at the meeting, when the inept Director told me that not getting promoted was an indication that I wasn’t good at my job. I cocked my head to the side, looked at her very directly, and said, “Oh, ok.” and then looked at the VP sitting next to her.

    I said very little during the meeting, defended myself not at all. It must have been fun for them to list all the reasons I sucked to which I nodded my head and said “I understand.” I was told by the office gossip that the inept Director was worried I was considering a lawsuit. (The office gossip just wanted to get a reaction out of me, which I did not give)

    Two days later I handed in my two weeks.

  92. KittyWhiskersPsPsPs*

    Provided some of the damning information in a deposition against them. They are out of business now and have to reimburse those they ripped off. It was cathartic.

  93. GG*

    I worked for a horrible bully of a boss who was well known not just in our office but industry wide for being abusive and impossible with her staff. I stayed in the role for upwards of two years. When I finally left, I kept in touch with my former coworkers and was absolutely tickled to learn that my replacement quit in THREE DAYS after working for my boss. Subsequent replacements lasted anywhere from 6 months to a year. Despite the hits to my self esteem and anxiety I endured while in that position, I’m weirdly proud that I was able to stick it out for so long and not-weirdly thrilled that she had to replace folks in the role basically quarterly on average, haha.

  94. PaigeNotPage*

    Firmly in the petty end of the spectrum but one of my coworkers, Doug, who I’d worked with for YEARS continually spelled my name Page in emails despite the fact that in order to email me he must have at one point correctly typed Paige as that was in my email name. I finally got tired of it and one day when he emailed me “Thank you Page” I replied, “You’re welcome Dug.”

    1. Jay*

      I have a common name with an unusual spelling – think Pattie instead of Patty. I understand why people get it wrong except when they a responding to an Email I sent. The correct spelling is in the TO: line of their Email and in my signature on the one they’re answering. Aaargh.

    2. Anonymoose*

      I had something very similar, where my email address was wrong, and I mentioned it to IT who ignored it for several days, and then when I saw them in the hallway I said “Good morning Steph!” and he responded “It’s Steve” and I responded “And my name is spelled with an ‘e’, not an ‘a'” and a few minutes later my email was fixed. Ha!

    4. Plz spell my name right*

      Hahahaha I’m slowly reading through the comments and stories and I posted a similar one below. Same thing – someone continuously spelling my name wrong, I “snap” and purposely spell their name wrong, and they never spell my name wrong again. Petty in every sense of the word but so worth it.

        1. Sinister Serina*

          I had a colleague who continuously called me by the wrong version of my name. I tried to correct him politely, by recounting a conversation with my mom in which I said my name the way it is pronounced. Listen, Susan and Suzanne are two different names. And he called me the wrong one until he retired.

    5. Where's the Orchestra?*

      I dealt with a version of that in High School from the second band director. He was new to the area and wanted to get in good with the “right families” in the area. One of their kids was part of the Drum section, and didn’t like me because I was “unimpressed” that he had money. So he insisted on calling me by a nickname created from my last name – which, well, I guess I now know your maturity level, but you’re only 17 and have time to mature. However, he convinced the Band Director (a grown adult in his late 40’s) to call me by the same name – which, charming. After telling the director that wasn’t my name, please call me by my given name instead failed – and continued to fail for two and a half semesters, I just started ignoring anything from the director that started with my incorrect nickname (anything directed to the section/instrument group I belonged to was listened to, as was anything that accidentally started with my given name – so I wasn’t completely ignoring the jerk). It was a half a semester long passive-agressive grudge match, that ended with me in front of the Principal. He just looked at me, asked what was going on from my point of view – and then absolutely tore the band director a new one (and got an investigation started that turned up at least five other students he had done this too) and denied him the end of year a bonus band director thought was just a rubber stamp. He got fired just before the end of his second year for using school board resources to job search, in violation of the agreement he has signed with the district to stay at the school for four years. Karma. . .

    6. Ant*

      I go by a nickname that can be short for a male name or a female name depending on the ending (y vs ie), and it always cracks me up when I email someone something they don’t necessarily want to hear and they address me with the full male option in their response – like, the name in my signature is very clearly the female spelling, my full name is *very clearly* in my email address, so if you must passive-aggressively full name me in your terse response, can you at least use the right one?

  95. Jay*

    I’m an MD coming to the end of my clinical career, which has included a number of leadership positions both at work and in professional organizations. I took this job because I wanted a purely clinical position – let me see my patients and write my notes and I’ll be happy. I was not looking to climb any more ladders. It’s a national company with local offices.

    After I’d been here a year, the company started an initiative in my area of expertise and I was asked to step into a low-level coordinator/educator position for my local market and I agreed. The woman who was managing this at the national level quickly figured out that I was a good resource and often asked for my input. So we’re on a conference call reviewing a series of training videos. The group on the call was 95% women. About 15 minutes on, a man signed on and interrupted the leader to explain that he was late because this was scheduled at a very inconvenient time. Then we looked at the videos and the leader asked if I had any comments. I started to say something and Mr. Inconvenient interrupted and, in a sneering tone of voice, said “I don’t even know who is speaking or why she’s involved.” I introduced myself by name and went on to say that I’d spent the last 25 years as a faculty member with the academic organization that trained the people who made the videos, had consulted with them on some of the early versions of the product, and would be happy to pass on any feedback the group had. I thought I was quite restrained – I didn’t mention that I was the immediate past president of the academic group. Didn’t hear another word from him that afternoon.

  96. AnonThisTime*

    Years ago I had started a new job as an attorney at a company and as my first big project, my boss assigned me to redo the procedures and job aids for a critical process — let’s say llama grooming. About two or three weeks later I held a meeting to roll out the new materials — it was a big meeting with about thirty people, most of whom I had not met before. So this was both the roll out of the new materials, it was also most people’s introduction to me. I went through my spiel, showed everyone what I’d done, and then asked if there were any questions.

    Another attorney, Fergus, aggressively asked, “Where do you get off taking it upon yourself to rewrite the llama grooming procedures? What was wrong with the old ones?” I was in shock — I couldn’t even respond. While I was sitting there, mouth agape, a VIP in the meeting said, “These new procedures are great. The old ones were awful, they were unreadable. Thank you for redoing these.” Everyone else spoke up in agreement. It turned out that Fergus had written the old procedures and had to sit there listening to everyone talking about how terrible they were.

    Also, years later when I was at Prestigious Co and needed to hire someone, Fergus approached me for a job. Yeah, I don’t think so.

  97. Anonymoose*

    I worked for a guy who made jokes about women. I asked him to stop, but he wouldn’t because he came from an era where he could get away with it, and he was very close to retirement so felt untouchable. It ended with him retiring rather than having any consequences, but I did find out that he told his wife about it, asked her “You find my jokes funny, right?” and discovered that she never liked his jokes for the decades they were married. That was probably better punishment than any meeting he could have with HR and made me feel good!

  98. The answer is (probably) 42*

    I have a classic “reply-all revenge” story! This person wasn’t so much a bully as he was kind of stubbornly oblivious, I had a few similar stories about him.

    I was asked to produce a document, and since there were a few people who needed to weigh in, we had a whole reply-all chain discussing the contents and giving feedback. Clunky, but in this case reply-all used productively. We got everything approved, and I sent out the finished version. This guy replies thanks. A month later he sends a reply-all email to the first email in the chain and asks “When will this be finished?!?! It’s been a month!”

    So naturally I responded, also by reply-all, and attached his very own thank you email from a month earlier, which also contained the full chain showing all the work I did. I also helpfully attached the finished document, again.

    I actually submitted a different story about this guy to notalwaysright years ago (please ignore the terrible title, I didn’t write that part): https://notalwaysright.com/office-based-frustration-on-the-rise-as-coworkers-attachment-to-incompetence-leads-to-inability-to-open-attachments/128062/

    1. JB*

      I remember when they were in the overly long expository title phase. So many complaints about it in the comments.

  99. LBAI*

    I was in a rather large meeting with the CFO, Treasurer, and about 20 other finance folks. One of these folks was an analyst, Cersei, who had a rather nasty, well known habit of being difficult to work with, especially towards my team (argumentative, uncooperative, “I’m better than you” attitude in general). I rarely got the opportunity to be in front of the CFO and Treasurer, so I wanted to make a good impression. As she was presenting, the CFO asked her a question about her work and how the results of it would be reflected on the cash flow statement (my team did the cash flow statement). She said, “Maybe if LBAI is paying attention she can confirm that this transaction would go into the investing section”. Everyone in the room looked at me, I looked at her, and just said, “Wow, Cersei”. And just took a beat for her to start realizing that what she said was not kind. Everyone in the room smirked. She corrected herself, and asked the question differently, and I confirmed that yes, it goes in the investing section. Later, she tried to apologize in the elevator with several of the other meeting attendees present, saying she didn’t mean for it to come out like that. Coolly, calmly, and matter-of-factly, I responded with, “I’m not surprised that it came out like that. You often disrespect my team and their work.” Her jaw dropped while everyone else in the elevator tried not to laugh.

    It was one of those rare instances where I said/did the exact right thing at the exact right time, rather than thinking of it later!

  100. sometimeswhy*

    I worked at a small photomat in their digital department. One of the negative scanners went down on a regular basis. One day, I was (literally!) elbow deep in this thing, sitting on the floor trying to fix it from the inside and the owner came back and just started yelling about delays and how this was unacceptable and how we were all incompetent, and a bunch of other stuff that wasn’t even related to the negative scanner I was working on. He was bellowing at the top of his voice, turning red, spit flying and blocking the doorway to the glorified closet that I was in.

    I kept working while he hollered. He finished with, “AND WHAT DO YOU HAVE TO SAY FOR YOURSELF?!!” and I took a deep breath and turned to look at him, arm still fully in this piece of equipment and said, “I’m sorry, could you repeat that?”

    And he just… deflated. He sputtered a little and walked off without repeating himself.

    Luckily/unfortunately, it didn’t cost me my job and I didn’t fix him. (I did fix the scanner.) He still yelled at people and once made the mistake of doing it in front of a high-volume customer who pulled his business on the spot but that was somehow also our fault. But it was really satisfying to find the reset button on him in that one moment.

  101. Already Ate Lunch*

    I worked for a kitchen and bath “designer” – just him as the owner and client person, and me doing everything else. My boss was a world class jerk – yelling, condescending, never happy, and inconsistent expectations. After 3 months I was done, wrote out a 2 week notice and gave to him on a Friday afternoon. He told me to “GTFO” while trying to steal my notary stamp. I was young, and it was really scary. But –

    That drive was home was the first time in months I wasn’t a stressed out mess.

    Two weeks later I received a paycheck in the mail. I called the bookkeeper (outsourced) because I didn’t want Jerk Boss to come after me. She explained that when Jerk Boss said I did give notice, he had to pay me for the two weeks. She advised to cash it ASAP, as he wasn’t happy at all having to pay me. But even better – she told me my paperwork was the best she’s worked with, and helped me job search with some of her other clients.

  102. old biddy*

    This isn’t anything that I actually did, but it was funny as heck. When I was a first year grad student, I shared a 3-person lab with Mike and Group Hothead (GH). GH had a huge chip on his shoulder that our boss favored another student. he had a temper, although he was an ok coworker otherwise. He had, however, thrown a giant temper tantrum in front of me the day he found out that I would be working in his lab rather than being assigned to another room, so I held a grudge about that.
    Around this time, a squirrel got into the lab and we couldn’t get it to leave for several weeks since it was winter and it didn’t want to go back outside. One evening, GH left a bag of M+M’s on top of his lab notebook (eating in lab was not permitted) and when Mike and I came in the next morning, the squirrel had eaten all the M+M’s and pooped and peed all over GH’s lab notebook. Karma!

  103. Nora*

    I have a master’s degree in social work and I used to work for a nonprofit agency doing direct service work. MSWs are highly valued in some parts of the nonprofit world because we can supervise interns (free labor!). As soon as my agency figured out that I, the only MSW on staff, could have interns, I was overloaded with them. That was basically how I was treated the entire time I worked there. Disrespected, overworked, requests for reasonable changes ignored or mocked.

    To be clear, I loved having students, I liked my students, and I still keep in touch with most of them. They are all lovely people. Leadership, however, were not. The CEO broke into my desk one day looking for reasons to fire me (thankfully my direct supervisor figured it out and declined to listen). When that didn’t work, I was forced to move offices into a back corner next to the loudest person in the office, who was also a relentless bully. They had staff birthday parties every month EXCEPT for mine. It wasn’t an oversight. I probably had a really good claim for a hostile work environment but all I wanted to do was bail.

    So anyway I finally had my chance to go, and I took it. The moment I left, the agency lost their ability to host social work interns. When I left I basically took 5 other people with me. Also, the entity I work for now sometimes paid this other agency for services rendered. However, we’re only allowed to pay agencies with specific licenses. I casually let slip to my current director that the other place isn’t licensed at all. Now they don’t get paid either. That’s what they get for giving me PTSD and a sleep disorder. :-)

  104. K$*

    I was an operations manager at a startup that, for a variety of reasons, went through a hostile takeover two weeks before I was due to leave. (I loved the job and had put in well over a month’s notice.) The new “CEO” was just about as much a culture mismatch as you could imagine. He was also sexist and racist and when confronted about those behaviors, he’d always say that’s “not how he meant it.” Eye roll.

    I was in charge of setting people up in our payroll system. This new CEO lived in another state, one that has no income tax, but had just told us he’d be spending five days a week on site with us in NYC. This meant that, from a payroll perspective, he was an NYC resident, and I explained that he’d be getting two tax returns, one from New York and one from his home state (this was very normal as we had a lot of employees who commuted in from New Jersey). This also meant that he’d pay New York income tax.

    He replied, “but I don’t want two tax returns,” and tried to get me to change his state of residence to his home state. I repeatedly told him that I was uncomfortable with this (and also texted a lawyer friend who told me that this was such serious tax fraud, I could personally go to jail for it). After he wouldn’t stop hounding me about it, I told him that he should just speak to the COO.

    The COO, however, wasn’t from the US, and didn’t have any idea about how tax laws differ from state to state. I gave him the heads-up that what the new CEO was doing was super illegal, and that he shouldn’t allow him to do it. The COO then tells the new CEO that if he wanted us to list his residence incorrectly this way, he just had to call up his tax attorney and get him to sign off. Of course, when he did, the tax attorney was like ARE YOU KIDDING ME and finally the CEO realizes that it’s not going to happen and he’s going to have to pay income tax like the rest of us.

    The CEO reached out to me and tried to say that I was “just confused” and “misunderstood” him despite the fact that I’d explained it over and over. More eyerolls. Either way, he had to pay his taxes and I left the company shortly before he ran it into the ground.

  105. Kindness By Spite*

    I worked with someone who was one of the most hot-cold people I’ve ever met, with a list of random excuses for it that made no sense half the time. It was to the point that after a few months I had to walk on eggshells around them every day until I could figure out what their mood of the day would be. They were also weirdly bad at our job despite taking every opportunity to brag about their accomplishments, while also taking every opportunity to slack off which left me with almost double the workload half the time because I don’t have a spine. A winning combo of traits to be working with.

    Well I’m a personal fan of the whole “kill them with kindness” mentality. So while I worked to make myself the star performer in our department (which would’ve tried to do regardless) I made sure I was as friendly and warm to them as I could possibly be regardless of how they treated me, right down to personally delivering them any treats my wife had made the night before so that they wouldn’t miss out. It gave me great satisfaction to be outshining them in every way and then also never once giving them a reason to ever dislike me, so any ill will they could feel toward me would be because they were ultimately being reminded of their own shortcomings and terrible attitude.

    Don’t get me wrong, I genuinely tried to become friends with them. But does it ever feel good to get that personal satisfaction with the only “consequence” being that I got promoted partly for being such a team player! ;)

  106. Janet Snakehole*

    I’ve got several:

    At an old job, a peer of mine (who happened to be a major jerk) and I had very similar names – let’s say his name was Dan and mine was Dana. He always mispronounced my name with a short A even though I told him over and over that my name was pronounced with the long A and sounded like “Day-na” instead of “Dan-na.”
    After months and months of me and everyone else at work correcting him, and him ignoring us, I began mispronouncing his name on purpose, calling him “Dane” instead of Dan. I haven’t worked there in a few years, but from what I hear from a friend who still works there, Dan is still known as Dane around the company

    1. Janet Snakehole*

      Oops, forgot to delete my “I’ve got several” comment after I decided to share just one.

  107. HBJ*

    Ooh, I have one from school. My first semester in college I was in Core-101-Class-Everyone-Had-To-Take. There was one guy who found out pretty quickly that I had been high school educated in a manner he found to be subpar. He regularly made cracks about me not having “really graduated” and how he didn’t know how I got in to school.

    I ended up being in the same group as him for a group project, so he had my number. I ignored him and the teasing from classmates that we liked each other (seriously, were we actually still in high school? Or rather middle where “if a boy teases you, it means he likes you”?) Now this was a class I wasn’t great at, but I worked hard, took every extra credit available, and wound up with an A. In this class, if you had an A at the end, you could keep that grade and skip the final.

    Fast forward to a few minutes before the final. I get a call from my jerk classmate. “Where is the final being held.” I knew because I, you know, read the syllabus. And I had it handy I could have looked. But instead I just said sweetly, “oh, I don’t know. I’m not there since I got an A. You’ll have to check the syllabus.”

    He just said thanks and bye, and I never saw him again.

    1. Lizzo*

      I was part of a four person group project in grad school where we decided to divvy up the project based on our strengths. I took on most of the paper editing, two teammates did the majority of the heavy lifting on the research, and one Dudebro said he’d handle the presentation.
      It’s been a while, so I don’t recall all the details, but Dudebro–who was sporting a pretty spectacular sunburn from a tanning bed–did not prepare and totally bombed the presentation. The rest of us were so pissed and dumbfounded. YOU HAD ONE JOB, DUDE.
      The professor was strict but fair. I went and spoke with him afterwards and he said, “Don’t worry, I’ll take care of it.”
      We got an A on the project–the only team in the class to earn an A!–but the sweet victory was when I went to check our grades (2 exams, 1 group project, participation, and final grade for the semester), which the professor had posted on his door. Grades were listed by student ID, not name, but it was easy to spot my three other team members on the list since they were they other As on the list.
      The only reason Dudebro passed the class was because of the project grade…and it was by the narrowest of margins.

  108. Ozzie*

    Ok I absolutely don’t feel good about this, and I have not and would not do it again. I’m wiser and way more professional now. But…

    I, a slight, 23 year old woman, worked for a startup as a survival job – just a pack line worker with a fairly small team. I got along great with my supervisors and the manager, absolutely no issues with the immediate team. I was promoted to team lead a few months in and oversaw the packing process, and with it came a $2/hour raise to $12 an hour. At the time, this felt like an absolute boon. The manager apologized that he couldn’t get me more, but that they had tried to only give me a quarter an hour, so this was the best he could do. No complaints from me.

    Fast forward a year, the company has been scaling up, wages haven’t changed, morale was sinking. Manager had been fired, as far as we could tell because upper management didn’t like him, or that he would push back against them look out for his employees, etc. I find out through back channels (I don’t specifically remember how, but solid chance I was not supposed to know) that the team leads – all men – who were promoted with or after me were making $15 an hour.

    I’m not saying they didn’t deserve to be making $15 an hour. But I was still making $12 an hour, and I hated the job, I hated upper management, I hated the company. The treated us terribly – no insurance, we had to fight to take our 10min paid breaks, the warehouse didn’t have AC, the schedule was horrible – the office staff were treated like real employees, while the warehouse staff just felt taken advantage of at every turn. By this point, they had hired a new manager in place of our previous and she… wasn’t great. She wasn’t a terrible manager, per say, but she just didn’t know what she was doing. But there was also a director of Ops who came around occasionally, who seemed to have less idea of what he was doing than she did. The floor team and one supervisor were really the ones holding down the fort.

    Well, I mentioned to the Director of Ops – I don’t remember exactly how – that it had come to my attention that the male team leads were making significantly more money than I was – the only female lead. By the end of the week, I had been pulled into the conference room with him, the guy in charge of “special projects” (we weren’t sure what exactly he did, besides micromanage us and schmooze with upper management), and I think one other upper manager. They informed me that it was not their intention to pay me differently, and that, effective immediately, I would make $15 an hour – the same as my male colleagues. I signed the like, acceptance of pay paperwork and went back to work.

    I felt pretty good about myself at the time – especially because working there was so absolutely miserable. In retrospect, there were about 600 better ways to handle that situation (not to mention a number of others). But the company folded about 4 months later and they did everything they could to take care of the office staff they laid off, while nearly giving the warehouse staff half the severance (and no paid for insurance coverage – only COBRA). So while I feel a little bad, and wouldn’t do it again……. they were still a terrible company to work for.

    1. Sparkles McFadden*

      I don’t think you should feel bad about this. It sounds as if you handled it professionally. You pointed out something that was wrong and management addressed it. Trust me, your $3/hour did not take anything away from anyone and did not contribute to the company going out of business at all.

      1. Ozzie*

        Oh, I mostly felt bad for implying sexism when really it was just an oversight. That was absolutely how they reacted to it – in a CYA manner. I at least could have made the case that I actually deserved the $3 (I was doing just as much work as the other leads – or in the case of one, absolutely more, since he was a 1 person team, where I was managing 10 others, and often doing his job too. Quantifiably.) They definitely ran themselves into the ground though, no concerns about my $3/hour doing that.

    2. Recruited Recruiter*

      I’m going to be honest with you. I am in HR, and I would be mortified if it came to my attention that a situation like this had occurred, even if it had been without my knowledge or approval. There are many places that this is illegal and is unethical everywhere – since they were promoted to substantially similar roles with similar qualifications.
      I think you handled this in the best way that you could.

      1. Ozzie*

        Aw this at least makes me feel better. When I’ve recounted this story in the past, it’s been met with shock, and a “why would you do that” attitude….!

        1. David*

          Right now I am having a “why would you do that” attitude toward the people who are reacting that way to your story! I mean, if people of different genders are being paid different amounts for the same work – intentionally or not – it shouldn’t be even remotely surprising that any of the people involved would want to fix that.

        2. Beth*

          I’m having a “Why would you NOT do that? EVERYONE should do that” reaction.

          Please consider yourselves absolved for now and always. If anything, this was a triumph and you can regard it as such!

    3. Loredena Frisealach*

      Honestly, I don’t think you did anything wrong! It very much sounds like gender discrimination, and they clearly thought so too.

      1. Ozzie*

        It really felt circumstantial at the time, but obviously I have no idea! Considering how terrible a company they were though, at least they reacted appropriately when it -was- brought to their attention.

    4. TechWorker*

      Idk if I’m missing something, but there’s absolutely nothing in this story that strikes me as you doing something wrong…? You noticed a pay discrepancy, pointed it out & it got fixed :p

    5. Lilly Ledbetter fan*

      I…. don’t understand why it was terrible to tell them you wanted equal wages for equal pay, and that the gender discrepancies were wrong and probably illegal?

      Did you curse at them or something? What was the bad part?

      1. Ozzie*

        also in response to TechWorker:

        I don’t think I was purposefully underpaid because I wasn’t a dude, I think it was just circumstantial, because of how my raise was negotiated before theirs, under different circumstances. (and maybe I’m wrong about that!)

        I definitely brought it up in a way that stripped that nuance from it and -made- it about gender, which was why they reacted that way. It just wasn’t the most professional way to go about it I don’t think – probably could have approached it based on merit.

        BUT the fact that this seems to be the response tells me that I wasn’t as wrong as I was made to feel about it! A little bit of a weight off my shoulders.

        1. Mannequin*

          The vast majority of places that pay women (or POC etc) less than their white male counterparts aren’t twirling their mustaches thinking Nyaahaha! Pay them less! These kinds of prejudices are often quite unconscious- this is why orchestras have people try out behind a screen, so they cannot see their gender.
          Any good employer/HR department would want to make sure their was not even the APPEARANCE of prejudice, even if it was accidental.

          The fact that the men negotiated their raises AFTER your & still got more actually DOES raise a huge red flag for genuine sexism however, because TPTB should have been using YOUR pay as a guide when giving those guys their raises as well. Remember, you yourself said your manager had to fight to get you $2 extra dollars ON MERIT, because they wanted to give you a single stinkin’ QUARTER- twenty five measly cents! But these guys just ALL rated an extra FIVE BUCKS, no problem?
          That sounds like a pretty clear cut case of sexism to me, and not something that you would have been able to make a case for yourself on merit alone. They thought you merited *twenty five cents*.

    6. learnedthehardway*

      I don’t think you did anything wrong. I think you got the result that was fair and that you needed. And you did it professionally.

  109. DMLOKC*

    Ah, yes, Glendzilla. She and I were in the clerical pool with desks next to each other in the floor’s fishbowl. She liked country music playing while she worked. I found it distracting and didn’t like that callers could hear the music while I was trying to transact business with them. She was a Mimi Bobeck fashion type; I was a banker fashion type. We worked in a scientific research organization where the 1990s dress was pretty business casual. I was the outlier. Very buttoned up, professional, working on my degree, wanting out of the clerical pool.

    I’d finally had enough of the loud music, loud conversations, crazy laughing, and employees using my desk as their coffee counter when they were visiting with her. I politely but sternly asked her to turn down the music and I asked everyone to please use surfaces other than my desk to rest their coffee cups and snacks. She BLEW UP. We wound up being called into the VPs office to discuss the behavior. I was mortified. He asked what was going on and she flared and flamed and went on and on about how I was being a snob and not having fun and intruding on her rights. I sat quietly and let her go. When asked for my side, I said that I was trying to do my work and appreciated a quiet, respectful workplace. The VP and our supervisor excused us and said they’d get back with us with a resolution.

    The only feedback I got was my supervisor telling me that I’d impressed the VP with my control and professionalism and I had nothing to worry about.

    I’ve moved on knowing that I can hold my own against the office bully.

    1. Mannequin*

      This woman sounds awful, but could we not with the “Mimi Bobeck” insults? Appearance has nothing to do with it. Unless of course, you think that “overweight” or “colorful & unconventional dresser” are character flaws?
      It doesn’t sound like your management had an issue with her wardrobe, and you yourself admit that *you* were the outlier at your workplace by dressing extra conservatively (maybe people viewed you as “stuffy” or “buttoned up” or “sticking out like a turd in a punchbowl”?) so why pick on someone ELSE because they did not dress like everyone else?

      1. SG*

        Nothing derogatory was said. It was an illustrated comparison. The only person reading judgement into it is you.

  110. Plz spell my name right*

    I have a common first name that has multiple spellings (kind of like Alison!). My particular spelling is fairly rare – you’ll definitely see other variations way more frequently.

    When I first started my current job, I was on an email chain with lawyers, accountants, and partners at our firm. I was tasked with answering some basic questions, so even though a bunch of people were on the chain, it was really between me and one other person. Like me, she had a fairly common name that had a bunch of spellings.

    Because my name is so frequently spelled wrong, I try to be really mindful of how others spell their names, so I made sure to spell her name correctly in each of my emails. But, in every response, would spell my name incorrectly. It was right there! It’s in my email! It’s in my signature!

    So finally, I was annoyed enough that in my next response, I purposely spelled her name wrong.

    She has never spelled my name wrong since.

    We’ve now worked together for almost a decade and have a great working relationship. But there’s still a small part of me that’s proud of my little petty moment.

    1. Ozzie*

      Omg yes!!! I also have a common name that is always misspelled – even in email! I have challenging customer with a similar situation with her name – I make sure to spell it correctly, she always misspells mine. For years. I once, totally by accident, spelled her name wrong in an email (I had just typed an email to someone with the same name, more common spelling!). Her response had her spelling my name correctly for the first time EVER.

  111. Unkempt Flatware*

    Not Petty but my first ever boss-bitch move. I managed the transportation department at a ski resort which included the staff bus up to the resort and the parking lot shuttles to get them and tourists where they needed to be within the resort. On Thanksgiving, the first day of ski season, a brand new employee somehow found my personal cell extension which is information only available to managers and for emergencies only. But this guy called my cell at 7:00am to complain that the bus should stop for him at his work area front door and that he shouldn’t need to have to use the parking lot shuttles. He followed it up with an email to me (why the call then?) saying the same thing. I wrote back copying his entire management team and said,

    “Dear Name, I respectfully require that going forward, all inquires of this nature get routed up to your highest level manager. In your case that is Mr. X. Please know that calling my personal cell phone before 7:30am on a holiday, especially for something like this, is not appropriate.”

    It may seem rather dull but I was never prouder of holding my professional boundaries.

  112. Ann O'Nemity*

    My boss used to steal food, then I read about some sugar-free gummy bears that were known have laxative effects….

      1. The cat’s ass*

        Oldjob was graced with the boss from hell, let’s call her snakelady. Evil, narcissistic and adept at managing up. Terrible to everyone else, and called us “the minions.” Appearances were VERY important to snakelady and she was very proud of our beautiful office in a swanky new building with windows that don’t open. She finally ran afoul of a fellow minion who was a very scary paralegal who was on the verge of retirement and heading back to her home country. Paralegal left very professionally, except for leaving a huge slab of raw salmon in the pencil drawer of her steel case desk, and then locked said drawer and crazy glued it shut. She then locked her office door, broke the key in the lock and crazy-glued that lock as well. By the time the hazmat people were called ( and it took about ten days before the office was habitable again), paralegal was safely out of the country. I’m still filled with admiration ( and frankly a little fear that she’ll resurface at some point tho she’s pushing 80). Snakelady was humiliated and grand bosses really started looking at her more closely as well. Staff also started making fish faces at her and started talking to upper management about her crappy behavior. I left for a much better job soon after that, but snakelady was out of a job a few months later as well.

  113. Super Anon for This One*

    After job searching for about eight months (confidence lowering and desperation kicking in) I interviewed at an organization where I really liked everyone on the interview committee except for Fergus, who would be my manager. Even when he called and gave me the job offer he made a weird comment about how until something was in writing I shouldn’t consider it final. So it was like, “congrats you have the job… maybe”. Such a red flag but I really needed a job and really liked the org.
    Well, our working relationship became what felt like (at least to me) a long, draining mind game. He was very belittling to me, usually when no one else was around, and he would repeatedly reprimand me for small mistakes, and basically hold me hostage in conversations until I said I was wrong. I thought he was untouchable at the org and was afraid to say anything because I assumed I would either not be believed, or Fergus would find out and treat me worse or I’d be fired.
    One time he got very angry at me over something that seemed pretty small, and came into my office, closed the door and spent 45 minutes telling me that he regretted hiring me, that if he could do it again he wouldn’t but that was “on him” and that I needed to seriously think about if I wanted to be in the role. This went on for 45 minutes and somehow I was able to hold it together until I got to my car.
    I’m not sure what is was but about 18 months in (I can’t believe I put up with that for so long) I finally snapped. I was at work late doing a favor for him, he made a mistake in a presentation that needed to be reprinted after hours, and I asked if I could expense something for a client. This was a very common thing done at my org by him and other colleagues. He then proceeded to berate me on the phone and would not let me hangup until I apologized for asking and said I was wrong for asking. I think the fact that I was at work late helping him and it still wasn’t enough to get a basic level of respect made me realize that our situation was never going to improve and I went straight to HIS boss after the phone call.
    It turned out his boss had no idea, and felt really badly that I had not said anything for so long. There were also other younger, lower ranked women that he was apparently treating in a similar way but I just was the only one that had to deal with it on a daily basis. I was so supported when I came forward and got to start reporting to Fergus’s boss who was really lovely. Fergus was let go, for a myriad of reasons shortly after and I went on to have a great career at the organization. Even though it was a bad experience, I learned a lot, gained confidence and I know what I will and will not put up with in the future.

    1. Wisteria*

      “he made a weird comment about how until something was in writing I shouldn’t consider it final.”

      Isn’t that pretty standard? I don’t know the industry, so maybe there are different norms, but that has been the understanding for every job I have ever had.

      1. Wisteria*

        I should have specified–every white collar job I’ve ever had. The service jobs I’ve held didn’t do offer letters. Again, I don’t know what industry you are referencing.

        1. Super Anon for This One*

          Yes definitely. It was just I felt like he was specifically doing it to make me feel unsure and uneasy. I had been told the interview was a three part process, and then after the third part I was told that there would be a fourth part. And then after the fourth part, there was a “potential fifth part” that didn’t happen, and then he called me to give me the verbal offer. And I was so excited, and said something about being happy and relieved and he followed it up with “just a piece of advice, don’t consider something finalized until you have it in writing” and then it was the weekend so I felt very unsure for the next few days. It just felt very cryptic.

      2. Soup of the Day*

        I think it’s just a strange thing to outright say to someone you’re trying to hire. Almost like he didn’t want it to be final, or something!

        1. Super Anon for This One*

          That’s what it felt like. No excitement about the hire announcement, which was not normal for that organization (I learned that later on).

      3. MM*

        This is understood, yes, but I can’t think of a time that someone has said it out loud in the act of offering me the job. You might say something like “of course we need to finalize [thing about benefits]/work out the details on [salary], and we’ll have the paperwork on that over to you by [date]” or whatever, but the overall purpose and mood of those conversations is “we want this to happen and it will.” So it’s weird to comment directly to the effect of “don’t consider this final,” which feels like a way of saying “don’t get comfortable” from before you even start.

        (This may also be cultural? Despite our self-image as brash and whatever, Americans–especially white collar professional Americans–are actually more indirect than a lot of other people, at least with anything negative; and we’re famous for positive hyperbole. Obviously these are generalizations, but anecdotally at least, in my experience, they broadly hold up.)

  114. Casey*

    Okay this is a long one but it will be very cathartic. I work in engineering, and I had a program manager Todd who had risen through the ranks on his “business savvy”, which turned out to mean “bullying every young engineer on his team and relentlessly cutting corners on quality.”

    He came by my desk on Tuesday and asked me to run a test by Friday. Not only would this have been a crazy workload, but it was logistically impossible – the required parts to run the test wouldn’t show up for a week. (Think like, running a test of how quickly a car can stop… without installing the brake pads.)

    Todd sends me an email that says, “I think of you as someone who is committed to the success of our project, and I would hate to change that impression. Unfortunately, that is not a delay we can absorb. I have you penciled into this meeting with [Big Boss] on Monday to report the results of the completed test.”

    So I’m like, okay, you know what? fuck you Todd. I confirm via email that he wants me to run the test without brake pads and he says yes. I bust ass to run the test without brake pads on Friday and of course it fails miserably. I send a picture of the literal debris to him on the same email chain and go immediately to happy hour.

    Monday morning I come in to an angry “we need to get to the bottom of this failure” email from Todd. I ignore it. Straight to the meeting with the big boss. I’m like “hey guys, I’m so sorry but I haven’t had time to pull together a slide deck since the test was just run on Friday afternoon. I do have some pictures and schedule updates to share, so Todd do you mind actually pulling up that email chain?”

    I explain what happened in the most neutral way possible. Big boss is immediately like… “wait wtf why didn’t we wait for the brake pads and do this right?” I respond that decision was direction from the program rather than a technical decision, so Todd would be better positioned to speak to it. Sweet revenge. He never asked me to cut corners again, and ended up leaving “for another opportunity” like six weeks later.

  115. TheseusShip*

    I was at a job that required a Masters degree and paid $14 an hour. I worked there for 2 years and about halfway through the second year, I started job hunting. Found a nice management job that paid a lot more, turned in a 6 week notice, made all this documentation for my replacement, helped hire my replacement, the whole nine yards.

    My boss was still upset that I was leaving (most full-time people started working there in their 40s and stayed until retirement. I was hired at 22, fresh out of grad school, desperate for money and work.) My boss in general was difficult to deal with – she thought any sort of charity in the community meant that the organization thought the town we lived in was “poor,” she let one of my colleagues “borrow” my work credit card for tuition reimbursement (which ended up maxing out the card and due to the finance department’s schedule, I couldn’t use the card for its required purpose for 6 weeks and had to use my personal card and do the whole reimbursement rigmarole), she was super invasive when anyone called in sick, always went for the cheapest solutions to problems no matter the quality…all-in-all just a garbage manager. Which, honestly, is expected, when the managers probably only made $35k a year.

    It was a small office and I’m not shy about sharing salary/finance information because I think it’s important that everyone is open about what they make and what they’re worth and yadda yadda. So I’d told one of my coworkers my offered salary at the new job – 55k – and within two days, my manager showed up to my desk and was like “I’m very concerned for you.”
    “Why?” I asked.
    “Well, I overheard [colleague] talking about your new job and the salary and I think she’s spreading misinformation and gossip about you.”
    “Oh, how so?”
    “She said that you were going to be making over $50k as a manager, which I think is definitely an exaggeration. I’d be more careful about talking to [colleague] in the future, you don’t want her to give you a bad reputation after you leave.”
    It was so satisfying to look my boss in the eye and say, “Oh, no, I was offered $55k for the management job that I’m going to. It was one of the deciding factors for me, being paid fairly for my education and experience.”
    She didn’t speak to me at all after that conversation and my last weeks were gloriously quiet.

  116. I blocked a job*

    My boss just stopped doing her work, but hid it for many many months. She became famous for asking her team to produce work by a deadline and then cancelling the meeting to never reschedule, drop the project altogether, or not show up with her portion completed. We had to cover for her to the stakeholders. Morale became terrible. She had some excellent people on her team though, so she was propped up and looked like she was producing to her superiors for a while, because she had delegated everything to us.

    Eventually most of her team quit out of frustration, myself included. What I heard from friend-colleagues is that she had to start showing up and it was clear to everyone that she was out of the loop and had not been supporting her team for a long time. She continued barely working though, and even delegated hiring new staff to her current staff. A few months after I left, she was let go.

    I guess she spent a while job searching because a year later I got a call from a vendor I knew in my new role, saying she remembered I’d worked at that company prior, and there was someone they were considering for a C-Suite level position who I may know. Hahahaaaaaa! I told her honestly about my experience with my former boss, and she did not get offered that job.

    People always refer to burning bridges as something your superiors could hold against you, but a lot of managers don’t realize their poorly-treated underlings have connections too.

    1. Rusty Shackelford*

      I had something similar happen – a woman I had barely worked with was on the committee interviewing my previous awful boss for a nice promotion. It was wonderful to be able to honestly say “no, she does not have these qualities you’re looking for, and let me give you very specific, objective examples of her behavior as proof.” She didn’t get it. Unfortunately, she’ll never know I had an impact.

    2. Employee of the Bearimy*

      I did that to a former co-worker who was wonderful to higher-ups but belittled and bullied anyone who worked for her. I reported her once for yelling at an intern, and my boss went to her and asked her about it. She of course denied it and he believed her. She ended up leaving for another job but a few years later started reaching out to coworkers about open positions we had. I had moved up on the team by that point and I told my boss (a different boss from the one who believed her over me) that we had worked hard to build a strong team culture and she’d wreck it. My boss just quietly ignored her overtures and I was vindicated.

    3. anon for this because this commentariat is tough*

      something similar happened to me in the whole “you never know who has connections” realm.

      my ex husband’s affair partner applied for a job where a hiring manager knew me as a vendor. At the time i still had my ex’s uncommon last name, and he was a known high level employee of the company the she was at, in the same department, and the hiring manager asked if i knew anything about her. I said that while I couldn’t speak to her professional expertise, i could speak to her judgement as to boundaries with coworkers, and he was welcome to talk to my ex as to her “professional” abilities. She didn’t get the job. One detail of note is that this job was finance/regulatory adjacent and inappropriate coworker relationships are almost as big a liability nono as bad credit, so my petty was actually also doing the company a favor.

      I had to go anon because the commentariat are tough here and I had mentioned this in other fora and some people were mad at me for “hurting her professionally” for what was ultimately my ex-husband’s choice to step out, but like…she was a whole adult, they were “together” for years while he was married to me, AND, as i said above, you never know who has connections.

      She never know it was me who cost her that job, i was just the poor fat stupid little wife who was lower than dirt so that it was me would never cross her mind. Which i just love. It doesn’t fix the hurt she caused me but it helps.

  117. suyuvazu*

    Years ago I was working for a staffing firm (XYZ) that was just bad. Crappy pay, crappy benefits, unweildy processes, mandatory meetings held evenings or weekends, just bad. I’d started working with a diferent staffing firm (ABC) to find a new job. Thanks to just sheer bad luck, XYZ found out about a couple of the client interviews ABC had set up. ABC & I knew this was bad, but ABC assured me that even if I was fired, they’d have me back to work in days. So on a Tuesday, I think, I get the angry phone call I’d been expecting. No, I didn’t handle this professionally at all, but at the time, I kinda felt like a bad ass:

    XYZ: We need you to come in for a meeting.
    me: Oh? What’s the meeting about?
    XYZ: We’ll discuss it at the meeting.
    me: I’m really not comfortable coming in for a meeting when I don’t know what it’s about.
    XYZ: We’ll discuss it at the meeting.
    me: Am I going to be fired?
    XYZ: We’ll discuss it at the meeting.
    me: Tell you what, why don’t we just make Friday my last day?
    XYZ: What?!? No! You’re not even going to come in to talk to us?
    me: Well, it seems like I’m about to be fired, so let’s agree on my last day now.
    XYZ: Well, you still need to come in to sign some paperwork.
    me: (I had another client interview that Friday morning) I have an early morning appointment, so it’ll need to be before that.

    So the angry staffing manager made two other folks come into the office at 7:00AM on a Friday to witness me signing something, don’t even remember what it was. I think she was hoping to force a discussion about why exactly I was quitting & wanted the oth
    er folks there for some reason. It felt so satisfying (at the time) to say I don’t really see any benefit, to me, in laying out my reasons for leaving.

    I went from that meeting to the client interview which ended with the client manager wanting me to start on Monday.

    bridge burnt

  118. Sanibel Island*

    I used to be the assistant manager for a teapot painting store/studio (actual industry withheld); it was both a retail (teapot painting accessories) store, and offered lessons on painting teapots.

    There was a manager, me, and two administrative people, plus 20 or so instructors. Eventually, the manager and the admins quit, leaving only me to hold down the fort.

    I was never formally promoted to manager, nor did I receive a raise for all the added responsibilities.

    To make a long story short, both the very privileged clientele and the owner were verbally and emotionally abusive to me. Being young and just out of college, I just assumed this is what I have to deal with (pro tip, NO ONE should have to deal with this).

    I remember this one customer called, BERATING me because the company we contracted to fix her daughter’s broken teapot was because it was her daughter did something to make it break, and the customer thought that was UNACCEPTABLE, because her daughter was an angel, and no way she could have possibly broken the teapot, how dare this company accuse her. This customer had me on the phone for 15 – 20 minutes, and customers were just looking at me, sorry looks on there faces (I did not have the customer on speakerphone, but she was loud).

    I ran to the back and had a complete breakdown.

    On top of all this, I had not received a paycheck in TWO MONTHS. And every time I brought this up, the owner would say, “Well, I have bills to pay too. You’re just going to have to wait.”

    One day, she changed the schedule, and without discussing times with me, she had me working every single day. She basically shortened my hours from 8 hours/5 days a week, to 5 hours/7 days a week. On top of that, the owner would also go to another state for the summer; and she was hard to reach at times. So she was already there, enjoying life while I was on my last logically functioning nerve.

    The schedule change, lack of communication, and lack of a paycheck, I sent an email to her that simply said, “I wish to discuss this, we need to agree on schedule changes, and on top of a schedule change, I cannot afford to keep working for you when you have not paid me for time I have already worked.” And I didn’t go into work the next day (which was my day off anyway before the schedule change).

    The following day, I had a weird instinct to check the schedule online. My access to the scheduling system was revoked. Could not do scheduling, could not see my schedule. I emailed my boss again asking for a formal letter of termination if that’s how I was interpreting it. No answer. I actually emailed her 3 times asking for the information, asking to discuss things. No answer.

    So I filed for unemployment.

    Turns out, she did not like that I filed for unemployment, and countered it. I got a letter from the unemployment office that there would be a summons on the phone so we both could state our cases. There was a date and a time on the letter. I was going to answer that call.

    The phone rang, and the unemployment office asked me questions, like if I actually quit, why didn’t I leave sooner, etc. Technically no, I didn’t quit, and then proceeded to explain and mention I HAD THE RECEIPTS of how poorly I was treated, and that because she couldn’t afford to pay me, it should be considered a layoff.

    Well, things worked in my favor when she didn’t bother to answer the phone when unemployment called her. I was able to collect until I was able to get a job, AND I got a check for all the back pay I was owed.

    Last I heard, the studio closed, the owner got divorced and ran off to the state she spent her summers in. Also, the liquidated inventory, well…was not supposed to be liquidated, it was supposed to be sent back to the company we got it from. Not sure what happened from there, I just hope they hunted the now former owner down and sued for what they could.

    And I hope she never runs a business again.

  119. Defo Anon for this one…*

    I work in performing arts, and was hired to play in the pit orchestra for a local opera company. The assistant director/keyboardist who hired me quickly proved to be an absolute s**tgoblin. First rehearsal, he gave me the wrong time, and I only just made it in the door on time because I was there early to warm up. Assistant director tells me he knows he gave me the wrong time, but he doesn’t want to look bad to the MD so I need to act like it was my mistake, and if I don’t, he’ll still tell the director I was lying and fire me on the spot. Well, things did not get better, but I was still there and still having work, so I dealt. But then, day of dress rehearsals, assistant director calls me and says someone from his church can play my instrument, and he always thinks it’s best for the company to demonstrate their commitment to the LDS church (N.B. this was demonstrably not a religious organization), so he was letting me go. He tried to get out of paying me for even any of the rehearsals by saying since they weren’t using my work I they had no obligation to pay. Uh, that’s not how it works, considering people get paid just to substitute in rehearsals.

    Well, he finally agrees to pay me, but then tries to demand I drive parts to him (two hours away) and get my check then. I refuse point blank. Of course, these are rental parts, meaning I have the only copy for the whole company and it’s bright line illegal to photocopy them (and the rental companies take that seriously). Since the dress rehearsal is that night, I hold all the cards, and he has no choice but to drive his lazy butt four hours round trip to get them. In the meantime, I remember one of the cardinal rules of returning rental parts: erase all pencil marks. As anyone who works in theater knows, every show has numerous cuts, repeats, and other changes that the orchestra pencils in. While some are given to us before the first rehearsal, most are ad hoc and you just pencil them in as you go. Well, I followed the instructions to the letter, and dutifully erased every single marking in my parts. Honestly, I did by far the best job erasing I’ve ever done. And, lo and behold, two hours later I got a screaming voicemail from the AD because his new player, naturally, had none of the shows marking and they had to waste 25 minutes of the dress rehearsal figuring out all the cuts (as I said, most of these were ad hoc, so there was no definitive list sitting around). It felt good.

    At this point, I could have stopped, but then I realized that the AD had given me a wonderful gift by calling me. See, previously we had communicated entirely by email or FaceBook voice calling. But now I had his phone number. So I looked up his carrier. Once you know the carrier, it’s a little known trick that there is an email address that you can combine with their number use to send text messages to particular numbers on that carrier. So… … …I signed his phone number up for Publisher’s Clearing House and a whole bunch of other services that spam the crap out of your emails. No, I’m not sorry.

      1. Defo anon for this one…*

        I don’t remember all of the specifics, but if you google stuff like carrier lookup and email to SMS there are good instructions on it.

  120. Annie*

    My ex-boss was a YELLER. He got off on yelling and making everyone subordinate to him (basically, all of us, as he’s president of the company, sadly) feel terrible for making any mistakes, major or minor.

    After I put together a successful, major trade show, I learned something had gone awry with a previous show’s shipment. I excused myself to visit the shipping folks at the current show to ensure the same thing didn’t happen again. When Boss found out, he was inexplicably enranged, and proceeded to yell at me for about 10 minutes straight, finishing with “I know this isn’t YOUR fault.” It was my last straw.

    100% inspired by this incident, I reached out to a startup-ish company in the same industry to let them know I was looking. They were interested, and I got hired. When I gave my notice, he said, “It’s because of me, isn’t it?” I ALMOST felt bad enough in that moment to lie, but instead I said, “Yeah, mostly.”

  121. Madeleine Matilda*

    In the early 2000s I had a job where one of my side duties was to purchase the office supplies using a company credit card. We were not allowed to purchase anything in the last month of our fiscal year (FY) using the credit cards. Everyone in our office was well aware that we could not purchase in the final month of the FY as we had sent out several emails the prior month reminding people to get their supply request in before we could no longer make purchases. One day in the last month of the FY my coworker Enid came to me to ask me to order a particular item she needed for a workshop she was doing in a couple of days. I told her that I couldn’t order it because it was September and we couldn’t order at the moment. I also told her the two places where we had the items stored and that she would find plenty of the item for her workshop. The next day I left on a work trip. That night my boss called me because Enid had gone to our grand boss and told her that I said I would not order the item for her. My grand boss asked my boss to handle this. My boss tells me this on the phone. I say to her I didn’t tell her I wouldn’t order it, I said I could not order it because we’re not allowed to order anything right now. Boss said we would meet and discuss when I return from my trip.

    I return and meet with my boss and Enid. Enid states her case first saying that I told her I wouldn’t order something for her as if I was just refusing to order anything she might need. I explained again that I had told her I couldn’t order it because we were not allowed to place orders at that time and that I had told her where she could look to find some. Enid said that she hadn’t understood that we were in the period where we couldn’t purchase anything even though we have had at least three emails leading up to the last month of our fiscal year reminding us that all purchasing would stop. Enid then said she had looked for the supply and hadn’t seen enough. Boss asks her Why didn’t you come to me? I could’ve called another one of our offices and had them overnight them to us. Enid stared blankly. Boss affirms I did everything correctly because we were forbidden to purchase at the time. I could have been fired for doing so. The meeting ends. I am still super annoyed that Enid complained about something because of her own ignorance and made me look bad to grandboss. One of my colleagues asked me how the meeting had gone and I tell him. He gives me a look and says we have plenty of that supply. I also told her where to look for it. I go to where it is and lo and behold we have at least twice as much as Enid needed. I grab all of that supply take it back up to where Enid and the boss are. Turns out she had never really bothered to look in the supply room and had only looked on another floor where we kept a small stash for convenience sake. This was only one of many things in the dead that made her a jerk. She complained once that our time keeper had messed up her PTO and shorted her 16 hours. After an in-depth review of our time keeping system it was revealed that the time keeper had not messed up her PTO, but rather Enid had gotten confused herself about the PTO she had used. She wasn’t a jerk in the sense that she was ever rude to people, but she was so incompetent that when she made mistakes she would blame other people and get them in trouble. Although most of the time when it was looked into it always came out that the person she complained about had not done anything wrong. I left a few years later for another job with the same company. Enid stayed there for years and from what I hear continued on in her bumbling ways causing trouble for other colleagues.

  122. a*

    My previous boss was an absolute jerk. I hated him. He hated me. He did everything he could to “get me” at every opportunity. I did the same, but it was mostly defensive. I did, however, get one spectacular opportunity to block him that makes me laugh every time I think about it. To set the scene: My husband and I worked together, and this boss hated both of us. There are about 30 people in my workplace. Everyone knows where everyone lives, because the nature of our work makes us want to know that information. My husband and I had just sold our old house and were living in a rental duplex while we built our new house. The rental was 2-3 blocks east of the boss’s house. We got a PO Box for our mail, so we didn’t have to worry about forwarding and losing stuff, including our work correspondence (which is rare). Our checks were direct-deposited.

    One day, I was out walking to the local middle school’s track for some exercise, and I saw my boss’s truck. Then I saw him see me. It was on my day off, so the next day I get to work to find an email from him telling me that I need to provide a physical address for the records. I know this is because he’s being nosy and wants to know where we’re living. So I tell him that I have updated all of my info to the PO Box, for continuity, and there was no need to have my physical address for work related correspondence. He then sends me this epic email about how he needs to know where we live because what if there’s an emergency? (We are technically eligible to be called in for major emergencies.) And he would need to know where to come look for us if we didn’t show up for work and didn’t call in – what if there were a gas leak?

    I respond back telling him that if there’s that kind of emergency, then my husband (who was in the Army Reserves at the time) would be needed by the feds which would take precedence. And thanks for the thought, but all the appliances are electric, so there are no worries about a gas leak. I was going to leave the address as it was.

    We lived in that duplex for 10 months and he never found out where it was. I could feel it burning him every day…

    1. He didn’t feel guilty*

      My brother was the manager of large fast-food restaurant years ago. He came in one morning to find that the new owners (sleazy businessmen—checks were sometimes late, etc) had emptied out all the equipment, furniture, supplies, etc. They had shut down the place with no notice to anyone. And this was payday.

      My brother called the owners and got their answering machine, no call back. He noticed that they made one big mistake—they had left the extremely expensive cash registers/point of sale terminals. Employees had started showing up for their paychecks. So he and one of the cooks loaded them onto a pickup truck and the cook drove them to a safe but undisclosed location.

      His next message asking them if they’d like the POS terminals was returned by one of the owners, frantic. He claimed it was just an oversight that they didn’t let him know the place was closing, and of COURSE they were going to pay everyone. He held the machines until every employee got paid, IN CASH. The owners were pissed but needed the machines ASAP.

      Extreme situations call for extreme measures!

  123. LastAdminStanding*

    A few years ago, I made a drastic career change borne out of desperation (a long story); I ended up taking a job as a receptionist at the company where my husband worked (no overlap in managers or anything). I was very overqualified, and my manager, the EA to the CEO, was a terrible micromanager… yet she also was more of a 50s-type secretary than a present-day admin – she spent a lot of time ordering lunch/coffee and picking up dry cleaning, while asking me to help with anything related to the computer. She was pretty condescending and you could tell she thought she was better than most people based on her position (example: she didn’t bother to learn most people’s names). She was obsessed with appearances; she’d offer me food but then tell me I wasn’t allowed to eat it at the desk (in case people saw me). We’re allowed to wear jeans on Fridays and I had to beg to be included (again, I sat behind a desk where no one could see my legs anyway). She was also sexist; once she asked me whether I knew something work-related because of my husband (not like “oh, did he tell you about this upcoming event” but rather “how could you possibly know how our business works unless you had your husband explain it to you?”).

    When an internal opportunity came up about a year into my position, she fought against me applying, but since she was on her way out anyway (relocation), I applied and got the job. Another year, another internal opportunity….aaaaaand now I’ve been doing HER job, but for a different CEO… karma!

  124. Former Retail Lifer*

    I don’t know if this counts or not, but I like telling this story. I was a retail manager, second in command, and my store was undergoing an HR investigation to determine why sales were so bad and morale (as determined by anonymous surveys) was so low. HR reps came down from corporate and interviewed everyone. I was asked very specific questions about my boss and I answered them honestly, assuming this would be anonymous. It was not. I got pulled into his office after the HR reps left and he confronted me about almost everything I said. I told him that I didn’t volunteer anything new. I only responded to the questions they asked me.

    Soon after, the retaliation started. I was getting written up for the dumbest stuff. My favorite one was the write-up I got when one of my direct reports left a mess ON A DAY THAT I DIDN’T EVEN WORK. I got written up so many times that I got put on a final warning, and the last straw was when a different manager claimed that I left funds unsecured. Supposedly, I left a roll of quarters out overnight at the service desk, but considering we had a staff meeting there at the end of the night, I really doubt I did. HR was no help when I said I was being retaliated against and I got fired. They said unsecured funds were a black and white issue and always leads to being fired, no matter the circumstances.

    A few weeks after I got fired, the guy who claimed I left the quarters out got fired for some sort of shady activity. Then, about a month later, after the HR investigation concluded, the guy who fired me got fired. The circle of life was complete.

  125. Anon for this*

    First full-time job out of college. I was hired for one project, which was only 9 months long (from the beginning) and went well. They kept kept me on to do more general marketing/admin with the understanding it was only for six months and they’d reassess. Now I was reporting to a different person who was rude and micromanaged me. I had to constantly tell him what I was doing. I mean CONSTANTLY. I thought it was annoying and he’d made me feel really horrible a couple of times (crying in the bathroom) but I was actively trying to find a new job and couldn’t afford to leave without something else lined up unless it had been like a threat to my health/illegal/etc.

    Well one day he storms past my desk very upset and asks me to come to his office. I joke “what’s wrong? been fired?” and he said yes! The higher-ups had realized he was watching youtube videos all day and I was doing all the work. He was quietly fired and I was asked to stay on permanently. I stayed for another few months and worked for a very nice boss who didn’t really understand what I was doing but knew enough to know that I knew what I was doing and then got a much better job offer elsewhere.

  126. Geneva*

    I was bullied by my ex-company’s HR director. She’s a nasty woman in her mid-40s who gets off on being Regina George to the mostly early 20-something staff. Besides payroll and benefits, she also manages company gossip and actively encourages staff to give her dirt to throw in some unsuspecting person’s face. For instance, grilling a coworker about whether or not she farted during a meeting. I wish I were joking. No spat is too petty for her to investigate, and by investigate, I mean automatically believing whatever she’s told and inviting “offenders” to private one-on-one calls where she tells them all the ways in which she thinks they suck at life. Not just work. LIFE.

    I knew it was only a matter of time before I got in her crosshairs. But what she didn’t know, is that I’m an assertive 30-something with experience dealing with toxic workspaces and toxic people – NOT a fresh college grad who is easily intimidated or unable to identify her manipulative tactics – gaslighting, mostly.

    So while she set out on her campaign to prove that I was terrible employee. I set out on covering my ass. She had IT count how many emails I sent and chewed me out for sending just a few on certain days…that I had to point out were weekends. She accused me of answering my cell phone in the middle of a client meeting….until I sent her a screen shot of my call log that showed it was a spam call I immediately declined. She also asked my coworkers to spy on me and report my every infraction, like joining a zoom call 1 minute late because I was on the phone coordinating an out-of-state publicity event that was a smashing success. I figured out her methods when she told me a manager said I missed a deadline for something she had actually assigned to someone else. After the call with HR, I asked the manager why she lied and she said she was uncomfortable speaking with me. And then HR called me back to tell me I wasn’t allowed to discuss my “performance issues” with anyone else but her.

    Then one day I snapped. She said, I had improved a little bit over the past two months she had been harassing me with twice-weekly check-ins but that I was still a “hot mess,” and needed to sign a disciplinary document. I should mention here that I am a racial minority and she’s white, so her stereotypical word choice added an extra layer of WTF to her behavior.

    I said no. I told her that the entire time she had been tracking me, I had been tracking her, and I had enough evidence to prove that I was being treated poorly compared to other employees. I had audio files of every meeting, screenshots of every belittling email, and text messages from coworkers who confirmed I was being verbally abused. She immediately asked if I’m going to sue. I kept it vague and said I was considering my options. Then I said I liked my job, but it was clear it (as in her) didn’t like me, and if that were the case she needed to pay me to walk.

    And she did : ). She contacted legal, they approved a severance package, and I was out of there within a few days.

  127. WonkyStitch*

    I didn’t really do anything other then be myself, which was eager to please and trying as hard as I could to do what my boss wanted. He just didn’t care for me or my personality. I was a recruiter and he made me recruit my own replacement unknowingly (he said it was to hire a 2nd recruiter but once she said she was ready to make the move, he fired me and hired her in my place).

    Turns out she was much worse than I was, caused all sorts of trouble for him.

  128. Belladonna*

    I was working the front desk at a llama groomers. Our usual staffing was a grooming specialist, two groomers, a cleaner, and one to two front desk persons. My boss (a groomer and supervisor of all non-specialist staff) treated everyone well except the administrative staff. For some reason, one day only me, boss, and specialist were in the office. So we were all pretty overwhelmed.

    A client came to reception and asked if her llama, Pam, was ready to be picked up. I went back into the grooming area to check the board where the llamas were listed. Her llama still said in work, but when the groomers get busy they don’t have time to update the status. So boss was in the area preparing another llama. I asked him if Pam was ready. He didn’t answer, so I asked again. He made eye contact with me, and then looked away still not answering. Ok, he’s busy and I’m obviously annoying him. But I have a client waiting, so I persist. I say, “Boss, client is here to pick up Pam. Is she ready?” He responds, “Belladonna, you need to calm down.” Now I did raise my voice with my last question, but I was going for ‘obviously you must not of heard me’, not ‘you are a giant nozzle.’ So with no answer from Boss, I return to the front desk and let client know that it will be a few minutes. She’s being incredibly patient.

    About five to ten minutes later, I return to the grooming area, and boss is now sitting at his computer. I ask again if Pam is ready…and he again tells me to calm down. Now I’m being intentionally very calm because it had become apparent over my time there that he really liked to get a rise out of people. So I reply, very calmly, that Pam’s owner is waiting. And then he claims that I never told him that. I replied, “I did, and why else would I want to know if Pam was ready?” He then YELLED at me to calm down again. To which I replied (very calmly) that I thought he needed to calm down. He then asked me if I wanted to go home….Yes was my one word reply. I grabbed my purse, walked out of the grooming area, told the client that Boss would be right with her, and walked right out the front door. Leaving Boss and specialist with six jobs and two people to do them.

    But I was not satisfied. From the parking lot, I called the other front desk person; we had coffee, and I told her my saga. Boss called her and said that he had “to send Belladonna home” and needed her to come in…oh darn she was sorry but she just was in the middle of something really important.

    The next day I left a message for Grand Boss, the owner. She didn’t return my call until my next scheduled shift that I didn’t show up for. I explained what happened, she said Boss had a different story, but she wasn’t surprised. I let her know that I wouldn’t be able to return to work under him. She says she understood, but she couldn’t let him go right then. womp womp.

    A year or so later, I ran into another groomer who let me know that he eventually got demoted. I’m so thankful that that job was for spending money, and I could just walk away. He was truly awful.

  129. Janet Snakehole*

    I had one manager that would treat me as the department admin, even though I wasn’t – I had a full workload for my actual position (marketing) and didn’t have time to do all of these other tasks she’d assign me. But I was the newest hire in the department I was always the first person she’d ask for help. The thing that annoyed me the most was that several times a day she’d walk to my desk, hand me a piece of paper, and ask me to make one photocopy of it – AND SHE HAD TO PASS THE COPIER TO GET TO MY DESK.
    At one point, my department was being moved to a new section of our building, and she asked me to make up the seating chart/floor plan for her, another admin duty that had nothing to do with my marketing responsibilities. So instead of pushing back, I put the copier right outside her office door, and put my own desk as far as I could from her office, far enough that I couldn’t hear her if she called my name from her desk. After that, I never had to make a copy for her again.

  130. Petty McPettison*

    This person wasn’t intentionally a jerk, just didn’t understand social cues at all. Ryan would barge into my office without knocking for no reason all the time. I asked him to knock and he would forget. He kept doing it during my lunch break, and wouldn’t leave when I would tell him I was eating. After months of this and many other annoyances from Ryan, one day I locked my office door while eating lunch, since he refused to ever knock. The splitting sound he made he did a full body slam into the locked door was glorious. He learned to knock after that.

  131. ceiswyn*

    I once worked with a colleague who was in many ways a nice chap, but really Out There when it came to science (we never talked religion, but he definitely inclined to Creationist ideas). One day I was having lunch while he earnestly explained to me how geological dates were just guesses because it was impossible to date anything that old, meaning that dinosaurs were far more recent than is generally admitted and definitely overlapped with humans.

    I let him carry on for about half an hour before I told him that I have a Masters in Palaeobiology, and started listing all the methods that can be used to date items on geological timescales, with added technical detail…

    1. Mental Lentil*

      Fellow science person here, and I love it when non-scientists explain how science can’t possibly be real because they don’t understand how it works.

      I love this! Thank you for this story!

      1. ceiswyn*

        I have two Bachelor’s degrees in different sciences, and I LOVE it when a science sceptic asks a ‘rhetorical’ question about ‘Ah, but how do they know x?!?’ and then has to stand there with a disgruntled expression while I tell them :)

    2. Kathlynn (Canada)*

      I know someone who claims they buried a animal bone they’d buried for a year then dug up and sent it to a lab and the lab said it was really old “thus carbon dating etc doesn’t work”
      False tests are always possible. Or the company was giving out fak7e test results to make people happy or to discredit science.

      1. StrikingFalcon*

        Or this just never happened. Carbon dating costs money. I doubt they spent $500+ to get an anecdote for conversations.

    3. Kaitydidd*

      I did something similar with a coworker, once. I was cashiering at a home improvement store in the summer between graduating with my BSCE and starting my masters of civil engineering. Dude claimed that there was only one way to reinforce a concrete slab and tried to quiz me on what that one true reinforcement method was. I asked what kind of slab, and then explained the what and why of the most common slab on grade reinforcment.

  132. SeekYou*

    I worked at a children’s charity and we asked the community to donate presents for our holiday party. We had an incredible response – every child had their wishes fulfilled and donors dropped off the wrapped presents to our office. How wonderful, right? It was. Until my horrible boss (the Executive Director) asked us to unwrap all the presents so she could select a few things out of them, because in her words, “They don’t need all of this.” I saw her take some of the more expensive toys and clothing and put them under her desk. She then asked us to re-wrap the presents. One day a friend of hers visited the office with her child (not one of our clients), and my boss grabbed one of the nice toys from under her desk and gave it to the kid! I was speechless! I told one of my coworkers and she had also seen our boss give a gas card (that was intended for one of the parents) to her own son!

    We were a state funded program, so I reported this info to our grant officer. He brushed it off like ‘eh it’s probably not what you think. I was devastated, but continued to work there for the rest of my contract (it was only a year). Lots of other shady things happened that year, and I continued to report them when necessary, even if they didn’t take it seriously. She got wind of my reporting and tried multiple times to intimidate me, but I stood my ground. On my last day when I picked up my paycheck, she was packing up her office. I asked her what was up and she said “I’ve decided to retire early!” However, I found out that she was actually fired. How did I know this? I became employed by another program that reported to the same grants officer. He apologized profusely for not believing me. Apparently she had been skimming off donations for years, and my reports were finally taken seriously. Justice!

    1. Kathlynn (Canada)*

      I’ve heard of this happening at other charities. As one friend said “she saw a lot of cool toy donations that never made it to the kids” at one she worked at.
      I’m sure there’s a lot of good charities. Sadly things like toy drives have a bigger chance to be stolen from in my opinion if only because it’s easier (harder to get caught then something that’s in the books like cash)

  133. Divide by Zero*

    I once had a coworker who was a high school classmate of my roommate. At work, I was being rejected by this lunch clique in which I had previously been invited regularly to join, and I asked my coworker what was going on. I was young and hurt; my (also young) coworker didn’t want to enlighten me.
    I relayed to my roommate about my feelings of rejection and conversation with my coworker one evening. My roommate proceeded to call this coworker and leave a voice message trying to stand up for me. I definitely did not put them up to it.
    The next day, this coworker made it A Work Issue, and went to their boss about it, who went to my boss about it, who sat me down and basically gave me the impression to leave my coworker alone. Not. A. Problem. I didn’t work closely with them, and I didn’t want to talk to them either.
    Fast forward a couple of months, we all know there is a huge layoff about to happen, and yep, my least favorite coworker was laid off. I didn’t miss them, but they reached out on social media to connect and I have never felt happier blocking them.

  134. KingKatzen*

    One of my first jobs was working for a miserly, controlling, irritable woman who refused to buy the department a shredder, but insisted I shred 1000s of papers by hand. I started dragging the recycling barrel close to her office door and slowly shredded the papers, knowing she was gritting her teeth as she hated noise of any kind. It didn’t take long for her to order a $30 shredder.

    1. Mannequin*

      Hand shredding takes so much longer and is so non cost effective I can’t even IMAGINE why she thought it made it worth saving $30 on a shredder.

  135. Ozzie*

    An instance where it SORT OF backfired…

    My boss kept reading back my emails, interjecting with communicating with customers and doing the opposite of what I had said, commandeering everything. It felt like a waste of time and made me question my capabilities of doing the job, as well as frustrated immensely, since I worked with these accounts weekly and felt as though she was constantly discrediting to customers I had good relationships with.

    I started asking her approval for even the most mundane things. Is this wording ok. Can I short this customer. How should I handle this basic question. Can you please check this response I wrote and okay it. It seemed easier this way, so at least she wouldn’t be second-guessing me in front of customers, and would maybe annoy her enough to stop.

    At my review, it was noted that she wanted me to be more independent, so that I could handle customer issues myself and not ask her about everything.

    I didn’t go full petty in the review at the very least, and we discussed my taking ownership of things, and then her sticking by me, even if she didn’t agree with me – and addressing it later to correct for the future.

    We still don’t have a great working relationship, and I will catch that she goes and reads me emails with customers occasionally. (this is now like, 3 years later) But, hey, at least it opened a conversation, I guess.

  136. A Simple Narwhal*

    I have a coworker who isn’t a jerk per se, just suuuper negative about everything. Every minor miscommunication is obviously a malicious personal attack at her, every change instantly has a million ways it could wrong and will most certainly make things worse, does work after hours that could have waited until the next day and then makes a big deal about how she had to work late, a “truly no one suffers as I do” type.

    One Friday before a long weekend, the company surprised us with a half day. My manager asked in our morning meeting if anyone would mind volunteering to keep a casual eye on the team inbox for any unexpected fires. Nothing crazy, just check your email once every hour or so, and if there was truly an emergency reach out to him and he would handle it. Negative Nancy said she wasn’t going anywhere and volunteered, great. Later, as the meeting wrapped up, our manager asked if anyone had any fun plans for the long weekend, or anything we were going to do with our early release. All of a sudden Nancy speaks up that while she wants to do something fun, she can’t since she has to stay inside the whole time and monitor the inbox. Our manager is confused and says that she doesn’t have to be glued to her computer, she just has to spot check the inbox a couple times, and is otherwise free to spend her time away. No no no, she couldn’t possibly do that, how can she leave or do anything when she has to be back to check the email, she’s stuck inside, she hopes everyone else has a fun time, going on and on about how she won’t truly get a half day like everyone else, etc etc. I’d had quite enough of this nonsense, so I very cheerfully said “gee Nancy, it sounds like this is an awful imposition for you. You know what, why don’t I take the inbox monitoring? I don’t have any plans, it would be no inconvenience for me to take this. You go and enjoy your afternoon!” She mumbled something about how it wasn’t a big deal, she could still do it, and then didn’t mention it again. She had no complaints about it when we came back the next week either!

  137. WantonSeedStitch*

    I never got a chance to get back at my old evil boss, except in my dreams. That’s actually more satisfying than you might think, though: even a few years after leaving that job, I had occasional nightmares about it. But over time, as I healed from the wounds it inflicted on my sense of self-worth, the dreams got less scary. One night, I dreamed that my old boss was, for some reason, taking over as head of my office at my new job (completely unrealistic: entirely different sector, entirely different roles, etc.). When they heard the news, all my coworkers started leaving in droves, packing their desks up and going home the same day. I started packing too. My old boss took me into his office and pleaded with me to stay on “for old times’ sake,” so he didn’t lose ALL his new employees. I responded that he must be out of his mind, and there was absolutely no way I would ever consider working for him again, no matter how much money or how big a promotion he offered me, and that the way everyone was running for the hills should be an indication to him of exactly how horrible a boss he was. It was SO SATISFYING to look him in the eye and tell him that, and even after I woke up, I had a warm fuzzy feeling about it!

  138. Mass Quitting*

    I had an awful boss in college who was rarely around. She regularly yelled at staff, sexually harassed the one man in the office, and violated labor laws. Everyone finally had it. On the day salary direct deposits hit for the month, everyone made sure the money reached their accounts. I spent the whole day proofreading resignation letters (effective immediately) so that 2/3 of the staff could hand them in at the end of the day and never return. My triumph was that to keep me, my boss upped my hourly wage so I was making triple the minimum wage.

  139. bopper*

    My software product relied on a set of information that “Ed” was in charge of. We used 2 sets of that info and there were discussions of a third. The Third set relied on industry cooperation.
    Every so often my project manager would have me check in with Ed on how that Third set was progressing. One time Ed exploded at me and yelled at me that he didn’t have control on what they were doing and blah blah and in the midst of his tirade I had an epiphany that This was not my Fault, I am only doing what I was asked to, he could have said “no update” and HE was the jerk and I don’t have to respond.

  140. AnonFor ThisOne*

    Ooh, I’ve got one! It’s long, but it’s good.
    It’s been years ago now, but I worked in a retail for a store that had a really strict policy against coworkers dating. I found this out because my department lead was telling me how she had met her current partner at the store but he had to quit so they could date. It was a little meet-cute anecdote, didn’t think too much of it, when one day at the all-staff morning meeting I see her current partner and he’s wearing a store uniform.
    Huh.
    So I assume they broke up or something, but no, they’re making out in storage so they definitely still together. And then it turns out that the partner is now going to be working in the same department, being managed by his partner, and that just doesn’t sit right with me. But whatever, it’s retail and maybe they managed to get approval from corporate to work together.
    Then one night I’m training the partner in my department and I make a crack to him about how he needs to be more discreet with his make out sessions with the manager because we have cameras everywhere. And this dude loses his mind. He’s in my face, screaming at me to keep my mouth shut, and who he kisses is none of my f*ckin’ business….it’s intense, it’s scary, and I’m done.
    I go to the assistant manager and let him know that I’m about to quit because I don’t want to work in the same department as Aggressive Partner, and he convinces me to stay so we can talk to HR.
    HR calls me, I give them my story, and they let me know they’re going to review the tapes. They call me back like an hour or three later to tell me that Aggressive Partner is no longer with the company and that I no longer have to work in the same department as his partner (my former manager). Whew.
    So I go back to work and it turns out that the store manager was friends with the couple and he was the one who approved Aggressive Partner to come back, knowing that it was against the store policy. I know this because he told me, when he pulled me into his office right after I clocked in. Then he shows me the new schedule, which has me working from 1pm to close every day. The schedule was clearly re-written: he had taken a Sharpie to my hours and then handwrote in the new ones. I had a small child at the time, there was no way I could work that schedule (I was working 8-4 previously), and he smugly tells me that he makes the schedule and if I didn’t like I could find another job where I could “learn to keep my mouth shut”.
    I go back to my assistant manager, show him the new schedule and tell him that once again, I’m going to have to quit. This time we call HR from the store phone immediately. I guess changing my schedule to force me to quit counts as retaliation against a whistleblower.
    So the big boss comes in later that day and pulls me into the office. Store manager and former department manager are looking smug and whispering to each other (I found out later they thought I was going to get fired because they had called corporate with a long list of complaints against me..which isn’t the smartest thing to do when you’re being investigated for retaliation, as it turns out). Big Boss apologizes for all the BS, says that I have a lot of customer compliments and that he is going to take care of everything. He thanks me for all that I do and sends me on my way.
    When I leave the office, Store Manager is called in. He is suddenly not so smug. And then 10 minutes later he is walked to his car and a sign is posted about him no longer being with the company, with the job opening for a new Store Manager.
    I felt pretty awful about him losing his job, even though he brought it upon himself. I was talking to the assistant manager about it later and he told me that Store Manager would be okay, and that maybe he could use this as an opportunity to find a job where he could learn to keep his mouth shut.

  141. Debbie the archivist*

    22 years ago I worked in an archive were many people came in to do genealogical research in the days before much of it was available online. I was in charge of our research room and interacted with all of the patrons who came in to help them get started on their research. We had developed detailed how to guides that walked people through the steps of using some of the most common records people came in to use for the genealogical research. But to be successful in such research do you need to know some details about the family you’re researching before you begin.

    One day a woman comes in with her sister to do some research. I greet her and do a reference interview asking her what it is she’s trying to learn. She tells me that her husband‘s mother’s maiden name was Livingston. She had seen a portrait of William Livingston who was one of the signers of the declaration of independence and she decided that William Livingston looked very much like her husband and that her husband must be a direct descendent. I explain to her that in order to confirm that she would need to trace her husband’s family history from her husband back to William Livingston. But she knew absolutely nothing about her mother-in-law‘s family. I knew right then that she was going to have a hard time with her research but I gave her some suggestions on how to at least start doing some research on her mother-in-law and hopefully she would be able to find out the names of her mother-in-law‘s parents and then work back from there. For the next hour or two she and her sister pulled various books off of our shelves and looked at some microfilm, but I could tell that they were not following our how to guides. A couple of times I checked in with them to see if I could be of any help, and even at one point help them thread the microfilm onto one of our viewing machines. But in the end as I suspected they really weren’t able to make any progress because she didn’t know enough about her husband’s ancestors. As she and her sister were leaving they stopped at our reference desk and she started berating me about what a wasted trip it had been and how it was somehow my fault that the bus that she and her sister-in-law had taken to our office has taken over 90 minutes to get to our office. One of our regular researchers was standing there, turned to this woman, and said “Don’t talk to Debbie like that. I saw her helping you and she has no control whatsoever over the bus lines.” This woman and her sister stormed out the door. I thanked the researcher who had stood up for me I went back to helping other patrons.

  142. Aepyornis*

    Two stories of mine.

    I once had a problem with a transporter who only transported one crate out of two to our customer, left the other one in storage and pretended they were only following my instructions rather than admitting the mistake, despite having emails to prove my instructions were correct. The problem was easy to correct, but they wanted to charge me 2 deliveries, plus storage, for their mistake. The level of bad faith was gob-smacking as they were plainly denying facts and emails, which is surprisingly hard to counter argue. It took me a while to prepare my reply for the next round, but it worked. I asked in a very calm but concerned voice if they were accusing me of lying or saying I was hallucinating and should seek urgent medical care. I kept one insisting it could only be one of these, and that I needed to know: I mean, I was possibly having a psychotic episode! They became suddenly willing to discuss finding a solution to escape that topic.

    The other one was when I was working in a small charity active in, say, llama grooming. We were in large part publicly funded as we provided a public service, and one condition of our funding was that we collaborated with small charity 2, doing alpaca training. It made sense, we had joint programmes, the synergies were excellent! Enter a new director of small charity 2, who wasn’t competent and whose programme started failing left and right almost immediately. Her solution was to pretend alpaca training was impossible to do and unnecessary, while llama grooming was so easy and much more needed (no). She soon started copying our programmes and producing incredible metrics (by which I mean incredibly made-up metrics), which, much to our dismay, the government (not being very versed in our activities but liking amazing metrics) accepted without question. Worse, they started suspecting WE were incompetent and slacking off, and more funding was coming their way, and less ours. The camelid world wasn’t fooled but our position was becoming difficult. My board was very reluctant to denounce their practice to the government, lest we were perceived as petty and jealous and our position became more precarious than ever (not an irrational fear, knowing the people in charge).
    Now, I love llamas and want to serve the camelid community as best as I can. I was not ready to just drop the matter and find a new job. I took full advantage of my low voice, ridiculously tiny team, and our shared office plan. We had separate open-plan offices with one joint break-room and conference room (access to our offices was through this large room). The office doors were thin wooden door. Her voice was loud, as was that of several of their board members. I could easily overhear their conversation. Initially, they held strategic meetings at odd hours or somewhere else. But I trained them to think these doors were sound-proof. I was alone in my office most of the time and made sure to never have loud conversations there, taking meetings with people with louder voices always in another room of the building. I jumped when I was in the meeting room and someone from her office came out, pretending I thought I had been alone (instead of having heared all about their weekend). I acted very surprised to find 10 people in the meeting room when exiting my office, as if I couldn’t hear everything. Small things, but it paid off. After a couple of months, they started having their strategic meeting in their office or the conference room while I was here.
    So knowing everything they were about to do, I was able to completely undermine them. They wanted to copy our successful llama festival of last year, but do it one month before? No problem, we’d announce our upcoming edition much earlier than necessary as a save the date. They were finalising, then sending the gov a (fake) report about doing llama bites prevention with over 10k llama owners in the state? We’ll send the week after a newsletter with a “did you know?” section listing there were no less than 8’758 llama owners in the state. They were announcing the success of a programme in our facilities with made-up numbers of participants? We’d happily announce their success with the real number the day before. I made sure it all looked plausibly coincidental, sometimes renouncing very tempting sabotage. They were looking more and more erratic and desperate, and the government gradually realised there were serious issues with them, and started reverting course and getting us our funding back (that part still took about 2 years, though). Amazingly, they never suspected a thing, and amazingly, that director is still in place 5 years after this (I’ve moved on, though).

  143. Kyrielle*

    So, at my first job out of college, I had a boss who was known for being…a character…as I came to know after a while. I won’t try to relay him beyond that, but I will say that fresh out of college, I wasn’t really ready for him. High-stress, medium-chaos, thoroughly demanding, but also friendly in tone so that you were left trying to figure out whether that was a good or bad exchange or what.

    One day he came over to me and asked me, “Do you have that piece of s— done yet?”

    Me: “No.”

    Him: “Why the h— not?”

    Me: “Because someone keeps interrupting me to ask about it!”

    …the instant the words left my mouth I thought, oh lord, I am going to get fired right now. Nope. We actually seemed to get along much better after that and worked decently well together.

    (He still swore, and still shed chaos, and in fact I wrote to you at one point about it later on…you told me to decide if it was something I could live with, because he wasn’t going to change. You were right, and I could and worked fine with him a while longer. And had to watch whether I was picking up bad habits, because yeah.)

  144. Casey*

    Well this isn’t a dramatic awesome quitting story, but I did feel some triumph at the end:
    My second job out of high school (while I was in college at night) was a nightmare with a horrible boss who didn’t know how to manage. The place was a mess with papers flying everywhere, no one knew what they were doing, and the boss would routinely walk into the main room where most people sat to yell at people. It was a small company, about 20-25 employees, so no HR department or anything like that.
    Turnover was crazy. Case in point, 1 day after I started, someone quit, so instead of doing what I was hired for, my job was switched to do what this person used to do. Which no one else knew how to do, including the boss. So I banged my head against the wall for 6 months as I taught myself how to do the very specific/complex job.
    When I first started, I didn’t realize how awful it was. I thought it was just a learning curve and would get better. It took about a year until I started job hunting. One day during my lunch break I got a call from one of the jobs I had interviewed at with a formal job offer. I accepted. My boss was away that afternoon, so I planned on giving him my two weeks notice the next day.
    Well, on my way out the door that day, Joe, my co-worker in my department of two confided in me that he had given his 2 weeks notice that day. He said my boss had told him he wasn’t allowed to tell anyone, but he didn’t want me to be surprised, so he was telling me. But I should pretend I didn’t know.
    The next day, I tried all day to talk to my boss, but every time I tried, he was ‘busy’. Finally, I just knocked on his office door, told him it was quick but it couldn’t wait, and I needed 5 minutes of his time. I told him I had accepted another job offer and was giving my two weeks notice. His immature, obnoxious response? “Oh, you probably planned this with Joe”. This left me in a really awkward position, because I wasn’t supposed to know that Joe was leaving. So I sort of just didn’t respond and gave him a weird look, and said something like “I’m not sure what you mean.”
    The next morning, I got a text at 8 am from my boss saying that there was no need to come in for my two week notice and I shouldn’t come back to the office. I guess the assertion of his power was more important than me being able to train someone to do my complex job that no one else knew how to do…
    On my end, I was thrilled not to spend another day in that place, and my new job was thrilled to have me start earlier.

  145. Loooong time ago*

    When I worked in science labs, there were a lot of pipette tip salespeople. One older guy came in and asked me, “Are you the little girl that works in this lab?”
    Me: “No. I’m the woman who works in this lab.” (You’d think he’d have gotten the hint)
    Him: “Aren’t you the little girl who used to work in the Serology lab?”
    Me: “OK. You can call me Ms So-&-So, you can call me Your Highness or you can call me Ma’am. Little Girl is NOT an option.
    Him: “Yes Ma’am.”
    Me: You realize you’ve blown the sale?”
    Him: “Yes Ma’am”
    Me: “You can go now. Don’t come back.”
    Him: “Yes Ma’am.”

    4. Employee of the Bearimy*

      When I was in my 20’s I worked on experiential learning professional development programs, and one time I was accompanying a group who was going to do some volunteer work with Habitat for Humanity as part of their program. We had booked a van service (one we used pretty regularly) for the day and the driver (who was also the owner of the company) was chatting with the group about what we were doing. When he saw me, he said, “This little girl is going to build houses with you? I don’t think so!” I just chuckled and went to the site with the group. Unbeknownst to him, I was in charge of booking transportation services for my team, and on Monday I went to my boss, told her what had happened, and requested we not use them anymore. Soon enough the owner was calling my office wondering why we didn’t have any work for him. I don’t believe we ever told him. Behavior like this was one of the reasons he went out of business, I’m sure.

  146. MDB*

    My thing is not nearly as fun sounding as some of the ones I’m reading here–but I worked in a pretty toxic workplace, about ten years ago. The type of work was something I had done before, and knew that I was good at–and I’m doing again now, and get lots of good feedback. This place had several people who went out of their way to be nasty and sabotaging (and in this role, kids were involved). Partly (I found out about six months in) because this org had laid off some very well liked people (Recession layoffs) and then formed a program that began with me, within months. My program was meant to be a revenue generator, and “productivity” was measured in billable hours, and not the quality of our work. So there was resentment that friends had lost their jobs and then along came new people—and also there were just some horrible people there.
    One such person was a peer, who treated me pretty badly from the beginning, and then (contrary to what I was told when I interviewed–that I’d be running this program as it grew) became the Coordinator of the program, and my boss. She was overall miserable toward me, looked hard and often for errors and shortcomings, was undermining and even sabotaging of my work, etc. Everyone in my “growing” program quit within a month of me, w/one exception. I remember calling the EAP for some advice (not something I’d ever do-I was desperate) and being told to get a lawyer–after finding that she was keeping a file on me (and one on a good coworker) for termination case-building (or just being awful and trying to intimidate).
    Ten years later, I’m in a truly fantastic, supportive, solid workplace, and I’m on a hiring committee for a new coworker. Her resume was one of the 100+ for the position, and if there had been no name on anything, she would have looked very qualified. I guess her gig after we worked together (supervising others) didn’t work out, because there was an end date to the job, and then about a year of no job. We are very happy with the person who was hired (not this one). If she did her research at all on this, she’d have seen my name on the website–and I hope she immediately felt disappointed and nervous about being hired.

  147. So this happened*

    Oh. Not that trauma should ever be a contest, but I have this! Buckle in. Its a ride.

    I worked for a small non-profit that specialized in medical and behavioral health services. I knew something was off. It had the typical red flags such as family environment etc. I had replaced a manager who was well liked by his staff, because he partied and drinked with them pretty consistently. I also had an assistant manager who I think was only hired to see which one of us would work out.. story for another time, but they ended up doing her dirty too.

    The office was predominately on headed by one particular race of people, and as such there was a distinct cliquiness about the clinics. This was allowed to fester, and turns out there were alot of icky feelings throughout that i had to help navigate. Fast forward to the pandemic. There had always been a misconception that clinic staff was lazy, spread predominately by my in-group boss and their grandboss. The ratio of staff to providers worked out well for the clinics, but evidently lead to work looking too easy. The CEO was always arguing to lay people off, and had gone so far as to solicit a list of individuals from each department. I provided mine based on performance, and was careful to put everyone into the mix. The list that was presented to the CEO was not mine, but was all women of color…. not the ingroup’s mind you, but all one specific race of individual. Needless to say that didn’t go over well. We all met to go over it, and my boss ended up dealing the conversation creating more work for the staff. (She wanted a team of four front desk individuals to call 20+ therapists patients to remind them of their appointments, ontop of the medical staff and manage their day to day jobs. Not possible. And I told the CEO as much. In front of a room FULL of C-suite individuals, other managers (My peers) and Directors, She told me that I needed to ‘Step the fuck down. The clinic staff is lazy and they can take this on.’ Abruptly the CEO looked at everyone in the room, said it was in everyone’s best interest if we discontinued the meeting, and stormed out. What bothered me that day was that no one in that room even batted an eye. It was obvious that this behavior was pretty frequent.

    I grabbed my things, went out to my car and started sobbing. I called my partner, who told me not to do anything until I could meet with my boss and her boss. And meet we did. My bosses boss was always fantastic. I asked them what happened, and they told me that the CEO gets like this sometimes, and they’ll be your best friend again soon.

    I told them that I had observed that no one had blinked, and that this behavior appeared to be frequent. It wasn’t shocking. My boss at the time told me that working with people like that makes you a better manager, and that it will help one to grow a thick skin. I told her I was sorry that had happened to her in the past, but that was no way to treat or manage people. I turned in my notice that day (A luxurious four weeks for them to find a replacement) and they walked me that day. I have NEVER been so relieved to leave a company.

    The shame is this CEO is VERY well connected politically, and the funds they are able to get for the clinic really DO HELP people. IT just sucks that the organization is run by such a terrible human being.

  148. Seven If You Count Bad John*

    Okay, I’m not sure this guy counts as a “work jerk” but it is a work-related tale of petty vengeance.

    Back in the 20th Century when dinosaurs roamed the earth, we moved to a new city for reasons which were good and sufficient. We were both looking for work, of course, and needed to land something with a paycheck quickly to get us rolling in our new home. So I went around to all the temp agencies and signed on, while still looking for permanent full-time work.

    Reader, I had the worst luck of my *life*. I kept getting interviews where the recruiter would ask “what are your job goals” and I’d say “I am looking for full time permanent work at a company where I can stay for a long time and grow”. And the recruiter would turn around and say “we can’t place you because you don’t seem career-oriented”. (??)

    Well, after a few stressful weeks of promising starts falling through (literally I’d get a call the night before a job was to start saying it has been canceled, this happened multiple times), I eventually landed a straightforward receptionist job, long-term temp with the possibility of permanent hire. Perfect. I hate doing reception but it’s a paycheck and it’s a start. (That job is a whole letter by itself, it’s one of the few times I have literally walked off a job.)

    So this front desk job involved, among other things, greeting walk-ins and signing for packages and similar. People would come in looking for work or trying to sell us stuff or trying to buy our stuff. Fine. And one of the most common types of doorsteppers was recruiters–temp agencies trying to get us to use them for hiring. They’d come in, usually in pairs (a trainee and a mentor) wearing their suits or their business casual and they’d have these expensively printed glossy packet folders full of their marketing materials and they’d want to talk to my boss. Sorry, she’s not available. We already have a temp agency we’re happy with. No, I’m not going to tell you who it is. Yes, you can leave that here and I’ll see that she gets it. (She would always roll her eyes and toss it in the trash unread.)

    The experienced reader of the AAM petty vengeance genre will already know where this is headed. That’s right; a few weeks into my (thus far successful) professional job with growth potential, who should walk into my lobby but the exact shortsighted nerfherder who refused to even try to place me. With a trainee in tow. He swaggers up to the desk with that confident salescritter ‘tude they all put on and gives me the Receptionist Line: “Hi I’m Peppy Recruiter with Temp Agency, here to see about providing your company’s staffing needs…are you familiar with Temp Agency?”

    “Yes,” replies Me, The World’s Worst Receptionist. “I interviewed with you in your office a few weeks ago. You refused to even try to place me because you said I wasn’t career-oriented.” The dude looked like he’d swallowed a turtle. “As you see,” continues Me, The World’s Worst Receptionist, “Your competitors have better judgment. My boss is pretty happy with their service.”

    I did let him drop off his fancy brochure, but I also was explicit that I’d be forwarding it with my personal assessment and recommendations. No idea what he told the trainee.

      1. Seven If You Count Bad John*

        NO!! it was a complete coincidence that the guy doing the doorstepping was the same guy I’d interviewed with. If it hadn’t been him, I’d probably have just done the usual spiel.

  149. The Dogman*

    Ahh this is a bit heavier, but was satisfying!

    Many moons ago I was a chucker of burgers, at one of the worlds leading burger chucking establishments, but I was in the UK, South Wales if anyone cares.

    I got the job based on my performance on the trial run, my direct manager (lets call her Allison, cos rule of aquisition 33, “It never hurts to suck up to the boss”, is always a good idea) and she was lovely. Apparently they didn’t get many people who only needed things explained once and who would look stuff up in the kitchen manual on their own… I didnt think I was going above and beyond, but Allison and the store manager (Dave) seemed to, and they liked me a lot.

    We had a very unpleasant junior (to Dave and Allison) manager we will call Karen (since that is “bad” name these days it seems) who hated me from the first time we worked together, she was haranguing a newer worker (I had been there a week) about how to sweep and I just said I would show them how to do it. She just wanted to shout at them to make herself feel better it seemed to me, and that was her personality for sure. Since I had interrupted her she turned on me, but I pointed out she was not actually the boss, had no firing powers and couldn’t even start the process of a writeup/warning, so she was wasting her time and I was going back to work.

    Her reaction was incandescent.

    I suggested she calm down…

    lol!

    I knew that was pouring oil etc, but it was too good an opportunity to miss. She flipped out so loudly that customers called the UK head office to complain about her.

    So over the next year or so she was after my job endlessly, but I was protected by Allison and Dave, and fairly quickly became respected by the Area Manager, Mike, and was set up in a rescue team to go to franchise stores (we were company) and fix the failing ones or help set up new ones. After a about 14 months of false accusations and efforts to trap me in something fireable she was told in no uncertain terms to leave me alone, up to and including just not talking to me during work hours.

    So once I was safe I started to plan how to get back at her for what she had tried on me, and on behalf of all her other victims. In the UK it is legal to record people (in places with no expectation of privacy) without their permission or even knowledge, so I started recording audio every shift I had with her.

    It took months, and some very worrying statements by some of our more vulnerable women staff members about her behaviour on nights out, and the final recording I gave to Mike, Dave and Allison was nearly 4 hours long of Karen hurling abuse, threatening jobs/hours and in the case of 3 women sexually harrassing them and trying to split them from their partners.

    Karen and 2 henchpersons were fired the next day.

    I did another two and a half years before moving into the tech support industry. Ended with the same pay as a junior manager while still being just a burger chucker too!

  150. Put the Blame on Edamame*

    I was a fiction department buyer at a huge, posh bookstore where management decided to “centralise” buying, despite the differences in markets between us and other stores in the chain, like airport outlets and small town booksellers. The quality and quantity of our stock declined rapidly, meanwhile my boss told me my new job role was to “dust and serve customers.” Several of my customers were not happy with our range, and I did my best charm offensive to encourage them to complain directly to management- which is how my boss and the new buyer had to face up to Tom Stoppard telling them that the drama section was a disgrace.

    5. Lady Knittington*

      That. Is. Perfect! (I can almost imagine it happening, too).

      Did the boss know who they were talking to?

  151. California Limited*

    Story from a friend:

    New department chair was one of those oversharing types who asked everyone to sit in a circle, go around the room, and share something deeply personal that no one else knew about them. People shifted uncomfortably and shared as little as possible, until they reached my friend, a petite, blonde, blue-eyed pixie with a high gentle voice who opened her eyes wide, smiled, and said, “My name is Judy and I have violent fantasies.”

    I have been waiting for years for the opportunity to use this line.

    1. Always say Kombucha*

      When asked what is my spirit animal or favorite vegetable or nonsense I always say Kombucha. They’re never sure if I’m stupid, ironic, or insubordinate. Which is fine with me.

  152. Very Queer Very Here*

    I was working as a teacher at a public high school in a former life, mid-20s. It was in a major city in a pretty liberal and diverse area, but in a conservative state. At the time that this story occurred, my now wife and I (we’re both women) were newly engaged. I’m a pretty private person, but I wasn’t at all the only non-straight teacher on staff; our principal was not Out, but it was an open secret that she and her “roommate” were not just roommates. Basically, it was a gay friendly environment for the most part. Other teachers were open with their students, and I generally had a policy of not broadcasting my queerness, but if a student asked I would answer honestly. After I got engaged, most of my students and the rest of the staff knew I wasn’t straight. But there were a couple of older, traditional staff members who were not at all okay with the gay.

    One such person was a support teacher I’ll call Dolores. She was older, from a very Christian and conservative country, and she was a talker; the sort of person who will not stop harping on negatively to anyone who will listen about EVERYTHING, and does not understand most social cues that the person is no longer interested. Most times, you have to just abruptly walk away and close the door to get her to stop talking. It was intense. And she was really homophobic. At one point, she started talking non-stop to another teacher about how 2 male students shouldn’t be seated next to each other in classes because they weren’t masculine enough and they would probably “spread their homosexual energy” too much. The teacher she kept trying to convince of this was openly gay, and she would say homophobic things in front of him just to make him crazy.

    Anyway– One day, not long after my partner and I got engaged, she corners me in my classroom to talk about something else completely, and somehow ends up discussing the gender roles in my relationship. For context, my partner and I are both very feminine presenting; it is often surprising to people that we’re gay. It went something like this.
    Dolores: In your picture, you both look like such nice girls. Who is the man and who is the woman?
    Me: Ummm. Well there isn’t a man in our relationship, that’s kind of the point. Anyway, about this spreadsheet…
    Dolores, refusing to drop it: No, but who wears pants?
    Me, pretending to be clueless: I mean, I’m wearing pants today. I haven’t seen her outfit today, so I’m not sure what she’s wearing. Does this have something to do with the spreadsheet?
    Dolores, more and more frustrated: But one of you must be the man. Who makes the decisions?
    Me: We make decisions together, because we’re partners. What does a man have to do with that?
    Dolores: YOU KNOW WHAT I’M TRYING TO SAY. WHICH OF YOU IS THE MAN?!
    Me: Ummm do you understand the concept of homosexuality? I’m not sure work is the best place to get into this.
    Her: YES I DO DO YOU THINK I’M STUPID?! I’m just trying to understand who the man is!
    Me, giving up: JESUS IS THE MAN. JESUS IS THE ONLY MAN IN OUR RELATIONSHIP, OKAY?!

    She was utterly offended and thought I was making fun of her (okay, I was). BUT. She never initiated contact with me ever again, which was the best revenge I could have asked for. For a couple of years after that, other staff members would ask me how I managed to keep from being cornered by her, and I would just say “I told her about my personal relationship with Jesus Christ, and she was terribly offended.”

      1. Very Queer Very Here*

        It’s basically my best Dinner Party story. It KILLS. Every time. I only left teaching within the last year, and from what I understand, she’s still up to the same old tricks there. A friend of mine is counting the days to her retirement.

    2. FACS*

      This is genius. A dear friend once answered the “who is the man” question with “No one. That is kind of the definition of being a lesbian”. Mike drop.

      1. LabTechNoMore*

        It’s so perfect I would borrow this line myself, except my relationships already have two men, and I’m Muslim. (Still tho… I might use it.)

    6. FD*

      Bwahaha, that’s great.

      Mind you it’s also kind of a depressing reflection on her own relationships but there you go…

  153. Joanna*

    I work in the defense industry and a significant number of my coworkers are retired military. Early in my career, I occasionally had to work with a retired Col, who liked to take his insecurities out on young women who went to college instead of into the military. We were on travel and I ran into him at the breakfast buffet before anyone else came down. I was making the necessary small talk, and must have used a “big” word. Without hiding his contempt, he sneered at me and said, “You use a lot of fifty cent words.” I have no idea where this came from, but as cheerfully as I could, I responded, “Well Bob, just for you, I’ll stick to 25 cent words.” The look on his face was priceless.

  154. rita*

    I had a boss who brought me onto his team, telling me that working with him would teach me what I needed to learn in order to be promoted to the next level. Then he sexually harassed me, which I tried to go along with/deflect without rocking the boat. Then he told me it would be too confusing for people if I got promoted. Then I got laid off.

    Later he left that company and started his own business, which was his baby. It went OK for a while until it did not. He ended up having to look for a buyer just to get out of debt, and my new much larger company acquired his business as a subdivision. He was not brought on, and I was put in charge of it. I realized within the year that his business was a failing idea, and I got to be the one to make the decision to close it altogether. Hee hee hee.

  155. Never Working for a Museum Again*

    The nonprofit I was working for organized a silent auction every year as part of their annual gala/fundraiser. I’m an artist and had agreed to donate one of my paintings for that year’s auction. Unfortunately I was let go a month before the event. I took great pleasure in withdrawing my artwork from the auction. One of my coworkers actually ended up buying it from me.

  156. HotSauce*

    My best triumph happened a few years ago. I was working under a manager who was a Huge Bully. He micromanaged everyone to the point of causing major slow downs or full stops. Every time you did A, you should have done B, when you did B, you should have done A. He berated people in front of others, the bigger the audience, the more viscous he would get. He liked to tell people he was a big guy with a big personality and if people didn’t like it they should stop being such crybaby snowflakes & nut up. After working with this cretin for a couple of years I ended up having a major panic attack at work. My department manager happened to be walking in at the same time and called an ambulance as I passed out. He called me into his office the following week to get a rundown of what happened. I figured I had nothing to lose, so I laid it all out for him. Boss was a monster and I couldn’t take it anymore, I was having suicidal thoughts and several of my coworkers had casually mentioned how they would love to meet Boss in a dark alley & beat the tar out of him. Department Manager thanked me & said I think the best course of action is to move you to a different area for now until we can look into this further. I ended up being moved to a new team with a great manager who was instrumental in my climbing the corporate ladder. Demon Boss was eventually demoted after a full investigation revealed that he had verbally and physically (!) assaulted several employees. He was forced to take several anger management classes and put on a very rigid PIP. He now works the night shift in the parts department by himself. I saw him recently when I went in to pick up a few things from the office one morning as he was leaving. He said hello, I fully ignored him. Petty maybe, but it felt utterly triumphant.

    1. WellRed*

      He physically abused people and wasn’t fired? Hell is wrong with your company? I love that you decided to speak up because yes, nothing to lose. I wish more employees would do this.

  157. happier now*

    I used to work with a woman who treated me like I reported to her, even though we were actually at the same level and had the same boss (there was other weirdness, like I shared an office with her *actual* direct report, while she had her own office). She would ask me to do things for her that were not my responsibility and that she ought to do herself. She would even ask me to do outside-of-work things, like (seriously) picking up her neighbor’s CSA box, because their dog was sick (?) (and this wasn’t, like, “Oh, you can pick up their box if you want the vegetables,” she was asking me to pick up the box and BRING THE VEGETABLES TO HER THE NEXT DAY, for *her* to eat, not even for her to give to her friends with the sick dog). (In the end she got her direct report to do this – it was probably 45 minutes out of his way to pick up these dumb vegetables which presumably would have gone to a food pantry or another CSA member or something if they hadn’t been picked up.)

    ANYWAY our mutual boss told me I was allowed to just ignore her when she made these kinds of requests, and so my strategy was generally somewhere between direct refusal and malicious compliance. I remember one time she asked me to update something that was 100% her responsibility in a part of our content management system that I’d never used, and I was like, “Oh, I don’t actually know how to do that, could you teach me? Oh, you don’t know either? Why don’t we sit down and do it together and then we’ll both know how to do it next time!” She got very annoyed and left my office in a huff. It’s not the most exciting story but it was very satisfying.

  158. Kathlynn (Canada)*

    We were getting a new manager, first thing I hear about him is that he doesn’t think women should work graveyards.We aren’t men enoughto do so. (at thispoint , I was the one training everyone for graveyards and constantly kicking people out of the store for loitering or stealing. And had gone through an armed robbery). Luckily for him and the company, the assistant manager knew me well enough to point out that he legally can’t do that, and might have pointed out that we wanted graveyards.
    he also made us download WhatsApp, and had a stanze of what ever the business needs are comes first regardless of anything else. (including breaking labour laws in some instances. but I didn’t realize it at the time. Else I wouldhave pushed back on it too). So he’s posting the schedules on WhatsApp and mostly talking to us there, and he tell a co-worker that she has to work Sunday morning because it’s a business need, and if she doesn’t like it find another job. The reason she’s unavailable for Sunday is that she’s religious and attends services on Sunday. And under my province’s human rights, reasonable accommodation requirements include allowing your employees to go to religious services. And so I told him that he needed to give her the day off or he’d be discriminating against her. “but it’s not about her ethnicity” , and I told him exactly what I wrote, that he had the duty to accommodate this else it was discrimination. The schedule was then updated and she got Sundays off from then on. I then seperately messaged my co-worker and apologized if my actions upset her or anything. (I didn’t say this, but she’s the type who doesn’t speak up easily). and she wasn’t.
    I then had the entire conversation backed up and sent to my email, where I saved it until I left the company.
    I would have considered going to hr, but I’ve seen enough to know that I know my rights regarding safe working environment and human rights better than they do. (they refused to investigate a sexual assault/harassment because my manager didn’t report it (her manager might have told her not to). and told me that I didn’t have the right to refuse work that could kill me due to triggering my asthma (I mean, aside from stopping my breathing I was dealing with deepfryers. I collapse there and I’m dead from falling in them or badly burned from the basket falling on me while lifting it. There was also a lot of other things to hit when falling that could result in a serious head injury or broken kneck. The room is tiny)

  159. BlueBelle*

    This is about 12 years ago. I was working as a consultant in the oil & gas industry. I was consulting for a very large company but was working specifically with one group. 3 months in there was a reorg and new head of this group was brought in. He has a long history at the company and had been part of some major thing in the 1980s and since then he was on the “untouchable” list. He was a grade A a-hole.
    In the 3 weeks I was working after he arrived, he repeatedly spoke to me as if I were an idiot and spoke directly to my breasts. 3 weeks after arriving he called a meeting with about 15 people. We sat in a conference room and he went around the table one by one to tell people why they were not necessary and they were being let go, then they were escorted out by security.
    He got to me and I let him talk and talk. I reached into my bag and pulled out my consultant contract that was signed by the head of legal, HR, and the CEO and informed him that I would be happy to leave as soon as I received my check for breaking the contract, which was over $35,000. He did not realize I was a consultant. I refused to leave until someone cut me a check.

    1. Warrant Officer Georgiana Breakspear-Goldfinch*

      Amazing. You actually got the check? He didn’t back down and say you had to stay? Wow.

  160. Feral At This Point*

    Company (a nonprofit) created a new position – a Director – and brought in a new person instead of allowing me to even interview, despite multiple successes and years of experience. I was highly annoyed but wanted to keep my job so I was determined to be nice, be a team player, and make the best of the situation.

    She knew almost nothing about the job she was hired to do, had been out of the industry for years, and was very threatened by me and my institutional knowledge. I tried to give her some tips, fill her in on the key players, company ‘norms’ and ‘culture’ but nope … she knew everything and didn’t want to hear or learn it.

    She insisted on going in my place to a conference that I had been going to for years and when I tried to fill her in on some of the ‘norms’ and friendly reminders about some of the quirks there, she reminded me she that was the Director and if she had questions, she’d ask. Her presentation was a direct copy of one I had done earlier to major donors, volunteers, and potential donors and dealt with and highlighted US tax laws, giving levels, gifts, etc. with all references being made in US Dollars. They were all Canadian and her conference was in Toronto. She had copied the US version and not the Canadian version, despite them being in the same folder and clearly labeled.

    She hit the roof when she got back and demanded to know why I didn’t remind her to use the Canadian version. I pointed out that I knew she knew she was going to Canada and it seemed insulting to remind her that Canada and the United States are different countries with all her years of experience ….

  161. sara*

    I used to work at a job that required a lot of physical labour, attention to detail, and daily paperwork. We had terrible management who took a very hands-off approach to anything interpersonal (especially interpersonal between 2 female coworkers).

    Many of my coworkers were variously terrible, but this is about one in particular. She would be frequently late, take long lunches, skate by on the bare minimum, etc. One time we thought she was working but turns out she’d been napping under a desk for 2+ hours. She’d let part-time staff handle tasks that were out of their scope of training (they didn’t have the safety training or experience). But she was BFFs with another coworker who was a suck-up to our boss, and so she basically had the boss’s favourite there to fight her battles, stand up for her etc.

    Meanwhile, I was dealing with some physical health stuff for a lot of this, so would do things like take 2x30min breaks rather than an hour at lunch, and then get “told on” for being in the office while other people were working. I had approval to do this, and also never left while urgent work was still happening unless I was literally going to faint. And she got the part-time staff all mad at me because I enforce the safety rules about who does what. And so on for a few years…

    As an industry, we had massive inspections that happened every 5 years, where all of our paperwork would be audited, all our work spaces inspected, etc. A huge deal because if we didn’t pass we could have to close down. There was a day we were prepping for this inspection, while this coworker was off (vacation or day off or sick day, I don’t remember) and we realized that a bunch of our paper records were all out of order/misfiled. There’d been a leak above our filing area earlier that year so we’d moved a bunch of stuff very quickly and it had gotten disorganized. In re-sorting these files, we realized that for the past year, she’d only done her (very mandatory) paperwork about 1/3 of the time. Despite frequently foisting jobs off on others so she could “deal with her records”. Not to mention that for the most part these forms involve putting your name and date at the top and then checking a bunch of boxes of the tasks that were done that day.

    This coworker got fired the next morning… Not exactly for the things she should have been fired for but better late than never.

  162. Iroh*

    On my first day on a new team after a corporate restructure I got into a really bad car accident. This meant I needed a lot of physical therapy and other doctor appointments.

    I was assigned to a woman I exclusively refer to as Shitty Manager, so I’ll call her SM. SM hated me, but her boss and skip boss liked my skillset. All she could do was make my work life a living hell, which she did.

    I had to have PT everyday for almost an entire year. I had originally scheduled that PT to be at 6:30am which meant I got to work around 8:15am (not a role where 8am on the dot was needed). I regularly worked until 6 or 7pm and was salaried. Well SM of course made a big show in one of our team meetings about me being late. I called her afterwards and reminded her of the situation, and pointed out I worked late to more then make up the time. SMs response was “8am-5pm are the core hours period. End of story.” So I told her that next week I would be there at 8am.

    I cancelled all my 6:30am slots and instead scheduled in the evenings meaning I had to leave work at 5pm sharp.

    Well SM loved to try and shame me in front of the departmental managers during our monthly meetings.

    SM barked, Iroh why are you sneaking out of the door at 5pm everyday!?

    Me feigning concern, Im confused SM, you set this schedule for me last month?

    I did no such thing! What are you talking about?

    Don’t you remember? We spoke about how I have daily medical appointments and I had been doing them before work but that meant I couldn’t get to the office before 8:15am and you said getting here at 8am was integral for my role. So I switched my PT appointments and now I have to leave at 5pm to go to them.

    Well I didn’t realize it meant you wouldn’t be able to work late! Arriving at 8:15 is fine switch them back!

    Oh no! I really wish you had discussed this with me more when I told you my situation. I’ve unfortunately already cancelled all those appointments after you told me that arriving at 8am was critical!

    At that point her skip level boss laughed at her and said “Well SM this is a great example of what I’ve talked to you about. So to make sure it sticks this time you will cover Irohs sales reports until she is healed.”

  163. Friendly*

    In my early twenties I (female) was working as the only photographer’s assistant at a studio shared by three male product photographers. They had a pinup calendar, very scantily clad young women, on the wall that they refused to take down. This was before the burlesque revival, so it couldn’t even be remotely excused as empowering for women in any way, just stale old sexism.
    It just took minutes after I put a Jeff Stryker (famous gay 80’s porn star) calendar next to it for them to remove it. (And mine as well)

    2. mf*

      Yup, this is the winner. I’d’ve paid good money to see the looks on their faces when they saw your calendar.

    3. Loredena Frisealach*

      At an early job, my coworker opted to have his ‘birthday lunch’ at the local Hooters. Where he bought one of their calendars and hung it on his office wall. I was young enough not to say anything, while also being obnoxious enough to retaliate. I bought a Fabio calendar and hung it in my office. I don’t think it took more than a couple of weeks before HR was asking me to take it down (every woman in payroll was swinging by my office on the regular) and confirming that yes, the Hooter calendar would be coming down too.

    4. Mannequin*

      Jeff Stryker is a regular at the market where my roommate works. When he discreetly let him know he’d been quite a fan of his films in the 80s, the next time he came in, he brought him one of his action figures- autographed!

  164. Data Maven*

    I had taken a job that was technically appropriate for my work experience (i.e. I was hired at a Llama Groomer 1, because I only had experience in Alpaca Grooming), with the expectation that if I did pick up the Llama specific aspects quickly I would be promoted within a year. This was explicitly cited when I took the role.

    Well, I took the role and quickly took on Llama Grooming 2 and 3 tasks and excelled. But, because of verybadleader when I brought it up around my 1 year mark I was told “We agree you are doing level 2 and 3 work, but you should be happy we let you work on that. You won’t get a promotion, and we’re taking away your favorite project”.

    Well, I decided that wasn’t worth it so I applied for and accepted a different role with a excellentseniorleader, but still within the same Camelid Care division. The catch? Well, now I’m at the same level as the verybadleader, who now is in the position where I tell his team how to execute on the Llama grooming to maintain regulations, and he has to not only comply, but also maintain a positive working relationship with me so he won’t get in trouble with my boss, excellentseniorleader.

    It’s very amusing because if he had just agreed to compensate me fairly in comparison to my peers, he wouldn’t be short a Llama Groomer, nor would he have to execute his previous direct reports plans.

  165. The_artist_formerly_known_as_Anon-2*

    Too many to add – I have a whole collection of “Dinner Table Stories”. I could have written a book.

  166. Liz Steedman*

    When I was contracting I worked for a company where the manager was prone to outbursts and bullying. I was in the contract for about a year when this manager decided that I should be made a permanent employee. The offer was really poor, just over 1/2 of the salary I was making as a contractor. But I was told by the manager that job security is more important then money, and I’d be taking a risk not accepting the offer I kindly turned it down. His response was “OK, we’ll be terminating your contract then at end of next week”. The opportunities were good in the industry, so I started looking for a new contract.

    End of next week arrives, and he announces to me my contract will be extended again for another two weeks but that is all, I’m out after that. OK, I’m still looking for a new contract. I find a new position in the 2nd week, just a few days before my extension is over. On the last day of my extension he announces again that I will be extended again for another two weeks, but that’s it – no more extensions. I kindly refuse and say it’s my last day as agreed two weeks ago.

    Man was he upset his tactics didn’t work to scare me into 1/2 salary and a permanent position. He stomped around all day in a mood and I heard him shouting at others in a closed room about how to cover my absence. I packed up my desk at 5pm and quietly left.

  167. Metadata Janktress*

    My boss at my first professional job out of grad school was one of the most incompetent humans to grace my profession. He was also a walking definition of the Dunning-Kruger effect. We’re talking about willfully doing things that could damage the things we work with, losing track of items in our system, entering data inconsistently…meanwhile, he’s dispensing pearls of wisdom to me like how a flat box should be stored, um, flat. One shining example is that he didn’t know how to do the coding we need to do for our documents. So he copied code from another institution’s document, tried to plug in our data, and pretended he knew how it worked. However, because he didn’t really understand it when writing our documents, the coding was broken in all of them. Since I actually studied that type of coding (which he knew) and it was a focus of my degree, I fixed one pretty easily. He then declared that I would work on it from now on because “I can’t believe it, but you know how to do it better than I do!”

    Several months before taking this job, I had applied to a gig at a really good institution, but there was radio silence for so long, I assumed that they chose not to interview me. However, they emailed me on my first day of work with this jerk asking to speak with me. Jerk was aware that I was interviewing (it was a part time temp gig, so it was expected that I wasn’t going to stay) and where, and he was dismissive of it. The hiring process took forever, so I spent four months being told the best way to staple things and how Roman numerals are complicated. (Yes, those were real things he ‘taught’ me.) Then came the glorious day at work when I happened to check my email and found an unofficial offer from the institution. I audibly gasped and he asked me what was wrong. I then told him as smoothly as I could, “I’m afraid I will have to give you two weeks notice.” That felt GOOD.

  168. Paralegal Part Deux*

    Two stories. My first job out of high school was at a frame shop in the back as a framer – framing the pictures while people waited and as standing orders. Anyway, the whole management up there – from the owner on down – was effed up. I said something off-handed, and they didn’t like it, so my immediate supervisor called my mother and my mother come to the store to discuss it. I was 19 and had no idea what was normal and what wasn’t. My manager then proceeds to jump on my mom for whatever it was I said in passing (it wasn’t a big deal as I recall – memory is fuzzy since I’m now 42) and tried to slap my mom. My mom wasn’t having that and slapped my manager. We left (what a way to quit, right?), and the manager pressed chargers of assault. It cost my mom $500, and someone made the comment of “bet you wouldn’t have done that if you’d know how much that was going to cost” and my mom, not missing a beat, said, “hell, no. If I’d known it was going to cost me that much, I’d have laid her out.”

    Second story was my job as a ceramics painter I mentioned the other day. I really did paint teapots (among other things). I worked on commission, and it was awful. I had the hardest pattern to paint, and the boss berated me on a near daily basis for not putting out more stuff like when I did other patterns. He was a moron to the nth degree despite his wife (who designed this stuff) explaining this to him why this one pattern was harder than the rest. Didn’t matter to him. So, there were some weeks I made like $113. *eye roll* Anyway, after he fired me, and I threw in the Granny-judgement at the time, I was basically told I had no marketable job skills by the unemployment office. BUT since the great yahoo of a boss sent my job overseas, somehow through unemployment, he had to pay for me to go back to school and get a trade/education to have marketable skills. I got unemployment for 2 years while I went to school, and unemployment paid for school, too. There are some days I’d like to thank they great jackwagon of a relative for giving me a career that I turned out to be good at, thankfully.

    1. Picard*

      Where the heck did you work that SLAPPING people (much less calling your mother?) was considered… ok??!!

  169. Always Sunny*

    I didn’t get back at this guy personally but it is still a funny work jerk story. We hired a guy whose main role was customer service, Charlie. After about two weeks he started getting into fights with everybody. He constantly talked bad about all the sales reps, he decided that his duties included contractor management despite the fact that we had someone in that position, Dennis. Charlie spends a ton of time blaming every problem on Dennis, including the problems he creates with contractors. At one point he called me up because a contractor couldn’t find the work site despite the fact that the address was correct on the work order. As i was trying to explain the location he talked over me and said “when you are able to figure out where he is supposed to be let me know,” and hung up on me. I called him back and chewed him out. After that we didn’t speak for a while, I didn’t really need him in my role so I chose to never call him. Shortly after that he got a review where he was told that every single person he works with has complained about his behavior and the way he treats them. He was completely shocked. He had no idea people felt this way. He offered me a half apology for the incident we had where he vaguely said that maybe he could have handled it differently and we’re all good now right? At this point I no longer cared. i knew the company wouldn’t fire him and i could get along just fine without his help and i preferred that he didn’t call me to berate me for made up issues. About a week after the review (I was not present for this) he got fed up with something and stood up and announced to the office, about three other people, “This place is a sinking ship and I’m not going down with it.” He then walked out the door. However, despite the fact he had just walked out of the office in the middle of the day he apparently changed his mind. He returned the next day George Constanza style, saying he didn’t really quit he just had a bad day. Finally at this point he was told he did in fact quit and he no longer had a job.

  170. Bec*

    I was an intern at a small non-profit performing arts organization. One of the six or so staff members was German and seemed to be doing her best to embody the accompanying stereotypes. I don’t believe she actually had authority over anyone, except, sort of, intern me (she wasn’t my supervisor, but again, very small company, so any staff member could pretty much tell me what to do), but she was used to calling all the shots in terms of how and when things got done. Brusquely. She was great at organization and very efficient, so mostly this worked out, but everyone was definitely used to scurrying to carry out instructions from Gertrude and seemed scared of what would happen if they fell short of her expectations.

    One day, we were working on a donor mailing. All hands on deck, assembly line-style envelope stuffing around the conference table. Two higher-ups signed each letter, someone else paired letters to envelopes (they weren’t window envelopes, so the name and address on the letter and envelope had to match), I folded the letters with a flyer inside and stuffed and sealed the envelope, and Gertrude applied stamps (two per envelope, due to a recent increase in USPS rates). Since she had the last step, she had waited for a bit of a stack to build up before joining us, and that backlog was steadily disappearing when she burst out “Bex! It’s so annoying that you keep passing me these envelopes face down! The stamps go on the front, I need them right-side-up! Why are you doing that?!”

    Now, not having worked closely with me, Gertrude did not know that my brain is not good at auto-pilot. I have reasons for every tiny thing. I’m not bragging; this can often be a hindrance, but in this case it came in handy. I am also not generally argumentative at work, but I do take things very literally, and she asked why I was doing it, so. “Well, Gertrude, the last step I do with each envelope is to seal it, and I need it face down to do that. I could flip them over for you afterward, but my part of the process is already going slower than yours – you’re almost out of envelopes to stamp! – so overall, I think we’ll be done sooner if you keep flipping them. Maybe you could let another pile build up and flip a whole stack at once, instead of one at a time since that’s annoying you.”

    I felt everyone at the table draw in a breath as I was speaking, and held it. Gertrude had yelled at me to do something her preferred way, and I had said no, at length. Fortunately, though I think it was close, Gertrude liked things being done as efficiently as possible more than she liked always having the most logical plan in the performing arts non-profit. She looked at the tiny stack of envelopes waiting for her, said, “huh, you’re right, I am way ahead of you!” and went to do some of her regular work at her desk while I stuffed more envelopes. Everyone exhaled, and one shook his head at me, wide-eyed, in that “I can’t believe you tried that AND I can’t believe it worked” way.

  171. YTA*

    The VP of Software Engineering (who had once spent a whole hour long meeting berating me because something was 1 pixel off) decided to start a weekly open forum meeting. He opened the first meeting about how this was a meeting for any and all feedback; if you wanted to tell him he was an a__hole this was the meeting to do it. So I immediately said, “Dude, you’re an a__hole.” I repeated that phrase every week until he stopped holding the meeting. I was privately thanked by many of my coworkers.
    (I never suffered any repercussions and in fact worked there for a few years after he was fired, not directly for being an a__hole but for giving the company an ultimatum that they promote him.)

  172. Mr. Tumnus*

    Not work related, but still a lot of fun….

    Several years ago, I had family with drug issues [they are several years sober now], so things would be missing from my house (I live in the boonies and had really old, easily jimmied windows at the time). At one point, they took a bunch of old books and sold them to a local antique dealer. When I found the shop, I asked the owner how much he had paid for them so I could reimburse him. (In my state, if something is stolen and then sold to a pawn shop or third party, you have to reimburse the shop to get your stuff back.) He said no and insisted they weren’t my books. They were pretty identifiable, but whatever.

    I told him I had a police report and would have to call the non-emergency number and wait for the police to arrive, and it would take several hours. I then stood outside his shop, in front of the door. I very politely held the door open for the next customer, and told her, pleasantly but loudly, that I was sorry to be in her way, I was just waiting for the police to help me recover my stolen property. I only had to do that once and then *miraculously* he realized these were my books, wrapped them up neatly, and gave me the amount to reimburse. He’d bought them at about 10% of their value, so I then sealed the deal by innocently remarking to his half-full shop that I didn’t realize antique stores had such high margins, but I would have to get in the business myself if I could get away with a 90% mark-up. A few people walked out right behind me.

      1. Loredena Frisealach*

        eh, OP was required to pay for the books, not like the pawn shop owner would be out of pocket. The shop owner may or may not have known they were stolen when he bought them, but he wasn’t entitled to refuse the reimbursement once he knew so not all the ire is misplaced!

  173. Aggretsuko*

    Sadly not my story, but we had a temp here who was lovely, and when we had an open position, applied for it. She only made it to the first round of interviews. But here’s how she found out about it:
    (a) In the staff meeting at 8 a.m., the big boss started talking about getting this girl’s computer back.
    (b) At 9 a.m. she had a Zoom meeting with our supervisor and then the supervisor’s supervisor, who wanted to be the one who broke the bad news. She lectured the poor girl about all of her inadequacies (no college degree–lemme tell ya, this job doesn’t need or require one to be able to do it) until she started crying on Zoom. She felt SO shamed that the big boss later called her to say nice things to her.
    (c) They did, however, extend her contract so she could train the new girl who does get the job!

    Happily, the temp got a permanent job elsewhere a week later. I was so happy for her that she could shove it in their faces.

  174. FACS*

    Two stories. First, one glorious morning I rode my motorcycle to work, parking where I always do and with a permit. I’m in healthcare. As I was taking my helmet off a youngish person came up, wearing his doctor coat (which is Not Done at our institution) and loudly informed me that I was not allowed to park in that lot. I’m not a big person but I’m no shrinking violet. He also informed me that he was a ER doctor and I could be blocking someone from lifesaving work. I extended my hand and said “I’m Dr A, chair of the (committee that interacts a lot with the ER) and president of the medical staff. Do you know Dr B?” He said of course as Dr B is the managing physician of the ER. I said “if you see him today let him know we are having chicken piccata for dinner. He is my husband”. Needless to say he did not last long. Message to the wise-you can be a jerk to colleagues (me) but sooner or later you will need us and never, ever tick off the nurses. They make the system work.

    Second my son. Not work but kinda great. In Scouts the senior leaders could choose whether or not to have a roommate or the best tent site. One guy decided that he wanted both perks. Picture the old fashioned tents when you pull on 2 ropes to open it up. My son and a friend launched a plan. They would simply untie the ropes and collapse the tent. No damage, just a pain. Other Scouts realized what they were doing and took over when the ringleaders were with the guy. One child had been taught to make towel animals so he would come back to a towel swan in the tent, or an elephant under the canvas. The adult leaders know what was up but were pretty “karma, what ya gonna do?” about it. No harm, no foul.

    1. Office Narc, Apparently*

      I would pay big money to see that guy’s face when you roasted him with that chicken piccata line. That is art in its purest form!

  175. just a thought*

    I started a government position last July that started at Grade X but has promotion potential to Grade X+1. This means that I could be promoted within my new position without going through the normal hiring process or other government processes. Everyone hiring made it very clear, I would have to earn Grade X+1. The promotion is not automatic and may take several years. (I am totally fine with Grade X for several years, but apparently the entitled millennial stereotype made everyone feel the need to repeat this over and over and over).

    When I on-boarded, I was placed with a terrible boss. He didn’t on-board me at all, I had to figure out all my benefits with zero help, I had no idea if I needed to fill out a timesheet and if/when I would get paid, and he didn’t assign any work to me or tell me what I was supposed to do. I eventually had to ask another department lead for help. Well, terrible boss got promoted to Deputy Director.

    Well Deputy Director was still my supervisor until a new boss was brought in as his replacement. I kept asking Deputy Director about what skills I should focus on or try to do to get to a Grade X+1 level. After months with no answer besides “show leadership potential” he finally put on my Individual Development Plan “lead a department initiative”. Great!

    Except…all 3 chances I’ve had to lead a department initiative he found a way to block:
    1. A Senior Engineer needed someone to lead his initiative. He would be there to help with strategy and bigger issues but needed someone to do the day-to-day. I had worked with him before, and didn’t have enough work, so I volunteered. Senior Engineer took this to Deputy Director and the Director. They said yes! We were both excited. Then a few days later they changed their minds. They took away the initiative with no warning or communication and let someone that has no idea what the concept is but “is a leader” lead this initiative.
    2. New boss came. He wanted me to lead an effort and have a more experienced person supporting me. Deputy Director said this a bad idea because “the project manager is mean”.
    3. The leader of an initiative I’m working on left and kept saying over and over that I’m the only one familiar enough with what’s going on to replace him and lead it. Deputy Director and Director decided this isn’t true and gave it to someone that has no idea what the initiative is and is now trying to play catch-up. Their excuse this time was “She is only Grade X so people may not help her and she needs a Grade X+1 supporting.”

    At this rate, I’m never going to be able to do my job, get leadership skills or get promoted.
    The worst part is the people that work with me directly say I would do great at leading. It’s just the Deputy Director and Director, who barely know who I am and have never worked with me directly, blocking things.

    WELL this Monday was payday. I got a paycheck bigger than normal so I checked the payroll system. I was paid as an Grade X+1. I emailed HR and payroll about the mistake. Apparently it is NOT a mistake. I was automatically promoted to Grade X+1 and Deputy Director is NOT HAPPY about this :)

    TBD if HR lets me keep the promotion (and if the promotion means I can FINALLY lead a initiative).

  176. Unrepentant Beer Thief*

    This is a two-in-one story! I had my own mild petty revenge but other people had MUCH more glorious revenge on the same person.

    10-15 years ago, I was managing a small specialty store that really took off not too long after I started (I am not taking credit for this, I just joined up when things were getting going), and the owner, after a few years, decided that since his business was doing so well he wanted a “fun” side business. He decided to buy a bar that he frequented when the current owner mentioned he was trying to sell it (in part because it was violating a million building codes and had either been condemned at that point or it happened shortly after the sale went through). The fact that he was newly-dating one of the bartenders seemed like big red flag, in that one shouldn’t be a significant other’s boss and certainly shouldn’t *become* their boss after the relationship starts, but he went ahead with it anyway.

    What happened was that he was so caught up in trying to run a bar that he wasn’t taking care of a lot of things he’d done around the store; the other manager and I were happy to step up and take on more responsibility, but the problem was that he hadn’t told us we needed to do those things at all, so suddenly I was getting phone calls about bills when I’d never been given authority to pay bills directly and so would never have thought they weren’t being taken care of. We were run ragged over that year’s holiday season (I remember I didn’t get any extra days off, since Christmas eve/day were my normal weekend that year) and the boss was almost never there and hard to pin down when we needed support or decision-making on things.

    It was a small place, with maybe five or six employees, but I am pretty sure that all of us seriously considered quitting during that time. I certainly did! In the end I was glad to take on more responsibility, in that I liked being the go-to person for purchasing decisions with some of our big suppliers, but it happened in pretty much the worst possible way. I remember coming in on Friday nights for a few months and doing paperwork from 9-11 at night, after the store closed, because it was building up too quickly to handle during a busy workday.

    My boss’s relationship with the bartender imploded in a whirlwind of drama I was not privy to, but the end result is that he was apparently too chickenshit to fire her so tried not scheduling her for any hours in the hope that she’d quit. What happened instead is that he got a call around 4pm on a Friday from the head bartender saying “if you want the bar open this weekend you should probably come in, because we all quit, starting immediately.” The entire staff walked out in protest. Good for them! Yes, this caused more stress around the store because he was, of course, super stressed about it, but I was honestly so glad they all took a stand.

    My own “revenge” came a couple years later. He sold the bar to someone else (how he found a buyer I do not know) but took all the bottled beer and the jukebox; not having a place to store them in his home, they lived in the back room of the store. The jukebox was still there even years after I left; it may be there still, for all I know. The bottled beer lived in boxes and six-packs bundled together on a pallet that took up needed space in the back room, and one day after dealing with some work-related frustration I just snapped and grabbed a few bottles that looked good and threw them in my bag to take home. Everything was jumbled together and plenty of the boxes were already partially empty; I realized no one had any idea how much beer there was and so every few days I’d grab a bottle or two of something I wanted. I had no desire to stock my fridge with pbrs but there were some decent craft beers in there!

    I stole maybe 10-12 bottles overall; I didn’t want it to be super obvious that anything was missing, but I felt no guilt at all and decided it was my consolation prize for suffering through the entire bar saga. I have mixed feelings about that job overall; there were some good moments and we did get stuff like health insurance that few places that small provide, but its most dysfunctional aspects weren’t clear to me until I’d gotten some distance.

    Bonus fun fact: no lie, the bar was named Hell. (If this makes me recognizable to anyone, please be cool, this is too perfect of a detail not to mention.)

    1. Sinister Serina*

      Hmmmm. Heaven and Hell? I knew them both back in the 90’s and lived near 18th St. But maybe this is somewhere else.

      1. Unrepentant Beer Thief*

        Sounds like some place different! No Heaven to be found, sadly, and no 18th either.

  177. GammaGirl1908*

    I’ve taught group exercise classes for many years, and there was a real grump at the front desk of one of my gyms. I’m not one to go around insisting that people give me gratuitous smiles, and I don’t need sweetness, but this gentleman couldn’t even manage neutrality. He sat at reception with a sour expression, scoffed in response to polite / neutral greetings (Me: Hello. Him: Ugh!), refused to move when I needed to use the computer at his station to log my data (often snapping at me to use someone else’s computer, even when his was the only one available to use), never knew where anything or anyone was and was pissy and rude about it “How should I know?” was a common response to a perfectly reasonable question), rolled his eyes at a normal request and didn’t answer, turned his back on people without answering et cetera. I mean, it’s one thing to be a grump, but then maybe don’t work reception?

    Anyway, one day I needed to use the workstation at his desk, and he had stepped away. I did what I needed to do (taking maybe 90 seconds), and was leaving when he returned and told me rudely that we instructors needed to use other computers and leave his alone (again, nowhere else available for me to do this quick, necessary task). I turned around and came back to the desk with a smile, and I said, “You know, I’m sure this is inconvenient for you. But the thing is, I have to use this workstation; I don’t have a choice. On top of that, every time I’ve ever asked you a question or even spoken, you’ve been not only unhelpful, but inexcusably rude. I’m an employee here, so I just let your horrible manners roll off my back, but I really hope you don’t speak to our customers that way.”

    He looked incredulous and stammered. Still smiling, I turned and left.

  178. Office Narc, Apparently*

    This is my moment, folks. Buckle up.

    At my last employer, I was casual friends with a male colleague. I’m a woman, we’re both early-to-mid-thirties. I knew we had very difficult political beliefs, but we had an unspoken agreement that we just didn’t talk about that stuff. We always got along really well and occasionally hung out after work. It was never anything other than platonic, and he was fun to be around.

    One day he casually mentioned that he has a podcast. COVID-19 arrived shortly thereafter, and in the early days of lockdown, I downloaded the most recent episode out of curiosity. It was shocking: He thinks COVID-19 is being overblown, he thinks China is somehow to blame, he thinks our workplace is being stupid/weak for sending as many people home as possible, he thinks it’s a violation of the Constitution, etc. It was nothing worthy of actually reporting to HR or anything, but his anger was… alarming. I said nothing to anyone but I found the podcast’s Facebook page and started checking it occasionally. I just had a bad feeling.

    A few months later, he posted this long rant about how he wants to accuse China of spreading COVID-19 on purpose in order to hurt other countries and cull their own population (just typing this makes me want to throw up and cry) but he thinks China is too dumb for such a sophisticated maneuver. He claims to know this because he was worked with Chinese businesses before (he actually has; the people he’s referring to are brilliant, kind, wonderful people). I was floored and furious and outraged at how racist and awful his comments were. I took a screenshot, sent it to my boss, and told him the whole story. The two of us then reported it to Mr. Podcast’s boss, who was equally horrified. She decided to talk to him directly about removing the post and let us know she’d call him right away.

    Out of curiosity, I went and checked the Facebook page a few hours later to see if he did take the post down and/or post something absurd about being “censored.” But what I found was even better: The entire page was gone! He deleted the whole thing. What’s more, the entire podcast was scrubbed from the internet. Dozens of episodes, gone for good. Nowhere to be found. I guess getting called out by his boss scared him, so he just took down the entire project and abandoned it.

    At this point, due to working from home, our friendship had largely faded, but I did get scared for a moment that he’d figure out I was the one who ratted him out and lash out. I mentioned it to a trusted work friend, and he laughed and told me that Mr. Podcast had apparently told everyone about his podcast. Everyone knew, everyone had listened, and everyone thought it was dumb as hell. There was even an episode where Mr. Podcast talks shit about Trusted Work Friend. He assured me that the podcast and its contents were not a secret and that there was no way he’d ever figure out it was me because he’d blabbed about it to so many other colleagues.

    I’ve since left that job. It’s still a little sad that he wound up being such an awful person, because he really was fun to be friends with for a while there. And part of me wishes they’d just fired him. But I will forever be proud of the fact that I scared a racist jerk into taking his entire podcast off the internet and that he’ll never know it was me. (Unless he reads this comment, which is unlikely, since he probably fancies himself far too alpha to read an advice column written by a woman.)

    2. Gabrielle*

      Thank you for shutting down such awful racism.

      OMG that last bit about him never reading this. So gross and yet you’re probably right.

  179. Ace in the Hole*

    At my first job in this industry, most of my coworkers were great but one guy was a bit of a bully. We worked in an unheated building, and stored our boots on a shoe rack in the locker room. I came in for my shift one December morning to find my boots full of water. Jerk Dude was the only one who arrived before me that morning.

    I knew he was waiting to see me struggling with soggy boots all day. Little did he know, I am the QUEEN of socks. I always wear two layers of wool socks to work and I keep backup pairs in my locker along with disposable toe warmers. I soaked up as much as I could with paper towels, then changed my socks at every break… my actual feet were dry and toasty all day. The look of confusion on his face when his prank failed to produce any results was priceless – and he never tried hazing me again.

  180. name, rank, ssan*

    To this day, I swear I wouldn’t do Air Force Basic Training again because of my drill sergeant. She broke all the rules that were supposed to protect Trainees from verbal and physical (!) abuse. I was scared of her, even as one of the older, more mature women of our squadron. We missed out on what few perks we should have earned (smoking during downtime, base-lib, touring San Antonio closer to graduation, etc.), but we were grateful just to make it through. Come to find out, she went bye-bye during the next training cycle–a Trainee had enough, and punched her in the face. An investigation ensued and she lost her job.

    1. RunShaker*

      whoa……I used to host trainees during Thanksgiving. The last time I did, I set my oven on fire. The butter from sweet potatoes overflowed to bottom & caught fire, a small fire. I asked them to not tell their parents! Nothing was ruined & I used baking soda to put it out.

  181. Petty Professional Intern*

    At my first internship at an ad agency, I was supposed to work with the design team. It was an odd situation, as the team consisted mostly of young people my own age, and I was the only one with a degree. I think they saw me as a threat and proceeded to ignore me to the point where I walked to the bus crying after work. Really the definition of mean girl behavior, even from the only member of the team who was over 35. A few years later, I was both working as a designer and a design teacher at the local university.

    Petty revenge 1: Younger Mean Girl took my class. I don’t think she actually recognized me (I was only an intern for three weeks before leaving for another agency) but I got a lot of satisfaction from seeing her turn in some very mediocre work. I still treated her like any other student, of course.

    Petty Revenge 2: When I was leaving my full-time designer job, Older Mean Girl applied for my role. (Younger Mean Girl actually applied as well, giving a third Mean Girl as reference. I laughed like a maniac when I read it in her cover letter.) I was very involved in the hiring process to screen capable applicants and my opinion was valued by my boss and colleagues. It wasn’t very hard to mention during the process that she had a history of being mean to interns …

  182. I shall not be named*

    First job out of college, i was barely making anything (not even minimum wage once OT was figured in). I killed myself for that job. 15 Hour Days, every weekend, manager’s emotional punching bag. I convinced myself that I had to put up with it since I had no experience in my field. After a year, one of the sales reps I met witht on a monthly basis quietly told me that she knew several firms who would hire me in a heartbeat. Ended up accepting a job that believed in 9-10 hour days and no weekends, covered most of my insurance and paid for parking. And this was at almost double my salary from first firm. Not even 3 week later, 1st boss called me begging me to come back. I was sooo organized. I could do everything. blah, blah blah. AND they would kindly hire me back at my original salary. I just looked at him (I’m sure I looked at him he had lost his mind) and told him they couldn’t afford me. It felt so good to actually get to say that.

    2. Firecat*

      Also depending on how far back this was, it is illegal to pay someone less then minimum wage. This is a little known thing with exempt staff – their total hours cannot make their wages less then minimum. If you want to it could be worth seeking back pay depending on how long you were there.

  183. EngineerDE*

    The worst workplace bully I ever worked with was Pat. He was an equipment operator in a manufacturing plant and I was a young female engineer. He was verbally abusive to multiple people with no provocation and took delight in it. It generally took the form of yelling and name-calling. He yelled at trainees who made minor mistakes, calling them “f***ing idiots”. When I entered his area sometimes he would roar, “What the hell do you want?” I could go on about how hostile he was to me and to many others. He told me once when getting my annual safety shoes that I shouldn’t bother since I wouldn’t last a year. A few years after I started, he met a wealthy woman at a motorcycle rally and decided to move to another state to live with her. He put in his 2 weeks notice, and during his last week, he no-called, no-showed 3 days in a row which meant automatic termination with no rehire eligibility. A few months later when the romance was dead, he tried to return, but of course he couldn’t. It was so satisfying to outlast him by several years at that company.

  184. Wendy Darling*

    I am loving this thread and thought why not add my own story. Over ten years ago, I was unemployed for many months, after the big economic bubble burst in 2008/2009. It took months to finally get unemployment and by the time that happened, I’d found a low wage, 40-hour/week job doing data entry/internet searching for a car dealer. I’d worked in the car biz in a variety of roles for the previous 10+ years so it was an easy job. Over time, I was promoted and making in the mid-teens per hour and got sold on the idea that I needed to buy a house – not easy to do at $14-15/hr as a single person except I worked 70-80 hours a week and this job paid the overtime without question, in fact, weirdly encouraged everyone to do it. My inner codependent and ego was on a high. Anyway, over time, what I thought was a great job with great perks and great money became an intrusion on my personal time and the big boss was off the chain inappropiate. One time, he was trying to hire a commercial realtor to sell a property for him and decides he’s going to drink a beer while we’re having a professional meeting, not unheard of but it was out of character. One beer in (he wasn’t a drinker), he was drunk and asking ultra personal questions of the realtor (think dating, sex, etc.). This type of interview style of getting super personal and then taking advantage of what someone might have naively said became the norm. He would make grandiose gestures under the guise of “helping” but then be offended when that person was unable or not interested to offer their loyalty or sacrifice their non work hours for him. He would even handle customer complaints by trying to sue the customer for libel. He had “fired” me several times only to “hire” me back a day or two later. I was crazy to go back each time but also desperate financially. Over time, I had just had enough, cleaned up my resume and started submitting applications. One morning before I had to work, I’d had a really upset stomach so it was taking longer to get ready than I anticipated and I was going to be late. I called to say I wasn’t feeling great but will be there just a little late. He got mad and said ‘just stay home’. I thought, alright I have the day off. I just had an upset stomach not a fever so I thought I’d drive to go see my mom who lived an hour away. I’m in my car, just having left my house and get an alert on my phone, the application and interview I had offered me a job!! The offer letter was in my inbox, I just had to print, sign, and return it. I was thrilled. 10 minutes later a text from toxic boss….”where are you?” “Umm, you told me to stay home from work so I’m not at work?” “Come in NOW” I should have told him to fuck off then and there but I turned around, only 15 mins from my house so it wasn’t far and went in to work. He’s on a fucking rampage about stuff, so I printed the offer letter, signed it, scanned it, sent it in to my new employer, and wrote out a notice letter for toxic boss. In the 10 mins this is happening, he’s decided he wants to punish me by moving my office to a different area and having me do a completely different job. So, I said “sure, and by the way, there’s a letter on your desk from me, let me know if you have any questions.” It only took 5 mins before I was called into his office and being interrogated: “how much are they offering you?” “when did you do this?” “you need to train someone before you can leave”. By now it’s lunch time and he’s asking me to turn over information, which is understandable, except that it’s in the most kindergarten sort of way. One task at a time, in no particular order, just what he’s randomly asking me for. Fine, whatever. Then, he finds another reason to blow up and I just walked to my desk, got my purse, left my keys, clocked out, and walked out. Former employees would post on Glassdoor about what tyrant he was and he tried to sue them too. I heard from someone that he’s closed the doors to his store without even telling the current employees it was happening. It was insane and I’m glad I’m out of that insanity.

  185. Mrs. Hawiggins*

    I had been employed at the HQ of a pretty large tech company, under a boss who made my life as miserable as possible. The only thing I can think of was that of all the things she had, I was the only one she thought she could control. She would berate me in front of staff at meetings, say “Oh that’s my assistant, nevermind,” to people on the phone who complimented my professional phone style, complain if her cafe sandwich that I ordered didn’t have ENOUGH lettuce on it, even when I’d asked for extra. It dawned on me eventually that I became sport for her.

    One day, her second in command started doing the same thing to me that big boss was doing. I took half a day off to get away. I couldn’t deal with it it was horrible. I return to a voicemail after big boss had left saying, “I had to spend half a day without an assistant because of x, y, z, so I think we need to talk about your performance.” Mind you her second in command had called me incompetent, valueless, and not necessary to the department. All because she was having a bad day apparently I was not answering her phone fast enough, and was not getting messages to her down the hall in less than two minutes. Ugh, I need Pepto Bismol reliving this.

    I asked to see big boss to talk about my performance at 4pm the next day but she said, “Uh, could we move it up to now because I have a spin class at 3:30.” It was noon. “Fine,” I said. I walked in, she took out her notepad to begin our “strategic planning for you,” to which I held up my hand in a stop sign motion. “No need,” I said. “I created a plan yesterday at home that I think will work for everyone,” and proceeded to pull out a resignation letter from the file folder I was carrying. Her eyes were like Thanksgiving platters.

    She then proceeded to tell me that everyone thought I was wonderful in the role, and no one seemed to be angry or dissatisfied with me (the hell) and I literally could not see through the gaslighting fog she sprayed the longer she talked. For a painful 30 minutes I was asked to reconsider, to talk to HR about any “problems we can work out,” and well you get where this was going. I was asked to think about it for the next 24 hours and “we would talk again.”

    So 24 hours later she called me into her office all smiles, “what can we do,” and “we’d like to offer this,” and blah.
    I just pulled out another resignation letter with the next day’s date on it. She was confused, so I had to tell her outright that my decision is final. I wanted to make that day my last day since I had so much PTO left on the books, but HR nicely asked that I transition for the remaining two weeks. I was allowed three days that I had already planned. I returned to show them that I was big enough to be professional.

    Big boss was asked to leave the company two months later, and rumor had it that I was one of the excuses they’d needed for YEARS. Other executives asked me to return to work for them, but I declined.

    1. Jenna*

      “I created a plan I think will work for everyone”

      This is SO GOOD. Congrats on getting out of there!

    2. Hawkeye is in the details*

      I sincerely hope you told the executives that you would not come back because they chose to allow your mistreatment rather than having the balls to actually manage your horrible manager.

      Ugh.

  186. Green Beans*

    This one wasn’t exactly a jerk, but in my first real career job, my manager had a rather pessimistic outlook on life. Most of the time, he was a supportive and great team member who added a touch of the amusingly dour to our group while respecting our more optimistic viewpoints. But every now and then, he would fall into a day-long sulk, including really pessimistic rants to others about how much everything stunk. It would end up casting a real Eeyore-like doom and gloom pall over our normally cheerful office for the entire day. Everyone knew, and everyone hated it. The rest of the team were all women, and it bothered me from a gender standpoint as well.

    Anyways, one day he was going off on one of his “the world sucks and is awful rants” and I looked him dead in the eye and responded, very matter-of-factly, “Well, we all just have to be adults and pleasantly deal with unpleasant things sometimes. Can’t make them other people’s problems.” Then I walked off.

    I was maybe a year into my first job, barely out of college, and he had at least 20 years’ worth of experience on me on top of being my manager… but it actually, somehow, worked. From then on, if he was in a bad mood, he would just excuse himself to go work on a solitary projects. If he found himself taking his bad mood out on others, he actually apologized for his mood and would refocus on the topic at hand (he really wasn’t a jerk.) It noticeably improved the workplace.

  187. talking back*

    We had a new CEO start awhile back and did an introductory meeting with the team I supervise, which we are all young-ish women. To humble brag, my team is a powerhouse within our organization and everyone on it is high-performing experts in their niche roles. The CEO (a man) made a comment about how he met our division head (who reports to him) a few years back when they were working on a cross-organization collaborative project together, and ended with saying, “You never know who you need to be nice to, in case they end up being your boss in a few years.” I replied, “I assume everyone on my team is going to end up becoming CEOs and Executive Directors some day,” and left it there. It’s the only time I ever feel like I said the right thing in the moment. It was one of my team member’s first days and I’m not letting some mediocre dude talk to the women I supervise that way.

  188. Divide by Zero*

    So not my story, but I felt a lot of satisfaction in watching this unfold.

    IT Guy from neighboring company was always a little smug about his abilities and rather proud of himself. He also had a little nervous laugh whenever he was addressed directly. He was about ten years my junior, so I chalked up his behavior to insecurity.

    Our office was small (seven employees) and one of the owner’s sons worked in the business, with the probability he would take over in the future. He was a modest, polite guy, particularly given his socioeconomic privilege. He never flaunted wealth or expected preferential treatment for it.

    IT Guy, Son and I got into a conversation about college and some of our recalled experiences. Son asked IT Guy where he graduated, and he proudly answered Baylor. IT Guy returned the question to Son, who replied very matter of fact (and truthfully), “Harvard.”

    The look on IT Guy’s face was priceless. Full drop of jaw, disbelief evident in the eyes, total uninhibited shock. He had no reply, and that pretty much ended the conversation.

  189. NewDayNewName*

    Not the most amazing story, but a satisfying end …

    I was writing up two retrospective medical studies of a particular implant device, working from data provided by the surgeon. My client was the implant manufacturer, and the surgeon was probably being paid very good money for serving as a clinician and publishing a study. We had all met in person to kick off the project and get me up to speed on the technology … but, after that, the surgeon completely ghosted me and the client. Didn’t return phone calls, reply to emails, respond to any requests from me or the client. Eventually, my client got fed up with the doctor and the project, said to invoice them, we were done. No problem, it’s work for hire; I got paid and never give it another thought.

    Many months later, the surgeon emails me out of the blue wanting me to send him the documents so he can send me changes, etc. Like I’m still working for him. Like I was *ever* working for him.

    I really enjoyed informing him that he would need to contact the client company and request the files from them because they owned the work; I could neither provide the files nor update them for him.

    Never heard another word … ah, sweet silence.

  190. Green Beans*

    Oh, another one, which very much indulged my petty side.

    We hired someone who just – didn’t work out. I had to train her on a fair number of things and she just couldn’t learn them. I asked her to take notes, and she wouldn’t because she was an “auditory learner.” She didn’t read SOPs, either, despite being told multiple times to reference them after training. I spent hours training her on things that took her replacement 15 minutes to learn, with the exact same amount of background knowledge.

    Anyways, I had given her live (Zoom) training for making a standard poster (both showing and watching her do it), and then emailed her a request for a poster to make, cc’ing her manager as requested. She sent the poster to me, and I sent a casual paragraph back asking for her to re-do the incorrect things that I’d flagged, along with the style guide I’d already sent. She did one thing, half-did another thing, and sent it back. I carefully wrote out a long, detailed, broken-up list of the corrections and sent it back. She did one thing, half-did another thing, and did another two incorrectly. I rewrote what I was asking for, noted the things she had done incorrectly, or partially, and sent it back. Rinse and repeat. Eventually I reached the point where I could not ask for any more corrections without really crossing the line into giant jerk territory.

    I finished the poster, pulled up the email chain and highlighted everything that had been an issue during the process in each email, color-coded by the following categories: 1) had been only partially done; 2) had been asked for multiple times before being done (I may have had sub-categories for 2 asks); 3) had been asked for multiple times and never done; 4) had been done incorrectly. I then forwarded the color-coding key, the email chain, and my concerns, along with the fact that I’d had to finish the poster, to her manager.

    My boss (her manager’s boss) told me, after problem employee had left, and with an admirably straight face, that the clear presentation of my issues had been helpful in identifying the same problematic patterns elsewhere in her work.

    1. Green Beans*

      *subcategories for more than 2 asks or less than two asks
      html ate my greater than/less than signs.

  191. Elwingdepelwing*

    I find this story a bit hard to explain without being either overly detailed or extremely nonspecific. But here we go.

    As companies go, we had another department do a task for us and we had to provide them with documentation for it. Since there was no standardized process for it I asked them what exactly they needed the documentation to be and I’d gladly provide it. (I’ll add that they were being pretty nitpicky about the documentation already, as they’d usually just do this task without needing that.) It turned out that they didn’t really know what they wanted, as we went back and forth 4-5 times, with me making the requested edits every time, and then getting angry replies that it wasn’t right. In the end I slapped a signature on it and called it a day. I also added a purple crocodile stamp, a kind of tongue in the cheek reference in our industry for unnecessary paperwork.

    A couple of days later I received a visit from the manager of the other department. She asked what the purple crocodile meant. I explained and also explained how the process went. Some weeks later I heard that the employee I had dealt with was temporarily suspended, for this and some other cases she hadn’t handled well. I worked with the manager to streamline the process for the future.

  192. anonymouse*

    I was working in a hideously toxic place but on a temporary zero hours contract. I was working for ~80hrs a week and only being paid pittance, so I used every spare moment to look for another job. I got a really good offer from a similar field and was told I could start as soon as I wanted as the position was empty, so I went back into the toxic hell hole the next day and told my boss that I would be leaving after lunch and wouldn’t be returning. Due to my contract, I had no notice period and by that point I was so done with that place that I didn’t care about any bridges I burnt.

    1. Sometimes supervisor*

      Not me but know somebody who did something similar. Job wasn’t nearly as bad as the nightmare scape you’ve described but he felt it was very much not as advertised and not what he signed up for. They then spent ages umming and ahhing about putting his job contract in place, despite numerous prompts from him. He found another job and told them ‘Well, as you’ve not formalised my notice period, guess I won’t be showing up after today’. (I don’t think he quite went through with it – he was also in a management position and it would have left his unsuspecting team in an awful position – but I also don’t think he gave them quite as much notice as they would have liked).

  193. Sled Dog Mama*

    Used to work at a place with two colleagues who thought they were nice guys except they never bothered to tell me how anything should be done or train me on ANYTHING. Fortunately I had been around long enough that I could pick up on most things and was willing to ask about most of the others, except for this one policy. One policy was crazy it essentially resulted in double the amount of work for two of us and wasn’t by any stretch of the imagination good practice (it just ensure that we were overworked and didn’t add any value to the process). We were going through an accreditation process and reviewing/updating all our policies. This particular policy wasn’t even written down and upon hire (in the five minute “how we do things” I got from one coworker) I was told that it was a “preference” so for three years I followed this preference. During this time we actually wrote a much better policy that added value to the process didn’t create duplicate work and was on paper. We were in the process of getting it approved and posted to our internal policies when supervisor left the company, a month before this he told me it was submitted and just required a signature so I could go ahead and implement it.
    During this 3 year period I had made some noise because my supervisor was altering time cards (of salaried-exempt employees so it didn’t affect pay just which internal account our hours went to) and a few other questionable practices. My job involves ensuring safety practices so I can’t really just let something like that lie because he might have been altering the time cards of the non-exempt employees (spoiler alert: He was) and then they are going to look through everything we do with a fine tooth comb.
    During this time I also got a major certification in my field that allows me to do a lot of tasks “unsupervised” meaning I could be primarily responsible for them without having a second person double check me. Typically people who have this certification are paid a bit more than those without so I went from being underpaid to severely underpaid and when I brought this up to management I got radio silence.
    So 3 weeks after supervisor leaves for greener pastures I get called to the office of his supervisor (who had zero idea what I do but that’s another story), they called Friday and said to come in Monday at 9 am. At that time I had been making noise about the fact that the ad they put out to hire a replacement for supervisor was bad (like spectacularly bad, it asked for unnecessary credentials and not for necessary ones, and didn’t describe the position at all) so I had reason to think the meeting was to talk to me about that, they refused to tell me why they wanted to meet. So Monday I arrive and they tell me that it came to their attention that I completed a to-do item in our internal tracking software without having the account open so how could I possible have completed the task the to-do was for. I of course replied that I didn’t complete it, the other person in my position had because I saw that I had completed the task (something we had done before). Remember that policy I mentioned above, this is what that policy was about, the old never written down policy was that we both had to do the task (that could take an hour) so when we rewrote the policy it did not specify that 2 people had to do the task just 1. The final outcome of the meeting was that they fired me.
    Within 2 days I had 4 interviews lined up (I was upfront with all four about the firing and the reason, all thought that the reason was bogus) I was offered the first position I interviewed for with a 50% raise from what I was making. I’ve not been here about 18 months. Many of my stress related health issues have gone away and the rest are improving.

  194. Not playing your game anymore*

    When I started my first professional job at a state organization, the boss was a by the book person and her business office person was of the same mind, fill out the right forms, have the right receipts, don’t buy unauthorized gaucamole, and everything was fine. Boss retired and we got a new boss. Everyone (who didn’t work for or closely with him) loved him. He was charming, had great ideas and never met a rule he didn’t try to bend or a book he didn’t try to skip to the end of. He wasn’t terrible when he started, but as time went on he got worse. Then he fell off the wagon and got mean if you displeased him, so he’d give you an order in the afternoon (after a few drinks) and then in the morning he’d be angry because, a.) you did something without proper authority, or b.) you didn’t do something because you were waiting to see if he really meant you should do x, y or z.

    The business office person was going crazy because he never had the right receipts, or claimed things that simply were not authorized (he claimed 2500 miles to be reimbursed for a 500 mile trip, and a double room – apparently he drove to his wife’s home in another state, picked her up, “on the way” and dropped her off “on the way back” people get fired for that kind of thing. So once we realized things weren’t going to get better, I learned to get or verify every request from him via email. Our business office person talked to the campus person who had to sign off on any money he tried to spend. Quit trying to run down receipts, quit trying to get him to get authorization, quite getting bids etc… She flagged every questionable expense for the powers that be and we let nature take it’s toll. Only took a few months for his loosy goosy ways to catch up with him.

  195. CarbonWatch*

    I don’t know if this qualifies, but it makes me feel good when I think about it. I started working at my current company about 12 years ago. A couple years in, I’m getting rave reviews, my duties and position scope have increased significantly, and my bosses are thrilled with me and my work. I asked about moving into a management role (not just any random position pulled out of thin air, we actually had a need for manager in one area and I even put together a training plan and how we could organize things), but they told me I was “too valuable” where I was at to allow me to move into ANY other position. So I asked for pay raise and maybe just a title change to reflect my duties. Nope, that was shot down too. I lasted a couple more years in that position, mostly because I got pregnant and didn’t want to give up my PTO for my maternity leave. It was so frustrating, because these bosses made a huge deal about how they were “so great” and loved their staff, and that our department was “the best” (definitely not), and they constantly praised me – but did absolute squat to show their appreciation. And it’s not like they had their hands tied – I saw other people get promoted, get raises, and do the things they wanted, and yet the bosses would complain about those people TO ME. Basically they were jerks, and I let them walk all over me for too long.

    But eventually I left and went to another department doing similar work, but it had a big pay increase. My boss in this new job was fantastic. After about a year or so, I asked about moving into a management role. He was 100% supportive, and just this month I have been promoted to manager of our team, taking over for him upon his retirement. I have increased my pay by almost 100% by changing departments, and gotten so much mentoring, development, and support from my team and boss. My quality of life has increased significantly – I was so crabby and negative at my old job. I actually have a career now that I love. My old department is on a steady downhill and will probably be dissolved at some point, while my new department is doing (actually) great things. So I think I have definitely triumphed over some arrogant jerks who ran off a lot of really good employees.

  196. Cake Diva*

    When I was in college I was working as an assistant manager at a store in the mall. At some point they hired a woman who was apparently friends or former co-workers with our district manager. She was a key holder also, but as the asm I had seniority/authority. Right away there were issues. She wanted to take smoke breaks. All. The. Time. Now, I grew up with parents who smoked and I understood that addiction is a bi—. But a 20+ minute break every hour was a bit much, and I told my manager as such. And also she was not filling out returns paperwork correctly – whenever we did a return, especially for cash, we had to document certain things like the customer’s name and phone number, and some information from the original purchase. Most of her sheets just had a dollar amount scribbled on them and her initials, none of the other info.

    A week after voicing my concerns, the manager and the district manager told me that I needed to be nicer to this woman. That she had told them that I was bullying her, yelling at her, discriminating, being overly critical, demanding to know where she was, etc etc. I was frustrated because I’d been at the store for a few years, long enough for both of them to know that was not my personality or my style. But who are they going to believe, a friend of the district manager, or some girl in college? So I just kept my head down, made sure all my paperwork and such was pristine to cover my arse, and chalked it up to sometimes you just don’t get along with coworkers.

    About a month later she got arrested. All thar return slip paperwork she didn’t do correctly? Yeah, she was processing fake returns so she could get cash from the register and have it not show up as being short at the end of the night. Someone caught her, either another manager from a different store in the company or another store in the mall. Not sure exactly.

    So yeah, she tried to get me disciplined I guess to cover up for her schemes. I wasn’t at the store too much longer – there were other problems that led to me going elsewhere. But it was a situation that’s hard to forget.

    1. CW*

      This reminds me of a Mexican restaurant I went to about a couple months ago. They were short on waitstaff because there were originally supposed to be two waitresses during that time but only one of them was working (this was a small restaurant, not a big one like Olive Garden or Cheesecake Factory). So what happened to the other waitress? Turns out she was recently fired because she had been stealing money from the restaurant for months. The waitress told me about it after apologizing to me for the long wait and why it was happening. I was completely shocked. To be clear, I didn’t complain about the long wait time – I was in no hurry and this was on a Sunday.

      Come to think about it, I won’t be surprised if she had been arrested or ordered to pay back all that she stole. What she did wasn’t only unethical, but illegal. After all, she stole money from someone/something.

  197. Ana Gram*

    About 20 years ago, I worked as an EMT for a transport company. No 911, just interfacility transports. I was 19 and in college and it was a great job. Good money and tons of flexibility. Until our paychecks started to bounce. The bank was next door to our building and we had to race each other over on Fridays and the first people in line would get paid. The rest did not. This went on for about 2 paychecks and a company wide meeting was called. About 20 of us gathered with the owner and he basically told us that if we didn’t like it, we could all get other jobs. So…we did. Everyone there called the rival ambulance service and was hired immediately. The original place hung on a few more years but, ultimately, they couldn’t get decent contracts and they disappeared.

    God, it was satisfying!

    1. CW*

      Was this in the United States? If so, that is illegal and you could have contacted the Labor Board about it. It is illegal not to pay employees on time, and just an equally illegal if your paycheck bounces because that counts as not being paid. In California, where I live, the laws are even stricter.

      In short, glad you got out of there. They deserve to be out of business for not paying employees properly and their bad attitude.

        1. CW*

          Ah I see. I didn’t know much about the labor laws either when I was that age. But lesson learned for both of us. I was a victim of labor law violations too when I was younger, though not because my paycheck bounced. That’s a story for another day. At least we both know better now.

      3. Mannequin*

        I wish my friend had known this when 2 of her paychecks bounced in a row at a small business she’d been the sole office person at for years.
        2 owners, and the one who could do something about it was on his honeymoon, and hadn’t left contact info with ANYONE, including his business partner, because he “didn’t want to be bothered with business”.

  198. RunShaker*

    I am female. My department isn’t very good at hiring & vetting new employees. We hired a new director, older gentleman. He was outgoing, showed interest in getting to know us & took our concerns about what was going on in our department seriously. But after 4/5 months, it went down hill. I met with him & a coworker & he interrupted her & started yelling about what she did wrong. Didn’t take the time to gather facts. Spoiler alert, she didn’t do anything wrong. Both of us totally surprised & was like where is this coming from. I jumped in & did what I could to calm him down. A month later, he was “suspended” for yelling at rest of management team for a week. He came back & slowly started yelling & bullying employees that reported to him. The thing is upper management was aware, complaints made, and was witnessed. Nothing was ever done. I got plenty of abuse as well. He would turn red & lean in to you while yelling. One day, we were sitting across from each other & he went 0 to 60 in 5 seconds. But this time he didn’t lean in, he lunged at me while yelling, red face, and spit flying. I was done & my favorite coworker heard it all. I went straight to HR. It turned out multiple people have reported him but HR couldn’t or wouldn’t confirm the allegations. No idea why & HR never asked me before. I gave names, I gave dates, I gave details. He was fired by end of the week. The kicker was head of our department who was fully aware of issue & did nothing spoke to me & favorite coworker as to why didn’t we approach him. I never answered but went back to HR to advise that head of department was disappointed & that I thought his question was inappropriate since he was well aware & did nothing.

  199. Adeline*

    I was an extremely dedicated employee to a medium-sized company for several years post-graduate degree. I was one of the youngest members on staff, which was not only a constant point of discussion amongst our managers, but a reason that I was frequently passed up for promotion and additional training. I had all of the requirements for promotion to a managerial position and was even informally managing my specific unit, but I was told that I was “not ready” to progress and that it was “not your time”. Meanwhile, I watched people fill positions with substantially less experience than I had, regardless of age.

    After four years in this toxic, exhausting environment after I was blatantly told that my supervisor’s supervisor did not think I had what it took to be a manager nor did I deserve professional development. Less than a month later, a managerial job opened up across town for a competitor in a virtually identical job with managerial duties. It came with a title, better benefits, and a substantial pay bump. I interviewed and was offered this position, and was told that I was the top candidate by a long shot. Rumor has it that my supervisor’s supervisor was LIVID and expressed directly to my new supervisor that I was not qualified for this position. My new supervisor hired me anyways and I’ve been here ever since!

    I’ve successfully flipped around a toxic team, helped lead our COVID efforts, and have been offered a myriad of opportunities to progress and train more. The environment is positive, not at all toxic, and it turns out that I was, in fact, qualified all along to lead a team of my own.

  200. So petty, so satisfying*

    An old boss of mine was the worst person I have ever worked for–not just worst boss, worst person. He was a terrible, petty micromanager. My coworker liked to duck out at 4:25 (just 5 minutes early) to catch a train that would get her home 45 minutes sooner, so he would call her into his office at like 4:24 to talk about nothing just to keep her there until 4:30. He would literally scream at colleagues in meetings. If I proposed something he’d say it was bad or wrong and then turn around and propose the exact same thing. He’d “proofread” things by bringing staff into his office to nitpick their work with/in front of them and would berate them for mistakes. Three coworkers quit because of him before I did–and not his direct reports; he was so awful he drove peers out of the organization. He went out of his way to give me more work in the parts of my job I actively hated. He was, simply and frankly, an asshole.

    I quit for a waaaay better job so the only comeuppance I got is extremely petty: he got fired. Like really fired. What I heard from friends is that one day, after totally losing it in a meeting, the VP went into his office to talk about his behavior. Some short time later she walked out, muttered “I have never been spoken to that way in my life,” and had him escorted off the property by security. They didn’t even let him pack his office, they shipped all his crap to him.

    Aside from a brief stint at a company run by a friend of his, he hasn’t been seriously employed in the two years since. Couldn’t have happened to a better guy.

  201. Sparkles McFadden*

    I worked for a truly unbalanced boss for many years. (That means I have plenty of stories but I’ll share just one.) I stayed because I loved the work, got paid well and the boss generally avoided me. I had worked for the company longer than the boss, and had a good corporate reputation. Much of my work was interdepartmental, and my boss resented it when people told her I had done a good job on a project. (I tried the “This reflects well on you” thing but to no avail.) I never said anything negative about her…which got harder as time went by.

    The boss sent me an invitation to a meeting and she asked me to prepare a presentation. But…the invitation had no one else on it. I called the person whose office was listed as the meeting place and he informed me that the meeting started fifteen minutes later than the time I was given, and was about a completely different subject. I worked with him on the true topic and we prepared a joint presentation.

    On the day of the meeting, my boss looked startled when I arrived on time, but had a Cheshire cat grin when I started my presentation. The grin faded when she realized I wasn’t going to embarrass myself by presenting something about another topic. After the meeting ended, my boss screamed at me in the hallway, yelling “How did you find out what that meeting was really about? Who told you?” I did my best to look confused and said “You sent me an invitation.” She continued screaming, stating I was lying because she gave me the wrong time and the wrong topic. I said “But that makes no sense. Why would you do that?” She said it was to embarrass me because I needed to be “taken down a peg” and everyone needed to see that I “wasn’t so great after all.” She did this in front of everyone who had been at the meeting, everyone in passing by in the hallway, and everyone getting coffee in the break room…including HER OWN BOSS(!) who said “I think we need to talk.” Everyone in the area broke into applause.

        1. Sparkles McFadden*

          Not just then. Things got better for quite awhile, and then they got very, very bad. I transferred to another department and, a couple of months later, she was let go.

          A few people planned a small gathering in a conference room for her farewell. A friend of mine passed by to see who showed up. He called me and jokingly asked why I wasn’t there. I replied “I was there in spirit. When the room is empty, take a peek behind the lowered projector screen.” When I heard where they were having their goodbye party, I wrote “GOOD RIDDANCE!!!” in giant letters on the whiteboard and lowered the screen over it.

    3. Sinister Serina*

      This is insane. And her screaming and outing herself in front of everyone is a thing of beauty.

  202. Rainbow Sheep*

    Certainly not the most epic quitting story out there, but still a highlight of my career.

    In my first management job, I worked for a terrible people manager “Jane” who had been demoted from a different position not long before I started working for her. She had it out for a low-performing employee on my team and told me to fire them. Jane wouldn’t listen to my protests about the company’s progressive discipline policy, so I went to HR behind her back and they chastised her for trying to circumvent the process. Instead of firing this employee, I put them on a PIP per company policy. Jane had it out for me after that.

    The next 2 months, I was constantly interviewing. Finally, I got a great offer from a competitor 2 days before my annual performance review. I knew what was coming so I cleaned off my desk and printed a resignation letter. Jane started the meeting by saying I wasn’t cut out for the job and I should consider taking a different role in the company without direct reports. I said “Actually, I’ve decided to take a role outside of the company” and smoothly slid my resignation letter on her desk with the kind of perfect timing I’ve never had before or since. The look on her face was utter shock. I barely hid my excitement. Because I was going to a competitor, Jane walked me out immediately. The kicker? They paid me out my two weeks’ notice, the new gig paid 20k more than that job, and I ended up working for one of the best bosses I have ever had. Jane got laid off not long after I left.

    Oh, and that employee Jane was determined to fire? Well, the day before my resignation I signed the PIP certifying they successfully completed all of the conditions and submitted it to HR…Jane therefore wouldn’t be allowed to fire them for at least 12 months.

  203. Ann Furthermore*

    Two stories, both immensely satisfying:

    A few jobs ago I was the Accounting Manager for a large company, and had the Accounts Payable staff reporting to me. The 2 AP specialists coordinated with the Purchasing department, who was notoriously slow getting things done. One day, an email popped into my Inbox from the Purchasing Director (a smarmy little weasel who always tried to make himself look good by making others look bad). He’d taken great pains to copy my boss, the Finance Director, and the CFO, and anyone else he could think of. He was very upset because a supplier had put the company on hold until they got paid for their outstanding invoices. He pontificated at great length about how critical it was for invoices to be processed and paid in a timely manner, and my said that my team’s failure to do so was damaging the company’s relationship with this supplier and putting critical operations at great risk. And on and on and on. Well. I logged into the system and pulled up all the unpaid invoices for this supplier. And guess what? They had all been placed on a system-generated hold because the goods had not yet been received against the PO — a task HIS team was responsible for. My staff had entered the invoices when they’d received them, but could not process them for payment. Never before and never since have I ever gotten such immense satisfaction from clicking ‘Reply All,’ and I very politely but tersely told him that the invoices were ready to pay, and would be processed as soon as the buyer on his team processed the receiving. I then said that because the invoices were so far past due, I’d be glad to have the AP team process a one-off payment batch to get the supplier paid as quickly as possible. Now, had he gotten off his backside and walked the 50 feet to my cube, I could have looked up the invoices and we could have resolved the problem in about 30 seconds. But because he was a jagoff about it, I responded in kind.

    This may be a modern-day myth, but I really want it to be true. My first job out of college was in the oil and gas industry. Everyone had to take a general knowledge class, where you learned more about drilling, exploration, how crude oil gets to the refinery, and so on. The guy teaching the class had worked for Shell back in the 70’s or 80’s. He was spending a few days observing operations on an oil rig out in the middle of Texas. Someone dropped a sledgehammer down the hole, which is very, very bad. Oil rig drill bits are made from crude diamonds, so they are of course extremely expensive, and not retrieving the sledgehammer would have destroyed it. They spent 3 days fishing for it — the oil rig screws the pipes together to feed down into the hole — probably a couple thousand feet — and then unscrews them and stacks them while it’s retracting them. 3 days. They finally retrieved the sledgehammer, and the manager lit into the guy who dropped it, told him he was an incompetent idiot, he was fired, get the h*** off his rig, he never wanted to see his face again — really chewed him up one side and down the other. So the now-fired oil rig worker asked, “Is there really nothing I can do to change your mind?” The manager said, “No! Get off my rig and get out of my sight!” So the guy picked up the sledgehammer, tossed it back down the hole, climbed down off the oil rig, sauntered over to his pickup truck, and drove off in a stunning blaze of glory.

  204. Not that kind of lawyer*

    When I was 19, one of the three jobs I had over the summer to save up money for university was as a waitress in a new deli that opened does the street from my house. Since the deli had just opened it did not yet have a liquor license. In the province I lived the minimum wage for a waitress who does not serve liquor was $6.50/hr but the minimum wage for a waitress not serving alcohol was $5.50/hr. The restaurant owner and chef treated staff like crap, the chef in particular would yell and was a total glassbowl. My 19 year old self developed a pretty tough skin. Well his wife did payroll and when she was getting me to sign the forms for the first week, I pointed out the error in pay, and let her know that I had pointed this out to the owner. She looked at me and said, “I have been doing payroll for 20 years and I have never heard of that.” To which I looked right at her and responded, “I am sure there are many things that you’ve never heard of, but it doesn’t make them not true”. Oh she was pissed. But she just got her papers and got up and left. In the end I was paid what I was supposed to be paid, but I realized when I was the first one to be let go when the business was on its way to closing, that I was the only one that was paid the legal rate.

  205. Heffalump*

    I wish I could report a more clear-cut victory over a bigger jerk, but this will have to do.

    Some years ago I was working as one of several typesetters at a company that did direct mail advertising. Hortense was the lead typesetter (first among equals, so to speak) by virtue of seniority. As I found out, incident by incident, she thought this gave her the right to order the other typesetters around. She was generally rude, tactless, and quick to fix blame. She was day shift and I was swing shift, so sometimes I saw her when I came on, and sometimes not.

    At one point we got a new release of the typesetting software. One of the new features was “formats.” (I’ll spare you the technical information.) One night I thought I’d use them in a job—after all, the features of a software package are there to be used.

    I got in next day, and Hortense pulled me into a conference room and ranted at me for five minutes:

    “We do. Not. Use. Formats.”

    “This is the way we’ve always done it.” (I’d heard of this as a cliché, but I’d never actually heard someone seriously invoke it.)

    “I’m sorry if you have a problem with this.” (Patronizing.)

    I spoke to Steve, my manager. He agreed that formats had their place, and he gave me the go-ahead to start devising a comprehensive set of formats to be used in some of our ongoing type jobs. Don, the other night shift typesetter, didn’t like formats either. One night he said Steve was encouraging me in this in order to spite him and Hortense, because he knew how much they hated formats. I said I didn’t think the company could afford the luxury of having me spend many hours on a project for spite. I was disappointed by Steve’s failure to put Hortense in her place, but that’s another discussion.

    Hortense quit several months later. I heard that she told the unemployment insurance folks that she had quit because of stress, which I assume didn’t fly. I would assume that not getting her way on formats was a factor in her quitting.

    John, Hortense’s replacement, was much more open-minded and forward thinking, and he was totally on board with the formats. I told him about Don’s “Steve’s encouraging you for spite” remark. One day when I came in, John was making the case for formats to Don, and Don finally came around.

    One of these days I may expound further on my belief that hostile behavior towards one’s peers that is obviously wrong and unwarranted is unacceptable and should be actionable even if it doesn’t rise to the level of grand scale abuse.

  206. I Only Support the Nice Ones*

    New user name cause I’ve told this story to many people.

    I worked at a vet clinic as a receptionist. We had one doctor was new to the field. The office manager was always telling me new vet doctors are always cocky just try to roll with it. He was a massive jerk. One day during a really busy day, clients lined up in the halls cause the lobby was full kind of busy day. Jerk doctor was running late. His client exits the room and I rush in to clean it up. Poor pup had peed everywhere. So I’m scrambling to clean it up quickly to get the next client in. As I am drying off the floor he comes to me, and hands me the paperwork for the client that just exited so I could check them out. He says to put his next client in and I said as soon as I finish here. He yelled at me in front of the entire, and again full, lobby and hallways “NO, NOW!!!”. I waited for him to walk away, finished cleaning up with room and put the next client in.
    I went into the back to find him to let him know his client was ready for him. I found him hanging out with the tech eating chips and chit chatting. I lost my sh** and flipped him off to his back as he headed out. The tech of course ratted me out. So jerk doctor called me into the office and to chat with me.
    Basically he had the degree so he felt he could call the shots. I gave him all the examples of him being a jerk to the support staff and reminded him we are his support staff not his servants. So all his standing around waiting on us to serve him was not going to bode well for him. I also reminded him that WE control his appointment calendar and in a sense his pay. There are other doctors in this clinic we could assign his clients to so no clients, no pay. I quit not long after that and I heard from a fellow co-worker that he went around apologizing to the support staff he had been rude to in the past.

  207. Sam*

    I had a boss who could not believe that I had the credentials that were on my resume. As a side note, I am a female which was uncommon for the role at that time. Anyways I was teamed up with a more senior system administrator to do a tricky configuration. I did something similar at a previous job but later I found out he only teamed me up with this person to “show me how much I didn’t know”. Turns out, I knew a lot and senior admin was super impressed. We were able to do the task and now I needed to report out with the rest of my team.

    When I started to report out, my boss told me that the solution couldn’t be correct and proceeded to call the senior admin to check during the meeting. To “prove his point about me” he plugged in his phone to the conference room audio so that everyone could hear. The senior admin not only corrected my boss’ incorrect assumptions of the configuration needs but he confirmed my idea worked, stopping to ask “Why don’t you just ask Sam, she’s wiz at…” while my boss quickly unplugged the phone from the audio system. I left that job very quickly.

  208. Child of a working mom*

    I believe that I have told this before. At one of my previous jobs I had a miscarriage. From the start of my pregnancy it was clear that there were going to be problems. I let my supervisor know and clearly I was having issues mentally and physically. When my miscarriage happened I told my supervisor. She proceeded to start a file with every mistake I made. Spelling mistake, grammatical errors every error I made. Repeatedly she asked why I was making so many mistakes and each time I reminded her I was having a miscarriage/ health problems. I explained that my workload was a problem and was told to “deal with it”. This went on for a few weeks and then my supervisor brought me up to division VP and President (both Male). She explained that I was having issues and she didnt understand why bur I had given no good reason. Then she gave them a packet with a list of every mistake I made since I told her I was having a miscarriage. DVP and Pres asked what was going on as I had been at the company for almost 10 years and never had any issues like this. I sat there and told them I had a miscarfiage and was having issies with depression and physically having issues due to the miscarriage. I said yes I had told my supervisor and I could provide a doctors note if necessary. They told me not necessary apologized and then sent me on my way. Supervisor was still with them and didnt come down until 2 hours later.

  209. The teapots are on fire*

    I was working in a proprietary post-secondary school teaching typing. The director was a drive-by sexual harrasser, standing in the hallway (the classrooms had windows into the hallway so they could watch us teaching and point to us when they were showing prospective students through the school) zipping and unzipping his fly in view of one of the teachers, once walked up and untied the sash of another teacher’s dress, just super creepy. This was the 1980s, during a local recession, and we all needed jobs. There was no HR and the school was founded by a small group of bros.

    One day he came up behind me while I was eating lunch and ran his hands through my hair. I let out a piercing shriek, spun around in the chair, elbowing him in the gut (it was probably his gut) and said, “What the heck are you doing? You scared me to death!” Since there was no good answer to the question, and he was a small-time bully, he turned around and walked away and never messed with me again. I had really never stood up for myself before and was really surprised that I could embarrass him without suffering any retaliation.

    Later as the school used up the untapped market of students and began to contract, he was the first “bro” to go, as he apparently had no financial stake in the company.

  210. Kate Kate*

    Super minor, but I had an interim boss at my first job. It was our busy time of year, but I also had mandatory training, so I was out of the office all day for a week, and left on time. However, I would come in 2-3 hours early to stay on top of my work (I’m more of an early bird anyways). One day, interim boss asked where I was, and went on a long rant in front of my coworkers about my attendance. My supervisor at the time spoke up, in front of everyone, and said I came in early to do my work. That shut up my boss immediately. Luckily he got transferred shortly after our busy time was over.

  211. lex talionis*

    Worked in a distribution warehouse outside of Boston managed by a very unhappy man who had recently left the seminary. He often had a few drinks at lunch which made him even more unpleasant. One day he got pissed at 2 workers who were popular and always helped their coworkers and he fired them. He told the rest of the staff they had quit. We knew it was a lie. When he left for lunch we got some bright red tee shirts (company colors) and put the fired workers employee numbers on them in white. The forklift driver hoisted one of us up and we tied the shirts to the rafters so they hung down like Celtics basketball retired player numbers. Forklift guy took off for a few days and no one else was authorized to use the equipment. Boss had to look at those shirts every time he entered or exited his office. There was a betting pool as to whether he would have a stroke or not. Can’t remember who won….

    1. iamcrazy4cats*

      I lived in Boston for nearly 25 years. The imagery resonates as does the amazing payback. My favorite story yet.

  212. Iroh*

    I went to a residential highschool that was mainly full of very privelaged rich kids. I was poor but a top student. I was also a petty teenager.

    To teach us humility, the school required that we work so many hours for free for them (honestly most of these kids needed to sweep some floors so I approved of the practice even if I was irritated at giving free labor when I could really use the food money).

    However the cafeteria was notorious. The manager was very nasty and vindictive to everyone, unless you were on the soccer team. I got my cafeteria rotation assignment, and unfortunately on my shift it was just me and one other kid who was on the team.

    I had to do all the work myself, and on nights we were scheduled to close I was often stuck for an hour past closing while he sat back in her office watching sports with her.

    So on the last night of my assignment, I had cleaned the entire hall by myself. There was only one table left and my friends were eating a late dinner 5 minutes before closing. I sat down with them and of course manager came around the corner to check on me. She starts screaming at me, and I tried to point out that the cafeteria was clean except this table which has to wait for them to finish dinner. My friend also tried to defend me and let her know I literally just sat down but she yelled at him too.

    She told me to get to work and to expect that she recommend I repeat the cafeteria assignment next semester.

    Well I worked at restaurants during my school breaks and knew a lot about food safety. When I was assigned the morning shift, I had asked about cleaning the drink nozels and was told night shift did it. When I was on night duty I was told day shift did it.

    So I walked over to the nozels, stripped them, photographed all the black and red mold I knew would be there, and cleaned all but the Diet Mr. Pibb because teenage me knew no one drank that but I wanted to be able to demonstrate it.

    I then emailed the dean of students STUDENT HEALTH RISK and attached articles and studies about how dangerous this stuff was and included the photos. The next morning the dean had me show him what I was talking about on the nozzles so I pulled it apart and it was coated in thick black slimy mold. Turns out that Diet Mr. Pibb was his favorite drink.

    Well she was fired and I was never assigned to the cafeteria again.

  213. TexasTeacher*

    Back in the 90s. I was getting e-mails meant for someone else. The person sending them was just putting the first part of the address in the to box. All but one person was with the same small town provider and got the e-mails. The one person who was with a different provider – had the same given name as I do. We both used it for our e-mails. So I was getting the e-mails instead of the other Kimberly.

    That was annoying enough. I E-mailed the person several times. At first, she was nice – but it devolved into her accusing me of hacking her friend’s e-mail. The content got nasty – suggesting that the then-president, his wife, and their daughter should be tortured to death. Finally, I went to the ISP – to see if they could reach out to her and explain she needed the whole address for her friend. She believed that any e-mail with Kimberly no @domain would go to her friend and her friend only.

    They reached out. Tried to explain. Told her if I got another abusive e-mail she would have her service cut off. She sent me a horrible e-mail. I forwarded it to the ISP person. She got her service cut off. Turns out they also forwarded the kill the sitting president’s family e-mails to the secret service. Caused problems for her because her husband was an officer at the local AFB.

    The thing is I worked for a local Children’s Museum that was part of a larger museum. I used my personal e-mail to send things to teachers. This woman booked a field trip and recognized my e-mail on the paperwork I sent. She filed a complaint with my boss and involved the school district. Thankfully I still had the abusive e-mails and the head of the ISP was on our board. I showed them to my boss. The ISP person knew about the call to the Secret Service and said I handled it correctly. When the school district followed up because of this contract we had with them – they were told the whole story. She was told resign or be fired. She resigned.

  214. Elle Woods*

    A few years ago, I heard about a local business that was looking for writers. I do a lot of that for my regular job and was looking for some supplemental income so I applied. Went through the interview process, supplied them with samples, and was hired as a freelancer. The company had a pretty standard contract they wanted me to sign and, after reviewing it, I did.

    Things went OK for a few months though not all that smoothly. The owner was hard to get a hold of, would demand huge last-minute changes, and was late a couple of times in paying his contractors. Then, all of a sudden, instead of payment coming from the company, it was coming from the business owner’s personal account. I had recently gotten a promotion at my day job was already thinking that I wanted to quit the side gig. After a couple more weeks of payments from the business owner, I resigned and got my final payment from him.

    Flash forward a few months and I was putting together information for my taxes. Because I knew the business had paid me more than $600, I needed to get a 1099 form to report my income. I called the company and left a message. No response. I emailed him. No response. I texted him. “I’ll get that to you ASAP.” He didn’t.

    I told my tax preparer about the situation when I brought my stuff in for her to prepare. She said it wasn’t a big deal and we could report the income even without a 1099. She prepared my taxes and included the income that I’d earned but didn’t have a 1099 for.

    A couple of years later I heard the business had closed and the owner was in some sort of legal trouble. Turns out that he was having people pay him directly so he could avoid having to report income to the state & federal government. If the rumors were true, he’d underreported his income by something like $100K. I was not at all surprised am glad he’s getting his comeuppance.

  215. Nonny-nonny-non*

    This one isn’t my triumph but we all gloried in it.

    Back when I worked retail we had a new Store Manager ‘Fergus’ who talked a good game – he told us he’d previously been in the Navy (UK) and ran a tight ship – but was actually pretty poor at his job. About a year after he started the whole chain went into administration, and most of the department managers were laid off to help with cost-cutting; he refused to come onto site that day and made the two Store Assistant Managers tell the dept managers the bad news. Honestly, I don’t think they were sorry to hear it from people they respected rather than Fergus, but we all rather despised him for it.

    Later that week he was talking to the store Secretary (a lovely older lady who’d seen it all and had few f**ks left to give, although she was usually very professional and polite) and he told her “I used to be in the Navy, you know, and we don’t go down with our ship; I’m not sure I’ll stay until we close down.”
    She promptly retorted “Funny, I thought it was only the rats that deserted sinking ships!”

    She was overheard by one of the Asst Store managers who shared her response at the final-day drinks after the store closed for the last time (Fergus declined to come in on that day too!) and it got her a resounding cheer.

  216. Iroh*

    In college there were speed bumps that served as crosswalks all around campus. Once I was on the crosswalk when a jerk sped his car up to cross before I reached his lane. I literally had to leap back from his car. Well the speed bump worked and it ripped his bumper off as it slammed down hard on the bump with the speed he was going.

    But I was a petty 19 year old with an adrenaline rush so this was not enough karma for me. As he slowly pulled into the parking lot next to the crossing, bumper grinding on asphalt, I walked over and as soon as I heard him saw him dial and say “Mom it’s me”

    I JUMPED on the hood of his car and yelled “Come one and all to see the JACKASS who nearly ran me over. Gaze in wonder as his whimp begs Mommy for money. Gather Bears and chant with me. LOOSSSER LOOOSSER LOOOSSSER”

    It was a crowded college so yeah, about 30 students were gathered and laughing at or chanting at him before got down and left. His windows were down so I could hear his mom the whole time. “Whose voice is that? Oh my god did you really speed on a crosswalk?” I’ve never seen anyone more embarrassed.

    1. Iroh*

      I should add I was a drum major on the Bears marching band so very good at projecting and pumping up a crowd.

  217. Mad Harry Crewe*

    One summer in college I worked for the campus Environmental Health & Safety team with several other students. We had two main responsibilities: making sure the database of MSDSs was up to date, and doing a catalogue of every single chemical (lab, cleaning supplies, paint, etc) in every single room on campus. This meant breaking up in teams of two – one person with a laptop adding database entries, and one person reading names and amounts off labels. We had floorplans of every building and would mark off rooms/closets as we completed them. We tended to split our time about 50/50 – four hours in the office digging around the web for current MSDSs, and four hours out doing the chemical survey.

    About half way through the summer, maybe 6 weeks in, the head of the department hauled us all out and yelled at us for not doing the survey fast enough – now, she and the other full time staff member were the only ones who had been there for previous surveys and she had given us *no* previous guidance about the pace we should be setting, just basic instructions about how to complete the task. She was very clear: we needed to be doing AT LEAST three hours of survey work PER DAY, or we were going to fall behind and not get everything done by end of summer.

    When I tell you that single conversation absolutely destroyed our work ethic – previously, we’d stuck to normal ~15 minute breaks, twice a day, plus lunch. After that point, as instructed, we were out of the office on survey probably 5 hours a day, and we put it to good use – hour long breaks, chatting in empty labs, exploring every interesting locked door that our universal keys gave us access to…

    We did finish the survey by the end of summer, and I have never forgotten what she taught me about respect and managing people.

  218. Not your buddy*

    My work hired a guy who was horribly unprepared for his role. He was younger and less experienced than his 3 person team, and if you’re guessing it yes he was a white male managing 3 black women.

    This guy had just finished an MBA program, which I mention because I have to assume he took some courses on how to be “relatable”. He would walk past me, a peer and a woman, and say “what’s up buddy.” Just, no. Buddy? Did he think this made him approachable? Or was he modeling our boss, who used buddy periodically when employees seemed overwhelmed (and for whom it seemed more…appropriate? It matched the boss’s personality.)

    I spent months with the passing “buddy” thrown everyone’s way. We all hated it. I tried to ignore it, because I was already pushing back on so many things. He was hitting on junior staff, throwing his team under the bus, and suggesting crazy intricate events during meetings with our boss, saying how it would be so easy for me to raise hundreds of thousands of dollars to put it on. I was constantly pushing back against his crazy fundraising ideas, while also not getting the materials i needed to raise money for the projects he was already responsible for. He was universally hated, so I felt bad for the guy because he should never have been hired, but also he wasn’t doing himself any favors.

    Our relationship became sooo frosty. So one day he walked by with a “what’s up buddy.” i didn’t even look up and responded, “nothing much sport”.

    He never called anyone buddy again.

    Oh, and his whole team quit within 6 months and he left after less than a year.

  219. handfulofbees*

    Oh man last month we had a guy with us who wanted to learn the industry. We were discussing some horticultural stuff, and I mentioned plant light requirements.

    He says, “How’d you learn that? Growing ganja in your dorm?”

    And I replied, “No, my Master’s degree.”

    Everyone around us goes OOOH and I just basked in that moment.

  220. Mimi Me*

    I was 23 and the assistant manager of a store that sold lotions and bath stuff. The store manager (SM) was 24 but considered herself to be “older and wiser” because she was engaged and planning her wedding. She was condescending as hell and we didn’t get on at all. But it was job and you don’t always like your co-workers, you know? I had worked several long shifts, several days in a row as we were prepping a new product line launch. The way our store was set up was that in order for us to access the stock room we had to go through two stores that were under the same company umbrella (mens clothing and womens clothing) and then push these big buckets of product back through into our store. The SM never helped – she was always either on the phone with a wedding vendor, updating something in her wedding planner, or talking with someone about her wedding. She would spend hours in the back office on the phone and while it was annoying, things needed to be done and I was all about doing them. Until the Friday morning I got a phone call at work from my mother about my grandfather. He’d been sick and my mom was calling me to let me know he’d been moved from one hospital to another. The SM took me aside and tells me, in her “I’m older and wiser” voice that personal calls were not allowed and that going forward I needed to use my breaks and make phone calls outside of the store on the payphone and that if I continued this abuse of company property she was going to write me up. She then proceeded to go back into the office and the phone lit up. Not gonna lie, I saw red!!! I picked up the line and listened at several points during the day to see if her calls were work related. They were not. She was planning a trip to Cape Cod that weekend to look at wedding things. I was supposed to work all weekend. I decided I wasn’t going to. I went on a break, left the store, used the pay phone and called every part time employee we had and told them all not to answer their phones or pick up extra shifts. Then I went back to the store and finished my shift. As I was walking out and doing the retail bag check (where managers scan bags for stolen product), I handed her my keys. “You’re going to need these for the next manager.” She asked what I was talking about and I told her that I was quitting. She started begging me not to and I just stared blankly at her before I told her in my most condescending tone “When you treat employees like shit and threaten to write them up for rules you won’t even follow this is what happens”. She got mad at that and accused me of not understanding the rules, that she was the manager, and how she had to make sure people listened to her. I said that was fine and again told her I was quitting, effective immediately. She panicked and started going on and on about how she had plans that weekend but I just told her that She was the manager and would need to figure it out. I stayed close with some of the other employees for a while and loved hearing about how not only was her weekend ruined but because of the product launch the GM came in and reamed her out for wedding planning while working. I wish I’d been there to see it. I was told she cried.

  221. redflagday701*

    My first real job was waiting tables as a college sophomore at a pizza buffet restaurant. One of the few perks was that instead of taking our free shift meal, we could pay a couple of bucks and take one (reasonable) trip through the buffet. The money we paid went into a fund for our employee holiday party, so it wasn’t a bad deal. Well, we got a new general manager who was probably under some pressure to cut costs, but unfortunately, he was also kind of a dick — he snapped orders at people, nitpicked trivial issues while ignoring legitimate complaints, and announced new rules at the drop of a hat, without consulting folks who might have known better or taking feedback well.

    One day he decided employees could no longer eat at the buffet and left an overly long, needlessly vindictive memo about it (he loved long, mean memos) taped to the time clock — basically, the gist was “If you were better employees I would have considered not taking it away, but you’re not, so tough luck.” We were all super pissed about it, and being a young punk who had recently put in my two weeks and was nearly out of there, I took it upon myself to scrawl “CAPITALIST SWINE” across the top of it. Hoo boy, was he pissed, and made sure EVERYONE knew it. We didn’t work at the same time again until my last shift, when he was coming in just as I was leaving. He was sure I’d done it and summoned me into the office to interrogate me. I wish I could say I proudly owned up to it and bade him farewell, but of course I just denied, denied, denied and got out of there. I did end up writing him a letter of confession and apology a couple weeks later, because it weighed so heavily on my conscience, and also because I love high-roading people; but in retrospect, with 25+ years of experience now under my belt: Jesus Christ, what a ridiculous thing for an adult man to throw a temper tantrum about.

  222. MissGirl*

    Pretty small potatoes. The owner of my first company out of college was a fairly wealthy man who owned multiple houses. He HATED paying for things and was one of those people who are always looking for a way to scam. He loved collecting art and would convince artists to send him their paintings in high resolution so he could “decide if he want to buy.” Then he would print the art and never pay the artist.

    I worked in our graphics department and he would send me images to be sent out to the printer. I would open them up and compress them down to the size of a thumbnail and declare they weren’t printable and send him that image for the printer in case he still tried.

  223. AVengefulParalegal*

    Years ago I was working for a new group of attorneys – at the same time as my mom was undergoing chemo treatments. Suffice to say, I was super stressed all the time, which took its own toll on my immune system, so I ended up sick myself quite a bit. One of the attorneys actually suggested that I was sick “all the time” because I was out “partying too much.” None of the attorneys knew anything about my personal life, mostly because they never would ask, so he had no idea how insulting this was. Later that year I was fired.

    Two years ago I ran into the “you party too much” attorney who was out at a bar with his wife. I had DREAMED of this day for years. I walked up to him and was SUPER nice initially, said it was nice to see him, etc, and then said since I didn’t get to say goodbye to him when I left the firm abruptly, I had to address something he had said to me. He meekly asked, “Hope nothing bad?” I said he had suggested that I was sick a lot bc I “partied too much.” His wife is now VERY interested why her husband had been talking to me about partying, I’m sure. I explained that in fact, I wasn’t partying, I was dealing with a stressful job with a bunch of assholes while my mom was undergoing chemo treatments. His face went WHITE at this point as he stammered that he had no idea. “And that is exactly the point,” I explained, “you don’t know what is going on in someone’s life. You’re an asshole.” I have never felt so vindicated in my entire life as I did in that moment, and in front of his wife no less. It was entirely worth the wait.

  224. Djuna*

    I worked for a retail chain that went bust, a competitor came in and bought our store and hired some of us back on our old contracts. Thing was, our old contracts were non-union and their employees were unionized. We were told we couldn’t join the union and our pay would not be adjusted. This is important context for me, working in the cash office, realizing one Sunday that I was working for time and a fifth (lol, seriously) at a low base rate and the people I was supervising were on quadruple time with a higher base rate. Their newest employee earned more than I did per hour on a normal day, even though I was a keyholder and had safe access and counted all their money. Needless to say, I started looking for another job.

    A year into my new job the store manager called me to ask if I would like my old job back, same rate, same deal. I let her ramble for a bit before telling her I wasn’t interested. I didn’t tell her that I had been promoted and was earning 15k a year more than they’d paid, just that I wasn’t interested. Then she asked me if I could recommend someone and I (honestly!) said unfortunately I couldn’t. Caught up with some former co-workers and confirmed that they couldn’t find anyone trustworthy to handle the cash after I left. That was backed up by the manager contacting me a couple more times to see if I’d changed my mind. I’d love to say they learned a lesson, but I somehow doubt it. Retail managers, pay your people!

      1. Djuna*

        Not on the first call, no. On the third, though? I gently told her my new salary and said I hoped she’d understand why I would rather not move.

  225. JustaTech*

    My tiny triumph, which honestly is kind of sad.

    Reasonably fresh out of undergrad I worked in an academic lab as a lab tech. Because my boss was brand new at being a boss he accidentally classified this as a union position (this will be relevant later). About three years into the job I’m given an enormous study to do that requires a full 12 hour day of tissue processing. And when I say 12 hours, I mean, with no break longer than 20 minutes, so getting in lunch or a chance to pee takes work. And it’s disgusting, and by the end of the day my arms are trembling from basically moving 100 liters of liquid around.

    Normally, after this I would put everything on ice and go home, and run all my tests the next day. But my boss doesn’t like how the data has been turning out, so he says I should tack on the 8 hour test (plus two hours of running) rather than leave the stuff to sit overnight. Now, this test requires exquisite fine motor control (which I don’t have after processing for 12 hours), and uses a machine that is finicky at the best of times. It is also only a week after a young woman scientist was brutally murdered in her lab when she was working late alone. (I am a woman, and was young at the time.)

    So I look my boss dead in the eye, in the middle of the lab and say “No. I’m not a grad student, you can’t do this to me. I will run the tests tomorrow.” My boss goes to argue and I say “I will call the union.”
    My boss closes his mouth. Pauses. “Fine.”

    It never came up again, and I told the new young woman lab worker (carefully not a union job) to not let him bully her into working that late (the security guard at night was *super creepy*, just as extra nope).

    What’s sad is that grad students and post docs shouldn’t be treated that way either.

  226. Three Seagrass*

    I had a boss that came in to the organization and stirred up a lot of drama. Rather than managing her, the CEO decided to get rid of her. Because he was a coward, he came up with this story that we needed to downsize and laid her off…and me and one other person. (It was a very toxic and disorganized place)

    And I found out a few weeks later that she had been taking credit for all my work.

    A friend that still worked there told me that they would have meetings about my old boss’s tasks and she would tell them, “No, Three Seagrass did that. And that too. And that.”

    My revenge ended up being two-fold: they wanted me to come back and I won’t, not ever. And my old boss has been through 3 jobs in the 3 years since that happened, and I have been at one highly-regarded job with a promotion and several raises.

  227. Angela*

    I did a six-month contract on a team of four people (including me). Two of the people I worked with were fantastic, the third was awful. She was unpleasant – to the point of not responding if I passed her in the hallway and said “Good morning”- impatient with me, harsh when I didn’t know how to do things I couldn’t have been expected to do (think internal procedures, etc.) undermined me in front of others, took credit for my work, etc. Awful. When I left, I wrote thank-you-notes to the two nice ones, and stuck them in envelopes with $5 Starbucks cards. Then I decided to send her one as well. I wrote a super-sarcastic, but plausibly nice, thank you note (“you were SO helpful and SO patient! You made me feel so welcome! So understanding when I needed time to learn a new procedure!”) Then I went back to Starbucks, bought another $5 gift card, immediately bought myself a drink with it, and stuck the no-cash-value Starbucks card in the envelope. Petty as hell, but still makes me feel better.

  228. LavaLamp*

    One of my less than finer moments fighting a sexist toad. I don’t really like this kind of toxicity but sometimes you have to hit people with what they understand.

    Most of my experience is in construction company offices. Most people who work in those places are decent hardworking and generally okay. This guy comes in and starts complaining about one of the company trucks, and how it needed maintenance. *Note; I don’t drive and he knew this.* I asked what was up with it, trying to be friendly and conversational.

    He spun that into a rant somehow about how I didn’t drive, and women should never drive because they all suck at it and just a bunch of utter garbage. I was the only woman in the room.

    I had enough of his nonsense, and told him that maybe if he’d stop lying about what six inches looks like women would drive better. I have never seen a person turn THAT many shades of red in my entire life. The rest of the shop saw this. It was. . . well legendary. And it got back to the supervisor who was also a woman. He was then soundly berated a second time.

  229. BookLady*

    I once had a boss who I’m pretty sure was trying to get me to leave. I was a top performer, but she rated me as “needs improvement” on two out of five areas on my performance review. And those two areas were the core competencies of my job! I was shocked and asked her to provide examples of areas where I’d fallen short of her expectations. She hemmed and hawed for a minute, but she had absolutely nothing to back up her ratings. (Oh, and the performance review form didn’t require her to include justification for her scores!)

    I told her I was surprised that this was the first I was hearing that my performance wasn’t strong enough, because she had praised my work throughout the year. I was supposed to sign the review in our meeting, but I told her that I wanted to put together a response because I didn’t agree with her ratings (this was allowed on the form under the employee comments section).

    Not 30 minutes after the meeting, she was at my desk with the printed review and a pen, trying to force me to sign off on it. She claimed it was due that day, but I knew that wasn’t true. I looked her dead in the eye and said, “No, it’s not due until Friday. I will sign it after I’ve written a response to your unfounded comments.” She looked furious, but walked away.

    I spent that evening documenting everything that happened in that meeting, including her inability to come up with any examples of my poor work and that she had praised me all year. I emailed it to her the next day, she read it, and then silently walked a printed copy over to me to sign. I double checked it for my comments, signed it, smiled, and handed it back to her. It felt so good to document her BS when she was trying to get around the system of not having to justify herself.

    Luckily, I had already been interviewing for a new job and transferred about a month later. And my new boss has always given me the highest marks on my performance reviews!

  230. Beth*

    I had a job where I ended up with a stack of hats (accounting, IT, operations, compliance, reporting) through a combination of my being very good at developing efficient work systems, and my jerkass bosses being ever more deeply invested in not actually doing anything that they couldn’t slough off onto someone else. (Very small firm — five people, including two co-owners — so not many places for the workload to land.) I had had a few years of getting fairly healthy raises as my hats piled up, but that dried up, and my bosses applied themselves to the important task of convincing themselves that what I did wasn’t really all that much, hence no raise.

    When I left that job, I gave two months’ notice. (I was moving across country to join my now-spouse.) I didn’t give a damn about the bosses, but I thought it would be better for my fellow peons if I gave the bosses enough time to hire my replacement and give me time to train her. (I had never had time to document more than the most essential of my core procedures.)

    They demonstrated their belief in my unimportance by not hiring a replacement AT ALL. They did add a staff person, but she started the week after I left and had a role that did NOT include ANY of my duties.

    I had one afternoon to train the bookkeeper they had decided to outsource to. She told me, at the end of the afternoon, that she hadn’t been able to absorb more than a fraction of what I’d shown her, because it was way too much.

    I had given them a contact to use to outsource the IT. He sent them a proposal for the work. They rejected it, saying he wanted way too much money. He told them flat out that his proposal was barely half of what I had been doing, and that they had been fools not to recognize how much money I had been saving them, and wished them good luck getting their IT work done.

    As best as I could tell from comments by my former colleagues, the jerkbosses eventually ended up hiring FOUR people to cover my work, and it STILL wasn’t being done to anything like the same standard.

    And me? I was literally snapped up as soon as I arrived in my new location, with the same title, less than half the workload, and a healthy bump in salary that has been healthily bumped every year since then. (And my new boss has always treated me as if I’m an important and intelligent person!)

  231. former AM*

    I was an account manager in a sales organization. I’m on a kick off call with a new client, and one of my Sales Reps. New Client and I hit it off, we have some mutual connections, etc. We spend some time on the call talking about our hometowns (we no longer lived in the state), the people we had in common, then she told me the long story of how the company came about, the cofounders, etc. After the call ended, Sales Rep was LIVID with me for “wasting time” and said to me “just because you and New Client f***ed the same guy, doesn’t mean they’ll be a good client.” (one of the mutual connections was a man, and we were both women).

    I have two triumph stories related to this:

    1. A couple months later, Sales Rep is on a call with another one of my clients, and realizes he has a mutual connection with the Client. They chat about it for a minute or two and move on. After the call, I lean around my computer screen and looked at Sales Rep square in the eye and said “Just because you and Client f***ed the same girl, doesn’t mean they’ll turn into a good client.” (I KNOW THIS IS TERRIBLE BUT IT FELT AMAZING IN THE MOMENT!)

    2. A few years later, I own my own company and New Client is my first client to sign a contract with me. New Client is leaving on maternity leave, and her backfill disappears a week before her due date. Who does she call to offer $$$$$$ to help out while she’s on leave? Since no one off the street would know her organization the way I do? That’s right…. me and my company. Guess taking those extra few minutes to connect and establish a relationship really do matter. ;)

  232. Not A Great Person*

    A few years ago I worked on a team that was absolutely stretched and incompetently managed, but was heavily relied on by much of the business. We had a new employee on another, related team – young, well meaning – but really pushy and always had an attitude of “I have this amazing idea for your team, what if we did X!”, where X was something we’d either considered and dismissed for good reason, was wildly outside of what was reasonable given how underwater we were, or was so minor we couldn’t justify devoting our limited resources to it. Not to mention, none of these suggestions were remotely related to her duties. By the end of her first few months on the job, she’d already suggested so many “ideas” that I was losing my mind. So I just stopped replying to her emails – all of them, about everything, permanently. I was senior enough and a standout performer so no one questioned my work, and she was junior enough that she never said a word to my face. She got all the info she needed to do her job from the general communications I sent to her team, and could get clarification from a number of other people, but in the remaining years I worked there I never responded to any emails she sent me, even if it was a perfectly legitimate thing to ask. Looking back I feel really bad about this, but I was so overwhelmed that any time she sent me an email it just pushed me over the edge.

  233. Melissa*

    I’ve told this story here before but, back when I was in high school, I worked for a franchise location of a pizza chain that is located primarily in the western U.S.

    The owner was an angry, spittle-flying-from-his-mouth, micromanager. I don’t think he ever said a kind word to a single employee in the 16 or so months I worked there.

    I put in my two weeks’ notice and, on my last day, ordered pizza for lunch.

    From our main competitor.

    And had it delivered to my restaurant.

    I paid the delivery guy a huge tip ($10, I think, which was a lot back in 1984) to come in from the door farthest away from the counter, and walk the length of the restaurant calling out, “Pizza delivery for Melissa! COMPETITOR’S pizza delivery for Melissa!”

    I took the pizza from him, paid him cash, then started up the stairs to the employee break room. But Micromanager was hot on my heels, screaming.

    I ate my pizza on the bus ride home. It was delicious.

  234. 1st Time Caller*

    Sorry this is long – Ten years ago I was hired at a very prestigious company (the president of the state university sat on our board) for my niche accounting specialty – contract accounting. Everyone was great to work with at first, until I was promoted one level over the director in charge of sales (let’s call her E.B.). She was not okay with that and started with small veiled insults that eventually led to her gaslighting and bullying me to the point that I had to start therapy and meds.

    For example, we had a remote computer admin program in case someone was out unexpectedly so that others in the department could access any needed files. One of her reports was in a car accident and was going to be out for three weeks so she got the remote program access and password. Unfortunately IT forgot to remove her access – and she would remote into my computer the night before our board meetings and transpose figures and change very small things in my reports so that I looked incompetent. (This was found out after I left.)

    After eight years there, and three years of her abuse, I finally had enough so I put my notice in with no future plans, I just knew that I had to leave. On the day that I put my notice in, E.B.’s new admin came to me for help with E.B.’s monthly expense reimbursement. I did not usually handle those, but the person that did was on PTO and the admin did not know who else to ask. I agreed to help as she said that she could not get receipts to match the credit card bill and that it looked off. I was curious and thus began the path to my triumph.

    In that industry there is a very important training and conference program that, once you applied for and were accepted, ran once a quarter for a year and you went to all four events. The events were held in “cool” locations like NYC and Las Vegas and you went to a different location for each session. Attendees went to three days of intense training and learning and then had two days of conference with vendors and such. I had gone the year previously, and E.B. was going that year. Now this event was very costly for an organization – it was 12k for the conference registration then hotel, airfare, transportation, meals etc. on top. It generally cost an organization 30k for the one attendee, but it was a huge networking tool and if you got a contract from a connection made there it was usually upwards of 500k for your company.

    As I was going through her receipts things were not adding up to what they should have – weird times and dates, a dinner coded to networking with a vendor who I knew wasn’t there due to a death in his family, cash receipts when they were coded to a credit card. I made this my only project for my last two weeks, and went down a rabbit hole, I even had my teenage step-son scouring her social media. Very long story short – E.B. cancelled her registration at the conference and they gave her a check for the 10k reimbursement, she would then still go to the conference city and have a lovely vacation with her boyfriend on the company dime.

    On my last day I had a meeting with my boss, the CEO, the board president, and the executive staff, including E.B., to go over my transition plan/documents. After going through the required stuff I then said “Oh, I have one last thing to share.” I then presented everyone there with a packet including an executive summary and appendices and switched the TV on and opened a powerpoint. It included such details as the copy of the cleared conference refund check with her signature on the back, emails from the conference chair stating that she had never attended, statements from those that she said she met with that had no idea who she was, etc. It also included photos from her alt Instagram with her and her boyfriend in those cities on those dates – the boyfriend who happened to be a manager at our biggest competitor who somehow kept just underbidding us for projects. After going through the powerpoint, I packed up my stuff while E.B. vacillated between shades of white and green, I then said “I’m sure there’s more, you need to get a forensic accountant in”. I then walked out the front door to shouting from the meeting room.

    E.B. was promptly investigated, fired, ended up owing the organization over 100k, and her very wealthy husband divorced her – and because she cheated the pre-nup was void.

    What E.B. did not know was that I started my career in a forensic accounting department right out of school. This made me remember how much I loved it and I opened my own firm specializing in it that is going well after two years. I even have an amazing executive assistant – E.B.’s old admin!

    2. A Feast of Fools*

      How…. is this NOT a movie??? This is gold.

      I’m in internal audit and I would love to be a forensic accountant and/or fraud examiner. ::swoon::

    3. Loredena Frisealach*

      Oh.My.G0d. This was absolutely amazing! I am in awe at what you managed to pull together in two weeks.

    5. Chauncy Gardener*

      +1000!! As a fellow accountant, this warms my fuzzy little accounting heart!! The path to executive downfall is often littered with falsified expense reports and a pissed off accountant.

    7. Sinister Serina*

      This was worth every word and deserves to be seen as a limited series with some big stars in it. I loved it.

  235. A Feast of Fools*

    My first sales job ever was at a dumpster fire of a place*. During my 2nd week there, they slid a document onto my desk and said that it was just routine but it had apparently been mistakenly left out of my new hire paperwork package.

    It was a contract saying that if I left the company before my first year was up, that I had to repay them some ungodly sum ($1600? $2000?) for training. I asked what training. They said the training I was currently receiving to get up to speed on their products and in-house systems. (Which was basically me shadowing senior sales people).

    Even though I was still in my 20’s, I had the presence of mind to say, “Oh, so sorry. Is it OK if I run it by my mom’s attorney first? She’s really drummed it into me to never sign a contract without first having a lawyer look at it.” The HR woman yanked the paper off my desk and it was never mentioned again. [Note: My mom did *not* have an attorney.]

    I quit somewhere around the 5- or 6-month mark. My co-workers were all like, “Daaaaang, now you gotta pay back the training fee.” They were gobsmacked when I told them that I’d never signed anything saying I would.

    *This was the same place that told our top salesperson (a 20-something guy) that they couldn’t give him a raise (in the form of a higher commission percentage, not a flat base salary) because then he’d making more than Old Joe who’d been a salesperson with the company for decades. Top Salesperson was gone within a couple of weeks, snapped up by one of our customers.

    *Also the same place that hired a senior sales guy away from the competition to be paired with me (we worked in teams of Junior/Senior). But this guy liked to show me his underwear every day. Like, literally unzip his pants in our shared cubed and let them drop to his ankles. Then always needing something on my desk that required brushing his hands or arms over my chest. And frequently mimicking jagging off. When I talked to my manager about it he said, “We paid a lot of money to get Pervert Sales Guy here, I expect you to find a way to make it work.”

    1. Pennyworth*

      I’ve found the phrase ”my attorney wouldn’t allow me to sign which include that clause” very handy once or twice. I don’t have an attorney.

      1. Siege*

        I got in a car accident with a city cop once. On top of the beautiful schadenfreude of him incriminating himself within two sentences on the witness stand, the city had to pay out for my totaled car. As part of that they gave me a document to sign that essentially boiled down to “this is the sun of money you are receiving, there is no more money for this ever, please die in a ditch”. I mean, it’s impressive.

        I’ve used it as a template a few times when I’ve been in accidents where I had to pay out since then, and it works surprisingly well to basically say “yeah, the city gave me this when I got in an accident with a cop, I don’t really know what it says but if it’s good enough for them, tee-hee!” It works best if you all but twirl your hair around your finger. There’s a certain species of man who will just sign anything if he thinks the woman handing it to him is stupid, which is interesting because me acting dumb doesn’t change the fact this is an iron-clad hold-harmless on steroids. They never read it, either, and it just wipes out their legal rights regarding the accident. (I would know, the city valued my car too high to avoid actually totaling it and offered a settlement; I was young and broke so it was great that I was getting a thousand dollars for a car maybe worth 1200, so I didn’t check with my very expensive lawyer before I signed and returned it, but at least I did read it, and I understood it – I just didn’t know it represented a bad deal to start.)

          1. Siege*

            “I was on X street. I saw the defendant enter the street and accelerate.” The judge stopped him there and said “you saw she didn’t see you and still sat in the road?” Or something like that. The cop turned into a gaping fish and the judge said “case dismissed”. He’d backed out of a parking garage and sat in the middle of the road; I was on the way to a job interview and looking for a landmark so I completely didn’t see him, but I wouldn’t have hit him if he’d actually, you know, driven on like he was supposed to. The damage was to my left headlight and his right rear quarter panel, so he was slewed across the lane. The judge was my hero.

            The cop tried to come after me a year later for “injuries” from an under-20-mph accident; my lawyer was happy to write a letter telling him the city had closed the case and if his injuries were so severe why was he just bringing it up now?

  236. Library Lady*

    Mine isn’t about s colleague, but it is about a patron at the library where I worked at the time.

    Backstory: At the time, I had semi-recently talked to my manager/director about how a lot of us were being sexually harassed by patrons, which sparked a lot of staff meetings about how we could address this. On a staff level, a lot of us were also making an effort to speak up in uncomfortable situations. I was about 25 at the time.

    An older patron asked for help finding a book but he immediately made me uncomfortable – standing too close, asking if we were allowed to “talk to people,” which apparently was code for “Are you allowed to date patrons,” and when I tried to walk away, he handed me a piece of paper with his phone number already written on it. I got mad, held my hands up, and said “I don’t want your phone number” and left.

    The next day I was at the desk again when the asshat from the day before suddenly slides into my view, and he starts getting angry, saying “Yesterday, I wasn’t trying to be fresh, I was trying to be friendly, and you didn’t need to get all uppity like that.” Without even realizing what I was going to say, I put up my hand, stopped him mid sentence and said in the most even-keeled “DO NOT FUCK WITH ME” tone I could muster, “Everything about our interaction yesterday made me incredibly uncomfortable and what you did was extremely inappropriate. I am here to work, I don’t want your phone number, and I have absolutely no desire for any kind of a personal relationship with you. And as far as I’m concerned, this is the last time I’m going to discuss it. Are we clear?”

    Y’all……the absolutely stunned look on his face was beautiful. He nodded, said “Well, ma’am, you have yourself a nice day,” then he left and I didn’t see him for MONTHS. I had no idea I was going to say all that, but I didn’t stutter, blush, or get emotional in any way – I just radiated “BACK OFF” energy through every pore in my body, and I have never been more proud of anything I’ve ever said in my life!

  237. Kipianon*

    A little late to the party, but here’s mine. I worked as a music teacher at an international school. Our school was in Eastern Europe but we had students from 60 nationalities. We also had another teacher on staff who liked to remind us constantly that he had a PhD in Global Citizenship Education.

    One year he and I decided to take our students to London to see some live shows. I’d taken students before, but was excited to plan this trip with him, because he was from England and I figured he’d be able to take us beyond the the typical tourist stuff. He certainly did. Instead of seeing contemporary theatre, he marched us through Kensington Park to see where Diana had lived (these were 12 year old kids from every country BUT England. They had no idea who Diana was).
    The “highlight” was a visit to the British Museum where he stood in the entrance and proceeded to lecture the students that “lots of countries weren’t taking good care of their culturally significant artefacts, so the British government generously agreed to take care of them here”. I was mortified, but didn’t want to get in a very unprofessional argument in front of the students. I knew from our planning meetings that he was looking forward to letting the students wander aimlessly about the museum for a few hours while he checked out a cafe nearby, so before he could send them off on their colonial explorations, I announced “Everyone, you are so very lucky to have here with you Mr X who is so knowledgeable and also British himself. And even though you are welcome to explore the museum on your own, I encourage you to go with him now, as he takes you on a personalized tour of the museum and shows you artefacts taken from your own cultures”.
    I then had a nice and quiet afternoon on my own at the museum (he was right about one thing; the Cafe next door was lovely) and he never mentioned British imperialism to me again.

    A couple of years later, I had moved schools but heard that after I left, he was no longer able to hide his incompetence and was let go. Now he is a professor at a prestigious English university, lecturing in – you guessed it – international mindedness.

    2. Pennyworth*

      ”The British government generously agreed to take care of them here” He said that with a straight face ? I immediately thought of comedian James Akaster, who has a set where he claims the Elgin marbles can’t be returned to Greece because ”we haven’t finished looking at them”.

      1. Kipianon*

        The straightest of faces. This was one of MANY times he demonstrated just how “internationally minded” he was. It was the first time he paid for it though :)

      2. Sinister Serina*

        I was thinking the same thing! Greece has a slightly different perspective on the marbles than this guy does, apparently.

  238. Mountainshadows299*

    At a previous job, I had a smarmy, vocal right-leaning, slightly annoying, but generally harmless coworker who occasionally came to receive consultation from my team (which was our job). The day after the 2016 US election, I was feeling rather shell-shocked (at the thought of that stupid sexist Cheeto being our president) and I guess it showed on my face. I walked into a coworker’s office to pass along work related info to a different coworker, and smarmy coworker happened to be sitting in the office. Upon seeing me, he said, with a giant grin: “Smile! It’s Tuesday!” I’m a woman, so “smile” comments are nails on a chalkboard anyway, BUT! For once in my life I thought fast and, keeping a deadpan disposition, I looked him dead in the eye and replied cooly: “Actually, it’s Wednesday,” and continued on my way. (It was Wednesday! The day after voting day.) It was the only thing I could think of that wouldn’t have come out TOO snarky to get me in trouble but was just enough of a push back to get him to stop being obnoxious.

  239. DJ Abbott*

    So, in my part-time deli job one of my coworkers tried to pick a fight with me. Out of the blue he started criticizing my work and saying I wasn’t getting enough done, when I had waited on all the customers he ignored.
    I stood up to him and said I wouldn’t take that from him when the reason I didn’t get as much done is I had waited on all the customers.
    The following week he started with me again, trying to order me around as if he was boss and making ridiculous demands. I said I was going to the restroom and he said I had to finish what I was doing first. As I walked away I heard him call me a b*tch.
    The manager wasn’t there that day. I told the assistant manager as soon as possible and describe what it happened and that I wouldn’t take such treatment from anyone. A few days later the manager asked me what happened and I told her without any comments or judgments.
    This coworker was disciplined for that and a couple of other things. I was not disciplined. It’s the first time I’ve ever stood up to a hostile man at work and not gotten punished.
    I learned the technique of stating only the facts with no feelings or judgments here at AAM. Thank you! :)

  240. Catabodua*

    My very first job out of college. I was a new AP Clerk, in the job for about 3 weeks. Part of my responsibilities was to process travel reimbursements. Like most companies, the company had a policy that they wanted the detailed receipt from a restaurant, not just the top/total receipt.

    One of the salesmen dropped off his pile of receipts, and every last one of his food items were just the top receipt, not the detailed one. I let him know I needed the detailed one …. and he started screaming and calling me an idiot and to just do my damn job, it’s not that hard, etc. then stomped off.

    My boss happened to come by not long after, while I was still teary-eyed and asked me what was wrong. I explained the whole thing, convinced I would be fired. I was thinking that because he was such a high ranking salesman that I’d get in trouble for upsetting him. This was 1988 and he made $280-ish a year in commissions.

    He was gone the next day. His tantrum caused the Controller to do a very deep dive on his expense reports and they realized he’d submit detailed receipts for almost all of his restaurants – but never when he was at someplace like a Hard Rock Cafe. And, those receipts were always several hundred higher than they’d expect. They realized he was purchasing his family souvenirs from all over the country at places like Hard Rock and then putting it through on his expense reports. I was making $25,000 per year vs his $280+ and I couldn’t understand why he didn’t just buy the $200 worth of tee-shirts. He could clearly afford them.

    I’d love to say they walked him out, but he rage quit when they started questioning him on his receipts.

  241. hardyhar*

    My second full-time job started off really well. Until I got a new boss, who turned out to be a legitimate sociopath. Bullying, harassment, assault, theft, frame-ups, you name it, this creep did it. He was also incompetent. But Terrible Boss was the son of an industry head honcho from the dominant company in the industry. This meant Terrible Boss could get away with pretty much anything, as the owners did not want to make Terrible Boss’s Dad angry.

    So Terrible Boss ended up illegally firing me and several others. This was mid-GFC, and the sector was in turmoil, so it took months for all of us to find truly stable employment. I came dangerously close to homelessness, and both the awful work environment and the job-hunting stress has left a lasting legacy on my health.

    About two years after the fact, it was becoming obvious to the ex-employer they were not going to win this. To avoid a Tribunal finding in our favour reflecting the illegal firings, they settled, with the sum reflecting what we were likely to be awarded by the Tribunal in damages. But Terrible Boss still wasn’t fired or laid off: Terrible Boss’s Dad was too important. Six years later, Terrible Boss’s Dad dies, and less than a year after that, I hear that Terrible Boss has been “laid off”. In those six years, he had left a trail of human wreckage.

    Ten years after Terrible Boss illegally fired me, and a little over three years after he was “laid off”, I’ve transferred my skills over to a much more stable industry sector. The company I work for is wanting to hire several new people with the same sort of skills I have. After the first couple of interviews, I’m asked if I can come and “jump in” on the hiring panel due to my skills and background, as the panel have come to believe they don’t actually know what to look for.

    “Sure,” I say, and – as this was mid-2019 – I join them in the interview room. I’m reading through the interview notes about the first two candidates when the next candidate walks in. I look up.

    It’s Terrible Boss.

    Watching the colour drain from his face as he recognised me was gloriously satisfying.

    I was about to quietly disclose a potential conflict of interest to the head of the panel, but I didn’t have to: Terrible Boss said he was withdrawing his candidacy, and then swiftly left the room.

    The best part was when another staff member spotted Terrible Boss in the foyer, and knocked on the panel door to enquire as to if Terrible Boss had just interviewed. She looked incredibly relieved when the panel head said Terrible Boss had actually just withdrawn his candidacy.

    When she and I spoke later, it turned out she had worked with him previously, too, and had also been illegally fired, and had also received a settlement pay out.

    And no, Terrible Boss has not been able to find, or keep, ongoing work. He won’t starve due to that overly-geneerous inheritance, but it’s a small victory that he can’t cause that damage to people anymore, either.

    1. Mannequin*

      No, you’ve underestimated- it’s a HUGE victory that he can’t hurt people like that anymore! His inheritance is a good thing in that respect, if it keeps him out of the workforce forever.

  242. AnonForThis*

    This is not something that *I* did to vanquish a work-related jerk, but it is sweet all the same.

    Our lease was up for renewal. We would probably have signed something w/ a slight increase because moving is a pain. But the landlord was not biting. He was sure that he could lease out the building to [well know tech company]. Rumors are that they pay above market rate (true as far as I can tell, but big enough that they kind of set market rate in certain areas) AND pay for their own tenant improvements – which they completely trick out the buildings for (also kinda true). So we move to another space. Super annoying and whatever, but it’s necessary.

    It has been 5 years. The old office? Still empty. I enjoy a frisson of schadenfreude every time I drive past.

  243. Ebb*

    Aha, my “worst manager ever” story.

    A few years back, I worked at a small company as the assistant to a particular manager. After I’d been there a little over a year, we hired a new manager for the role — let’s call her Heather. On her FIRST DAY, as I was attempting to train her on some of our systems, Heather told me way too many personal details about her impending separation from her fiancee; the relationship had imploded when she slept with her previous boss… who was married! Come to find out, this woman had no personal or professional boundaries, and would do anything to get attention, including but not limited to: comparing her appearance to others, making racist comments and then laughing them off as a joke, sleeping with coworkers and talking about it, barging in on me in the bathroom to ask questions, asking me to be her “wakeup call” so she didn’t come in late, and asking me to do her hair before anyone else got in.

    On top of the personality issues, she was actively bad and lazy at her job. A lot of her labor ended up on my shoulders, and I had to actively work to correct her mistakes, some of which were hazardous to our clients. I was her only assistant, and after a year I was the only person anyone in the company would talk to when they had corrections, because I would actually incorporate critical feedback rather than laughing it off. So I got all of her critical feedback, on top of my own job, but she got all the praise for my work. She once complained to me, in tears, that she was so tired of having to prove herself at work every single day, to which I responded, “…isn’t that… what everyone does? every day?” Anyway, I eventually got fed up with her attitude after she “playfully” insulted me in front of everyone for refusing to go home until I’d fixed a mistake of hers — it was a five-minute fix that nobody would have known about if she hadn’t made a point of calling me out in front of everyone. I went over her head and made a formal complaint the very next day.

    This was my first experience “using my capital,” as Allison likes to say. I remember explicitly saying during my complaint that I found the situation unsustainable and I couldn’t commit to staying more than a month if I had to still interact with her. I wasn’t sure if I’d be fired or not. To their credit, our bosses immediately manufactured a crisis in another department for me to help out with for a couple weeks, and fired her in less than a month. I was so relieved — I hadn’t even realized how much she’d destroyed my professional well-being. I stayed with the company for years after.

    I wish I had a single, impactful, petty anecdote to share, but for me the triumph was articulating my problems and being listened to. In my next job I also had a toxic manager, but I had the experience and perspective to deal with it effectively; I was able to rally my coworkers to make a complaint together, resulting in a reassignation of the manager that was better for everyone, and I was formally praised for my conflict resolution at my next evaluation! So it all turned out as well as it possibly could have.

  244. Tell her Teller*

    Years ago I was working as a bank teller. We had a little satellite branch that needed 2 people in it at all times due to money handling protocols, so when lunch breaks came, my boss would come down and “cover.” This didn’t involve pulling a drawer or helping customers, though. Just standing there and chatting with me while I’m helping drive through and lobby customers simultaneously.

    So one day I’m running around trying to help everyone, while she’s on her cell just chatting away. She hangs up and kinda stands over me while I’m counting out a customer’s money and goes, “That was my salon. I had to reschedule my manicure after you called in sick last week.” With a customer in front of me I turned to her and said, “I’m sorry [Boss], next time I’ll schedule my sinus infections around your nail appointments.” The customer chortled and boss didn’t say anything.

    I wish I could say that was a turning point, but she was so oblivious that it was like the conversation never happened. She eventually got demoted and transferred a couple of times, but still worked for that bank until retirement.

  245. Anonymous Lawyer*

    I’m a lawyer representing claimants in Social Security disability hearings – basically, if someone is too sick to work and gets denied when they apply for benefits, I represent them in front of a judge and help them get their money.

    There was this one judge, who has since retired, who was known for being obnoxious to the female attorneys. Several years back, SSA made two rule changes for disability hearings. The first change was that lawyers were required to either inform the judge of the existence of outstanding medical records 5 days in advance of the hearing or submit those records 5 days in advance of the hearing. The second rule was that SSA had to give at least 75 days’ advance notice of a hearing date.

    I had a case where I got 73 days’ notice for the hearing. Not a big deal; I normally waive the right to notice in a case like that because I’m ready to go anyway and don’t want to further delay things. One of my clients’ doctors was dragging their feet in sending me medical records, and two weeks before the hearing I still didn’t have the records. (This is very common.) I wrote a letter to the judge informing him that the records were outstanding, thus fulfilling my obligation. The records arrived the day before the hearing and I submitted them.

    On the day of the hearing, the judge said he wasn’t going to accept the records because they were submitted the day before. I told him that the rule said to inform or submit, and I informed him two weeks in advance so the regulations say he had to accept the records. He refused to budge. Then he asked if I would waive 75 days’ advance notice of the hearing since I only got 73. I said I would waive notice if he would accept the medical records into evidence. He said that this was not a negotiation and they were separate issues. So I refused to waive notice. The judge was irritated but postponed the hearing because he had no choice.

    The records were now submitted well in advance of the new hearing. At the new hearing, I won the case based on the strength of those records. The judge never gave me any grief again. I think he was simultaneously annoyed and impressed that I outmaneuvered him.

  246. MeowMixers*

    I work in production. Production always has some sort of daily production meeting where issues, actions, and production numbers were discussed. I was in a quality support role. A manager in a different department was known to be a royal ass (yelled at people all the time) and who was also a micromanager. We had some higher-ups from corporate that were due to come to this meeting. She printed off scripts for everyone to use. Mind you, I had been there multiple years, so I knew how to report out. I did it every day. So I stood up in front of everyone and squinted at the paper and slowly read it. If they had a question, I would look at the paper and try to answer them. I looked very uncomfortable. Later on, she told me that she didn’t appreciate my attitude and threaten to fire me.

    The thing is, I am known for being a great presenter and was highly successful in my job. I just didn’t care if I pissed off a bunch of people. Plus she couldn’t fire me. My manager looked over the script after the fact and was disappointed that I didn’t read all of the spelling mistakes out loud.

  247. GeekGirl*

    Nothing I did, but sit around and wait for karma to catch up with this guy. He was my boss, following after a well liked and respected boss. Anything from the prior boss was tossed. Only his ideas were worth exploring. He moved up the ladder quickly, and eventually made it to the second most important guy in the organization. He had been a chaser of young blonde females all through his career, and finally got caught in his company car with a subordinate staff member outside a restaurant by internal security. He retired early almost immediately, clearing out his office overnight. To my knowledge, he has not found employment in the same field in the last three years.

  248. Today*

    I worked as a minion for a government funded service provider. As a minion I suggested a more effective way of delivering our services, where we would not actually be managed directly by the service provider, and would be able to provide services across a wider scope and more effectively. I even wrote a report on how it would work. The whole concept was shot down completely by management a couple of levels above me: “This organisation will never support [profession] in [new concept].”
    A few years later I was in a different role and was asked by the government to contribute to a project examining how services were delivered. I suggested my original model and it was taken up and expanded, reports were written etc etc. Now the government is requiring service providers to deliver services according to the model I suggested years ago!!!

  249. Expiring Cat Memes*

    Bit late to the party, but it was such a beautiful moment.

    I had produced a good piece of work for my department that was well-received and widely shared in the organisation. The subject matter was squarely in our department’s realm, but it fed downstream into the work of another department, who I had consulted in development via my usual at-level contact.

    Other Department director (aka Work Jerk) didn’t like this piece of work or that she hadn’t been consulted, despite it being a fairly small thing that wasn’t in her remit. She demanded retraction in a scathing email sent to me, CC’ing in every senior leader in my department, a C-level executive, as well as a bunch of random senior leadership with no stake in the issue. The whole thing blew up with my senior director calling a meeting to sort it out.

    10 minutes before the meeting, C-level exec showed up at my desk asking for background because he’d been roped into this meeting and had no idea why. I quickly explained it, and while we were shrugging at each other in confusion, Work Jerk arrived. She clearly didn’t put my face to my name, and started unleashing a torrent of emotionally-charged criticism about the work; how stupid it was, what idiot would do that, it’s the worst piece of shit she’d ever seen, etc. C-lev’s eyebrows started rising but he couldn’t get a word in sideways with her under full sail. So she carried on like that until meeting time, when the 3 of us went to senior director’s office. I could see she was confused as to why I was tagging along, but shrugging it off.

    Shortly into the meeting, I saw it start to dawn on her. She was shifting uncomfortably in her seat and not making eye contact with me. But – not one to admit fault, and perhaps bolstered by C-lev’s earlier silence, she pushed through and continued her tirade, though with less emotion and certainty this time. Senior director, a skilled jerk wrangler, let her go on a little, then cut in with pointed questions. At that point she had no option but to talk herself into an embarrassing corner where it became clear to everyone in the room that the only issues were the ones her department was failing to manage.

    Watching her skulk, deflated, out of that office after all the bluster she arrived with was so unbelievably satisfying.

  250. REPLYALLGAL*

    I have a good one, I had recently come back to work after having a miscarriage and medical management and I had asked it to be kept quit on a need to know basis just because if anyone asked me if i was ok I was likely to cry (not my finest work moment).

    Anyway there was office bully/gossip who was part of middle management had been causing a bottle neck with work I needed from her team to complete my job. I had for about a year been sending her briefs and them sitting in her inbox going no where (me sending chaser emails and sometimes getting a opps i forgot about this and then nothing or just nothing). She would scream if anyone including my manager tried to circumvent her process, so we all kinda kept trying to go down the process

    I sent her a email asking her politely for a update brief xyz and said I knew there had been a lot going on in her team (lots of sickness) so not to worry if it hadn’t been tackled yet, all I needed was a rough date and I would manage the teams work stream accordingly.

    Cue her CCing all departments, all above and below managers and managers managers including board members from other departments (my company is a large company) so about 50+ v senior people with the response that she hadn’t got any briefs from me ever or chaser emails, that I was clearly confused and incompetent and being disrespectful to even say such a thing and I was clearly unstable to due my miscarriage and as sad as that was, maybe I should look at the reasons why I lost not only the briefs but also my baby and do some internal reflection and take some personal accountability and reflect on what I could do better next time to avoid negative outcomes (miscarriage?) so it didn’t effect work.

    Luckily I had been creating a paper trail just in case.

    So I replied ALL – attaching all briefs sent via email, chaser conversations I had with her totally over the year. About 50 not done briefs in total. Documented, time stamped and in chronological order. I also attached the email asking to keep my loss private which was sent to the managers and HR due to protect my privacy at the time. I kept it factual and apologised for any crossed wires, suggesting maybe IT issue (even though about 60% of emails sent to her had responses that she would delegate them out and never did and all had read response on). IT was looped in at some point – they did a check did and stated in fact she had opened each email and done 0 with them. They naturally replied all too (god bless our IT team)

    She openly screamed when she read the email – she had taken a long lunch so the email chain had IT’s response on it at that point, hit the desk and came screaming to saying “I was jealous that I was clearly defective and she wasn’t (3 lovely children)” got escorted from the building, went on 6 months sick leave and she was moved to another department in the basement along with some of the managers who had essentially let her grow to the sizeable bully she was.

    I got a round of applause in the canteen, apparently I wasn’t the only person who had run ins with her including my manager who had been trying to help the bottle neck but she had been saying she never got any emails from me and kept being sent in circles. I became somewhat famously known in the office as the starter emailgate.

    Probably not my finest moment but it felt good.

    1. Foxgloves*

      Oh I think that may well have been your finest moment! My jaw literally dropped at “maybe I should look at the reasons why I lost not only the briefs but also my baby and do some internal reflection and take some personal accountability and reflect on what I could do better next time to avoid negative outcomes”. That woman sounds AWFUL, and well done you for doing something about it.

    2. Sinister Serina*

      Oh, I think it was (from my perspective) your finest moment. You didn’t strangle her, which would have been justified with the things she said to you! And I’m sorry you went through this-it’s truly awful.

  251. Foxgloves*

    I was pretty new to the workplace (24/25) and was excelling at my role, when a colleague left. About 50% of her job was this annual, high stake, high visibility event, and about 8 weeks before the day the event was due to take place, I was given responsibility for it. The colleague who had left was paid at the same level as my boss (two levels higher than me), so I immediately asked whether I would be getting any additional pay for the work I was doing on the event. I was assured that I would be, and that it all just needed to get approved by various levels of management before they could confirm exactly how much, but in the meantime it would be great if I could carry on with getting everything sorted. So I did, and in every single one of my one-to-one meetings with my boss, I’d ask how the approvals were going, and every single time he assured me that it was ticking along and would be sorted soon. Eventually, about SIX MONTHS after the event (which had taken place IMMENSELY successfully, and I’d been working insane hours, culminating with me being in the office until 11:30pm the night before the event, getting back in at 4:45am the day of the event), I was told that I’d be getting an uplift of a couple of spinal points for the duration of the time I’d done the project. I lost my shit, pointed out that it NEVER would have run without me, that NO ONE else was willing to do the work, and that I was being severely underpaid for what I’d done. So my boss went back, managed to get my entire role regraded, plus a much more significant one off payment, and confirmation that I’d be back paid for the time between the event taking place and then. However, unbeknownst to him, because of all of this I’d been interviewing for another job, and literally TWO DAYS after he’d told me my new salary, I handed in my notice, and then left for my new job, which had the same salary as my boss. He was not happy, but I pointed out that if I’d been paid fairly the whole way through, I never would have looked to leave. Their loss!

  252. Alternative Person*

    I used to work at a tutoring centre.

    There was an arsehole co-worker who used to act like he had the knowledge/know-how and throw around fancy sounding stuff but barely knew his hand from his arse.

    One of the many recurring debates was how we were going to run the pre-school programme. I wanted (and designed) a functional learning pathway that incorporated all the basics- fine motor skills, communication, working together, etc. and put together a set of materials to do this, some self made, a couple of very basic tbs and curated free web printables.

    This arsehole gossiped, inferred and implied (we never spoke directly because he knew on some level that I could shut down his BS) that my programme was no good because it was too hard for the students. He centred his entire premise on the idea that the target students were ‘Pre writing/conversation’ and therefore should use a single, specific tb. He would loudly extol the virtues of this tb and how students were ‘Pre-writing/conversation’ and therefore should be doing this tb. He even got some of the other staff to support him.

    Management were inclined to go along with him and management was too wimpy to address it with me directly because they knew I would argue back.

    Which is what I did. I waited for management to try and get me on board and spent about ten minutes ripping apart this guy’s argument on every level (with peer backed research) with the headline being, those terms don’t mean what he says they mean. The manager walked away, a little pale.

    Arsehole co-worker never mentioned ‘Pre-writing/conversation’ again or any other pseudo research term.

    The absolute kicker, the tb he was suggesting was actually harder than the materials I had curated. Because that tb expected students to already be able to write.

    In the end management dropped the idea, I suspect because they couldn’t make a valid case for this guy’s programme, but enforcing mine would cause the arsehole and his minions to whine and not do it anyway.

    At the time I left that job, the plan had been to transfer me to a nearby branch which the arsehole guy was well know for hating. One afternoon, he loudly declared to the lobby at large, ‘Soon that place isn’t going to be my problem anymore’. I had to hide in the bathroom for five minutes to laugh because I had already accepted a job at a different company

  253. Holly*

    This happened years ago, and I hope would not occur these days!

    I was working in a small, male-dominated office, and we routinely got free gifts from vendors at Christmas, mugs, cheap wine, calendars etc.

    Now the calendars were usually showing vendors products or generic landscapes.
    But one year two of the calendars were of Page 3 girls!
    (‘Page 3’ being cheap and tacky pictures of topless women).

    The receptionist and I were horrified, but the men didn’t see the problem.

    One lad insisted on putting a calendar up by his desk in the open-plan office.
    The other went into one of the Directors offices – which had a large window by the main entrance, so everyone passing could see in.

    The receptionist and I remonstrated with the lad in the office, but he countered that he could decorate his desk how he pleased.
    So we made plans loudly to decorate _our_ desks with large Chippendales posters (male strippers).
    After spending the afternoon loudly discussing the proposed Chippendales pictures, lad asked us to stop as he was feeling uncomfortable!
    We said we didn’t want him feeling uncomfortable, say, how about we don’t put up the Chippendales posters, and in return you take down the Page 3?
    Deal done.

    For the Director, he had the same attitude, it was his office and he could decorate it as he pleased, and there was nothing wrong with the calendar anyway.
    I asked him if his wife would mind, and he didn’t see the issue.

    Next morning boss stormed into the office, and without saying a word, ripped the calendar down and threw it in the bin.
    I guess his wife _did_ mind.

  254. johnwayne*

    We had a terrible, nasty, boss who shared an abbreviated name with a well known, actually much loved, celebrity – think Kenny Loggins. He hated this fact and insisted everyone call him ‘Kenneth’.

    Whenever I and other co-conspirators talked to our grandboss, we made sure to refer to him as ‘Ken’ #9so not the name everyone knew he hated, but also not the name he preferred). This managed to ingrain itself into the grandboss’ brain so that he would always call him ‘Ken’ in private and public and ‘Kenneth’ didn’t have the minerals to correct him.

  255. Just a small town doc*

    I am a physician. When I started at my job, there was an older male physician who often monologued at me, sometimes for an hour or more as I tried to get through hospital rounds. In his defense, I think he was trying to help me, but much of what he says was so dismissive of patients and unkind that I cringed when I saw him.
    We had a patient we were co-managing on a ventilator. The family had a lot of disagreements about what should be done. It was during the time the Terry Schiavo case was in the news, and we were discussing that.
    From there, he segued into the runaway bride from Georgia, who had also been in the news. He commented, “You have to know she had issues, getting married for the first time at 32.”
    I would have found this comment offensive no matter what, but as is, I had a personal connection. I smiled sweetly and said, “I also got married for the first time at 32.” It was the only time I’ve ever seen him speechless, and he avoided me for months.

  256. cubby*

    once i worked at a college in a part time administrative assistant position, primarily to help launch a new doctoral program but also doing general reception. the full time office manager took a 2 month sabbatical to go cross country biking, and i was asked to cover all her duties without any additional hours, as best i could. she managed the three master’s programs and all the undergraduate stuff and a ton of other additional duties.

    well, i somehow managed to keep all the balls in the air. i’m sure a few things got overlooked that i didn’t know about, but nothing caught fire. i thought the office manager would be pleased, but i didn’t realize at the time that she was actually kind of territorial. the only thing she said to me when she got back was ‘well i guess i’m not needed here after all!’

    this caught up with me a couple months later, when they finally hired a permanent director for the doctoral program, who became my new boss. the office manager poisoned the well, telling her all kinds of things about me that were either made up but hard to disprove, or ostensibly true but had never been mentioned to me as a problem. the director bought into all of it and offered me a probationary half-length contract renewal instead of the full-time position i’d been promised.

    i thought about it, and then i declined to renew my contract, and then the college declined to fill my position, and the office manager had to handle all her own work AND my work for the next two years. meanwhile, i had a job in the next month where i was valued for what i brought.

  257. SongbirdT*

    I don’t know how much this counts, because the bully boss doesn’t even know who I am, but here it goes:

    I worked for a non-healthcare company that instituted a no-nicotine policy while I worked there. There were other paternalistic policies as well – only diet sodas were permitted in the cafeteria, all sweets were removed from vending machines, and no desserts were allowed to be sold in the cafeteria. Also, it was expected that all employees would eat lunch in the cafeteria and outside lunches were to be a rare exception. (However, 4pm beers provided by the company before everyone drove home was a-ok? Anyway…)

    It was working on quitting smoking, but had a setback weekend when I got notice of my monthly (yeah, monthly) random nicotine test the following Monday. It was no surprise a few weeks later when my manager tearfully fired me.

    So first thing I did was file for unemployment. The company fought it and I successfully appealed with the help of an employment attorney, with the state declaring that the work rule was unreasonable and I was entitled to full unemployment compensation. Win #1 for me.

    I had also gained skills in a particular Software while I was at the company, and I was quickly able to find a job as an admin for this Software that nearly doubled what I was making at the bad company. Today I work for Software as a product expert, and my annual bonus here is twice what my annual salary is at bad company. I thank them for firing me every. Single. Day. Win #2 for me.

    Now for the kicker – this past year, the owner of the company has been indicted on tax fraud in the largest individual fraud case ever brought in the US. Not my doing, of course, but the schadenfreude is real.

    1. Anonymous & Anonymous*

      I worked there too! Glad you made it out!

      You have to admit, though – pasta bar day in the cafeteria was pretty darn tasty :)

  258. anonymouse*

    I had heard a number of allegations about abusive behavior by one senior coworker towards entry-level people of a certain demographic, and one particular allegation was the tipping point for me. I reported them as discrimination allegations to our supervisor, who encouraged me to repeat them to a relevant group of people. Another person corroborated one of my allegations, because he had investigated it. Someone from the group leaked stuff to the jerk, and some time later I got a letter from his lawyer threatening legal action if I didn’t stop “slandering” him. (There was no slander, of course, because of qualified privilege and substantial truth.) I dutifully reported the lawyer’s letter, but the supervisor did nothing apparently for months.

    After those months passed, the jerk did another round of retaliatory verbal abuse. I went over the head of the supervisor, and an in-house lawyer educated the jerk about the unlawfulness of retaliation as a response to discrimination allegations. Since then I haven’t heard a peep directly from the jerk, although he has whinged about free speech in departmental discussions [eyeroll]

  259. Not a Mama Bear*

    Not work directly, but something I wouldn’t have been able to do without AAM’s guidance:

    My two-year-old recently broke her leg– she slipped and got a “toddler fracture” which is apparently pretty common since their bones are still so bendy. This happened on a Tuesday night but we didn’t know how bad it was until x-rays on Thursday morning, so around 1pm Thursday, I was on the phone with pediatric orthopedists frantically trying to get her an appointment ASAP.

    I find a practice that has their final appointment of the week at 2:45pm and they’re about an hour away. I get through to someone who says they certainly will fit her in since this is an emergency case and I just need to go through registration to book the slot. After 20 mins with registration, I transfer back to the pediatric orthopedist’s office and get someone else who seems much less competent and interested in helping me. Meanwhile, I’m getting really nervous about the time– we would have to leave immediately to barely make 2:45pm but I don’t want to sit in city traffic with my poor kid (who is doing great all things considered, but is definitely miserable) if we can’t confirm the appointment (and if that’s the case, I need to find another doctor).

    New Phone Person tells me there are no more appointments in any of their locations even after she had me read out the radiologist’s x-ray report, which is all jargon except for the important piece– my toddler’s leg is legit broken and she needs to be seen by a doctor. We’re going in circles for another 20 mins when she confirms that the next available appointment is the following Wednesday. To which I reply: “You’re telling me that you think it’s good medical advice for my daughter to wait a week before seeing a doctor for her broken leg?” and then I just shut up. (Note, she didn’t tell me to find another provider since they were booked, she actually told me to just wait… AFTER someone else at this practice told me they always reserve appointments for urgent cases).

    Magically, we had the 2:45pm appointment confirmed, but after spending over an hour on the phone with everyone there was no way we were going to make it on time. We got in the car as quickly as possible and called halfway there to apologize that we would be late. We got a totally different person who said it was absolutely no problem, they would still see us that day but we might have a longer wait. Daughter got a cast for 3 weeks and was back to normal 3 weeks after that. This is (clearly) a huge medical system so I never got to meet any of the people who I spoke with on the phone, but I definitely left a message about our experience when the robo-survey called me.

    TLDR; Without AAM, I would have let someone’s disinterest and incompetence intimidate me into finding another doctor’s office which could have delayed my daughter getting the care she needed. But after reading AAM, I was able to calmly repeat the ridiculous thing I was told and advocate for my family by simply shutting up and letting it sink in. Thank you!!!

  260. Fish girl*

    OK this is SUPER petty, but I worked at a place that required (and provided) scrubs for us to wear at work. One of my coworkers always made a big deal about weight, fitness, diets, etc (both hers and others) in a way that was excruciatingly boring and also rather offensive, since she was always commenting on what other people ate and did. She loved to brag that she was the only who could fit in the smallest size of scrubs (XXS). So a few of us started to take the extra XXS scrubs and hiding them in the dirty laundry bins, just to make her think that other people were also wearing the tiny scrubs. It worked. She was paranoid and started cornering people to figure out who else could POSSIBLY be wearing that size, because clearly ONLY SHE could be thin enough for it. Everyone denied wearing the scrubs, which only made her more paranoid that someone was thinner than her and HIDING it from her.

  261. starsaphire*

    This isn’t related to my job, but to someone else’s – the property manager at an apartment complex I lived in.

    This was in the early ‘90s and the apartment complex had recently been sold. Apparently it had been kind of a swingers’ hot spot back in the day. But the new brooms booted the previous manager and a lot of former tenants, and the new property managers were an older couple who were VERY devoutly religious. Like, religious art all over the walls of the property office, sort of thing. This all happened shortly before we moved in. (I have NO problem with religion, but… place of business?)

    My ex and I were in our early 20s and moved in shortly before we got married – and I made the mistake of mentioning the upcoming wedding. The property managers heartily disapproved of the fact that we lived together prior to marrying, and frowned even more on the fact that I worked outside the home. Every time I called for something to be repaired, I got a personal lecture on housekeeping (they never said boo to my ex, of course). Once when the dishwasher broke, they took 3 days to get around to sending a repairman, then refused to do any work because “there were dirty dishes on the counter” and I got another scorching lecture about my terrible housekeeping and a stern order to “get this filthy mess cleaned up” before the repairman would come back. (I owned like one pan and four plates at the time, but whatever.)

    This wasn’t all they did (ripping out my herbs and killing my flowers that I kept on the fenced-in patio because he “thought they were weeds” and so on) but we’d finally had enough with them barging in whenever they felt like it and lecturing us on our personal lives, so I took some time off work and started looking around for another place.

    This meant we had to break our lease, of course. But I had an idea.

    I went down to the office on the first of the month (more time off work – they kept bankers’ hours at that place for some reason) and handed in our thirty-day notice. The male manager’s face got all thunderous, and his wife reminded us we were in the middle of a six-month lease, and asked me why we wanted to move now.

    I put the biggest, cheesiest smile on my face, laid a hand over my ample stomach*, and said, “Well, we’re looking for a place with a second bedroom!”

    You’d have thought I’d just won an Oscar. Oh, they couldn’t do enough for us! Of course the lease was no problem, don’t even give it a second thought, make sure I have my ex do all the heavy lifting, I should go home and rest and put my feet up! I think she even gave me a recipe. The lease was never brought up again.

    After that, they were all smiles and we didn’t have one single issue with them. Clearly I had repented the error of my sinful ways, and was going to submit neatly into the fold.

    *I’m fat. I am also childfree. That second bedroom was a great home office.

  262. anon for this*

    This isn’t related to my job, but to someone else’s – the property manager at an apartment complex I lived in.

    This was in the early ‘90s and the apartment complex had recently been sold. Apparently it had been kind of a swingers’ hot spot back in the day. But the new brooms booted the previous manager and a lot of former tenants, and the new property managers were an older couple who were VERY devoutly religious. Like, religious art all over the walls of the property office, sort of thing. This all happened shortly before we moved in. (I have NO problem with religion, but… place of business?)

    My ex and I were in our early 20s and moved in shortly before we got married – and I made the mistake of mentioning the upcoming wedding. The property managers heartily disapproved of the fact that we lived together prior to marrying, and frowned even more on the fact that I worked outside the home. Every time I called for something to be repaired, I got a personal lecture on housekeeping (they never said boo to my ex, of course). Once when the dishwasher broke, they took 3 days to get around to sending a repairman, then refused to do any work because “there were dirty dishes on the counter” and I got another scorching lecture about my terrible housekeeping and a stern order to “get this filthy mess cleaned up” before the repairman would come back. (I owned like one pan and four plates at the time, but whatever.)

    This wasn’t all they did (ripping out my herbs and killing my flowers that I kept on the fenced-in patio because he “thought they were weeds” and so on) but we’d finally had enough with them barging in whenever they felt like it and lecturing us on our personal lives, so I took some time off work and started looking around for another place.

    This meant we had to break our lease, of course. But I had an idea.

    I went down to the office on the first of the month (more time off work – they kept bankers’ hours at that place for some reason) and handed in our thirty-day notice. The male manager’s face got all thunderous, and his wife reminded us we were in the middle of a six-month lease, and asked me why we wanted to move now.

    I put the biggest, cheesiest smile on my face, laid a hand over my ample stomach*, and said, “Well, we’re looking for a place with a second bedroom!”

    You’d have thought I’d just won an Oscar. Oh, they couldn’t do enough for us! Of course the lease was no problem, don’t even give it a second thought, make sure I have my ex do all the heavy lifting, I should go home and rest and put my feet up! I think she even gave me a recipe. The lease was never brought up again.

    After that, they were all smiles and we didn’t have one single issue with them. Clearly I had repented the error of my sinful ways, and was going to submit neatly into the fold.

    *I’m fat. I am also childfree. That second bedroom was a great home office.

  263. Gracely*

    The story I’m telling is technically a colleague’s, but we all suffered, and so all enjoyed this.

    A few years ago, we got a new Grandboss. During interviews, Grandboss seemed competent and all around a wonderful choice, plus, one coworker had worked with Grandboss at a previous company and had only great things to say. However, when Grandboss showed up to start work, this IMMEDIATELY changed. We actually wondered if we’d somehow ended up with Grandboss’s evil twin, the difference was that stark. I’ll spare the details, except to say, Grandboss’s direct reports were crying on a routine basis, some of us were clearly being set up to fail so we could be fired and replaced, etc., plus Grandboss was majorly egotistic yet incompetent at all aspects of Grandbossery, so it was extra crazy-making.

    Grandboss didn’t realize that within a few months, it was so bad that all but maybe two people in our branch of the company had gone to HR to complain. Our branch had never had a serious HR complaint before. GreatGrandBoss found out about it and was extremely displeased. They tried to coach GrandBoss. Once, when GrandBoss took the day off, they even came and met with all the regular (non-supervisory/managerial) staff. We were told to keep documenting everything.

    Well, not long after that, my colleague was due for a promotion (it was a formal process set in motion before Grandboss came in that they were supposed to approve because specific benchmarks had been met), and when Grandboss found out, they actually said, to my colleague’s face, “So you think you’ll actually get your promotion?” Obvious subtext being that Grandboss had no intention of approving this promotion that my colleague was very much due. There were multiple witnesses because it was said in a meeting.

    It must have been the straw that broke GreatGrandBoss’s back, because we soon got an email announcement that Grandboss would be stepping down to a reduced, non-supervisory role to focus on “special projects.” There was a slight reorg of positions. My colleague got their promotion and now works for NewGrandBoss.

    Here’s where it gets delicious: as part of the reorg, GrandBoss now reports TO MY COLLEAGUE.

  264. Kammy6707*

    I work in academia, but am not faculty. My beloved boss (who was faculty) was stepping down after she had been given the bait and switch on her position – she was told it would be counted toward her tenure by the Dean and then after almost a year in the position – actually, no it won’t, sorry! My boss refused to be treated like that – after stepping down, she shortly left the school as well.

    The Dean was new to the position and was quickly dropping morale in the department by eliminating staff positions, demoting people, tons of re-orgs…everyone was watching their back. After my boss gave her notice, it was expected that I would step up and cover her responsibilities until someone new was hired. But, this was a State school – the wheels move very slowly and I knew I could be looking at this set up for a very long time. I was already over my job and had been looking/interviewing – I wanted to move from the academic side of things to something more administrative where I could move up (my promotion options were limited as I wasn’t faculty). My boss was really the only reason I was staying at that point.

    My boss suggested I ask for additional compensation and even helped me put together a list of the extra duties I would be taking on as justification. (Note: this list was actually requested by the Dean in order to consider any additional compensation.)

    So I send the Dean the list, and she calls a meeting with me shortly after and basically said that nothing I listed was any different than what I was doing in my current role. Say what? And, um – then why is my boss a Director and I’m a Coordinator? And I make less? I was livid. It was clear in the meeting she was never planning on considering my request and she expected me to just suck it up and just do whatever extra work was needed. She was extremely condescending and dismissive. In addition to this, my previous Director was lazy (this was well-known in our division) and I had been doing a lot of things that were her responsibility until she retired and I got my new boss. I was over being used.

    Well, joke was on her. Within the next few days, I was offered a job that I had recently interviewed for. I gave my notice, meaning the program would be without a Director or Coordinator for the foreseeable future. The Dean was out of town, but she had the Associate Dean take me for coffee to try and sweet-talk me into staying (they knew they were screwed) – offering me more money and said I could even work on re-writing the job description to include more tasks I was interested in/growth projects. I turned her down.

    And not to toot my own horn – but I received lots of calls/visits from people I collaborated with from our division and others expressing how disappointed they were that I was leaving and what a great job I did! The person in the position before me was a total train wreck and I completely turned things around.

    At my next job (on the Admin side, as I wanted!), I was promoted to the level of Associate Director within 6 months and my salary was 20k more than I had been making in my Coordinator role at the State school. It felt so, so good.

  265. Midwest Manager*

    I’m a bit late to the thread but wanted to share my own quitting story:

    I was a young admin assistant for a small branch of a Fortune 100 company. I had already put in my notice due to a terrible new manager (he’d told me after his first 2 weeks on the job that he’d have fired me a long time ago if he’d had a say in it – because I had been empowered by the previous manager to simply handle things without getting permission each time). My notice was originally for 2 weeks, but I was asked to stay on 1 extra week to accommodate a mandatory training that the manager was required to attend. With him gone, I was the only other person with specific authority in the office for certain parts of the business.

    Day 2 of the extra week, I arrive to the office to find a pile of papers with a post-it on my desk that read “I found this on my desk after being in training all day. Why didn’t you handle it?” Every item in that stack was something I could have handled, and was generated by one of the other people in the office. None of it was ever brought to me, and manager was extremely protective over his desk. No way I would have looked at anything on it or “overstepped” to handling anything without his permission.

    I immediately contacted his boss, explained what happened and that I had no interest in staying out my notice period. I gathered my belongings, returned the stack of papers to manager’s desk along with my office keys and a note that read: “Do it yourself.” Walked out and enjoyed my 3 extra days of freedom before my new job started the next week.

  266. Petty success*

    I used to work in a job where there were three of us were working on the same massive pile of work. One of the other two just sat on her phone all day, leaving us to pick up the slack. (My manager was not interested and refused to confront her.)

    I had my annual review, and a sudden idea. When I got back to the office, I told her that the review included an audit of our individual workloads. She said she felt sick, left the office, and – never came back.

  267. Pobody's Nerfect*

    I had a work jerk boss once who was abusive and aggressive, would call me at home late at night to rant and rave and yell about whatever I’d done to upset him that day, talked bad about me to others, was jealous of how organized I was, etc. I was physically sick for six months straight due to the stress of dealing with that guy, my immune system was just shot. Just when I thought I couldn’t take it anymore and was going to have to quit, the news hit that he’d been fired on the spot because he got caught doing illegal drugs in the restroom at work. Suddenly all his rants made more sense, knowing they were fueled by whatever he was putting up his nose. The next day I fairly skipped into the staff meeting, I was so happy that he was gone, had gotten what he deserved, and that I’d survived him.

  268. A Little Bit Alexis*

    1. Once had a supervisor who would snoop through our desks after hours. Not sure why as there was never anything exciting to find but it irritated me to no end. One day I got a file folder and labeled it “miscellaneous personal items” and in it, I put a piece of paper one which I had written, “Lanie-I know you’re snooping through our desks. Stop it.” Made me giggle because I knew she’d be furious but wouldn’t be able to say anything because it would be an admission she was snooping
    2. Same horrible supervisor hated my older co-worker. Made up lies about her on yearly evaluation then threw said evaluation away when co-worker wrote a detailed response completely contradicting all the untruths. Co-worker told big boss how awful the eval was but supervisor lied when confronted and said she never wrote such an evaluation. The SJW in me had to act! Knowing she wasn’t a criminal mastermind, I figured she just threw the eval away in the bin at her desk. Snuck in her office and sure enough-there it was! Took it to the big boss as proof she had lied. Supervisor was fired and hilariously stole some office equipment (stapler and tape dispenser for goodness sake!) on the way out. I suspected she was doing so and raced behind her on the stairs. She dumped the supplies at a restaurant below our office before I caught up to her. Lady was a whack job!

  269. LostInNonprofitLand*

    Super petty from high school–I was a lifeguard at a upper middle-class suburban neighborhood pool. I came from a different, upper middle class neighborhood across town, whereas most of the other lifeguards came from the neighborhood where the pool was located. As a result, I was slightly ostracized– barely given any of the 5-hour lifeguarding shifts, but I did receive 8-hour “gate guard” shifts–I checked patrons’ names against a notebook to make sure only residents of the neighborhood got admission into the pool, and took the money for any visitors they brought (which was an additional fee). Sure, it kinda sucked to be left out, but I was actually making more hours for the same wage as the gate guard and got out an hour before close, so I let it go. I mostly got along politely, if not friendly enough, with the other guards, but I definitely didn’t fit into their partying, country-music listening ways. I was too much of a good girl, although I never really vocalized that–everyone just knew.

    One day it was pouring down rain–the kind of day where the pool would just be closed, and the head lifeguard and first shift (who arrived two hours before opening to clean) would call the gate guard and give them a heads’ up. But the head lifeguard, or any of the other lifeguards for that matter, didn’t bother to call me. I tried calling the pool (this was in the early cell phone era, when people didn’t really exchange phone numbers unless they were close friends, and texting was not a thing yet) so I was forced to drive all the way to work for my shift–only to find the gate locked and the pool closed.

    I had finally had it. I literally only had ONE SHIFT LEFT (a lifeguard shift at that!) before the end of summer and the start of my senior year of high school. So I decided to quit, giving them the same amount of notice they gave me–none. And, lo and behold, I received a call from a church group looking for a substitute lifeguard for a pool party at their church grounds for the same time as my normal shift, for 2x the amount of money! It was a beautiful summer day, and when I didn’t show up for my shift, the head lifeguard frantically called my house. My mother picked up, and told him that he’d have to talk to me about why I didn’t show up for my shift. When I finally called him back, after my day of making mucho bucks, the conversation went like this:

    Doug (because fuck you, Doug): So LostInNonprofitLand…. did you know you had a shift today from 10-3?
    Me: Yes.
    Doug (*sputters): We-well… why didn’t you show up?
    Me: I was making more money lifeguarding a private party.
    Doug: (*more sputtering about how I already had a lifeguarding job*)
    Me: Why didn’t you call me yesterday to tell me you were closing the pool due to rain?
    Doug: Uh… ah… well… it’s VERY unprofessional of you to be a no-call for a shift.
    Me: And it’s very unprofessional for you to not call me in advance if you’re closing the pool.
    Doug: Well, this will affect our willingness to rehire you-
    Me: Don’t bother. I won’t be reapplying for the job next year. You have constantly favored the other lifeguards over me–including your girlfriend, her sister, and their younger brother–who has less lifeguarding experience than I have. I’m sure one of them filled in yesterday just fine. (*hang up*)

  270. Using a different name today*

    When I was in high school my family was totally broke and worked as many jobs as I could handle. One of them was a waitress at a local IHOP (International House of Pancakes). The best shifts were Saturday and Sunday morning because it was just packed with families and you could make a ton of money in tips. I was waiting on one family and the father literally GRABBED my a**. Hard. Up the crack. I was 16 (talk about loss of innocence!) and he did this in front of his family! Not one of them said a thing. Then he asked me for more coffee. I went to the coffee center, refilled the insulated carafe with piping hot coffee, went over to his booth and then “tripped.” Steaming hot coffee went all over his crotch. It was horribly mean and he probably has scars for the rest of his life. But I didn’t care then I still don’t!

      1. Using a different name today*

        Me too!
        I still have bad dreams about it sometimes. And man, do I say something if I’m in a restaurant and I see someone harassing a server

  271. Vesuvius, Whose Best Revenge Came From Doing The Right Thing*

    So these are two of my most satisfying stories from working for Hell Company. I don’t think I can get into too much trouble if I fictionalize it, but for context, the sheer amount of bullshit I faced is enough to write a LEGAL THRILLER about one of the bigger sites I worked on (and there may be an actual IRL legal case against this particular office — that is how bad they were to me). I am in a field that has a lot of misogyny and sexism built into it because we’re adjacent to the oil industry and, surprise surprise, a lot of older, conservative men don’t like young women telling them what to do.

    I worked at this location for 1.5y, approximately. Finally quit due to mounting medical problems related to a condition nobody can see that makes me occasionally miss work when I have a problem. This was part of why I quit. I don’t know if I ever shared the story of James, but Cersei and Jaime are the reason I eventually quit, not James.

    So, Story One: The Saga of Petyr, the Office Creep

    Petyr was a hellish creep to work with and a professional licensed to run a constantly-producing-problems site called Hellsite in a dangerous neighborhood. Now, it’s owned by a big $ person on Wall Street, and it made Hell Company lots of money, so Petyr had job security. But Petyr was sabotaging Hell Company and refusing to train people. He was assigned me to train as a test to see if he could improve, after driving out the woman who previously held my position, Ashley. Petyr was — incredibly racist, and Ashley was not white. As I was junior and couldn’t say no, Petyr decided I was an “easy mark.” So Petyr started making me uncomfortable right off the bat, and constantly inserted himself into my conversations, trying to make me look incompetent, following me around the office to make “smart” remarks, and talking to…well, not my face. He also kept trying to snoop through my email and, on multiple memorable occasions, decided he wanted to FOLLOW ME HOME on PUBLIC TRANSIT. I was able to lose him every time, but ew.

    Petyr was assigned me as a trainee on Hellsite for a few days. Hellsite requires respirator clearance, a respirator, and HAZWOPER training, all of which I had. Out of spite, I learned everything from Petyr that I could, went home, and wound up complaining about him instead of working with him again with the support of my coworker Nora. He’d also been harassing Nora, when I wasn’t around to harass, and she put in a complaint too. Enter stage left, Jaime…boss of Hell Company’s local office.

    Jaime tried to write off both of our complaints, but I was very serious and went over his head. See, Petyr was inexpensive, but word around the office was he was also in some hot water over stealing about $22k from the company in 2019. Since Cersei, the manager (who initially seemed nice, and then went…downhill), had been protecting him they needed someone to replace him. That person was me, as I’d learned the office side of things first because Petyr was doing too many things to handle them. My complaint to Jaime was the final straw, and subsequent disrespect of Cersei (in an important meeting!) cemented his departure. From the local office. He was too valuable to fire entirely, which should have been a red flag.

    So, due to being unable to hold his tongue, Petyr got fired unceremoniously — and replaced with two less expensive people; Jake, to do the fieldwork, who billed at half Petyr’s rate, and myself, for the office work. At the time, things seemed good. Then the pandemic hit, and Cersei showed her true colors.

    Story Two: Cersei’s Fall From Grace
    Hellsite was closed due to COVID restrictions in March of 2020 and reopened in May. Jake was working the site when it reopened on the ground, and I was in the office doing the office work. Prior to reopening Hellsite, Cersei survived COVID-19, and was dealing with the medical effects. This is about when Cersei made me on-call responsible for everything on that job site.

    Cersei began treating me like crap inside of a week of Hellsite reopening. If Jake screwed up, it was my fault. If the subcontractors didn’t call or listen to me, it was my fault. I had to be tougher. This culminated in Jake leaving (I’m not sure what happened but I think he left for a better job), and me being put in charge of running the site itself. And nothing I did, no matter how good, satisfied Cersei. I discovered problems the subcontractors had caused building the site and it was my fault. At one point we even got a gigantic trash bin delivered and Cersei had an idea, didn’t communicate it, and I put it in the logical location for putting trash away…which was inevitably incorrect. I got to hear from her regularly for about an hour about how incompetent I was and how ashamed I should be, etc. She began taking credit for my work, berating me for following her orders, and it became a daily thing for her to threaten my job. In short, she was a nightmare, but Jaime would hear none of it when I tried to bring this to his attention. She was his golden goose. If I dared bring up Cersei’s bad behavior again, she implied she’d have me fired. So I was stuck.

    Cersei also went batty when it came to sick time. Jaime defended her decisions at every turn and I was the only person (though I did train two other people, hired after me — Laurel and Tormund) who could predict Hellsite’s problems and resolve them. I’m not an engineer, but I had to get good at knowing when I was being BS’d by the old subcontractors, so I learned how the system worked by observation. I even figured out how to solve a seemingly-impossible issue by the scientific method — rather than assuming I knew everything about the water table on-site. But I was punished for everything under the sun imaginable that inconvenienced the project. I later found out Jaime and Cersei had previously aimed this attitude at Nora, which culminated in her quitting. Nora took her own petty revenge on them by deleting her draft documentation for a computerized map, which they desperately needed, after they treated her badly for, drumroll please…getting too sick to work at an insane pace, then pushing back on getting 60h/week for a full month as retaliation for getting sick. Then Cersei started ordering all of us to ignore health and safety regulations to save on costs. I pushed back wherever I could, and I noted it down, and she never looked at my notes (which are legal documents, and admissible in court). There were multiple almost-ER trips and one ER trip involved in her incompetence.

    By the time I lost my temper, Laurel and I were getting the brunt of Cersei’s temper and Tormund could make a mistake and she’d just say “oh, it’s okay, try to do better next time.” Cersei’s management always focused on short-term gain and no matter how many times I emphasized we didn’t have time, I got my job threatened if I disagreed with her. Every time I mentioned concerns to other managers Cersei made me out to be unreliable, flaky, and a screw-up, and Jaime helped create this ruse. In spite of all this I was working 55-60h weeks regularly. I got very sick around the time this started (burnout and a cold leading to laryngitis because Cersei’s demands were insane), which didn’t help. Everything was my fault.

    So I developed a Very Good Retail Face, specifically for dealing with Cersei, and slowly, everyone from Hell Company who worked as managers because they all blamed me for things. Cersei even went so far as to stalk me and break into my desk regularly, then act like we were friends outside work. I smiled and pretended everything was normal. Ultimately, what broke me was Cersei’s treatment of me after I got concussed in a car accident. I was expected back at work the following day and later harassed for being CONCUSSED enough that I COULD NOT SAFELY operate a motor vehicle. I was advised not to drive for the first week. I could not report in to work because looking at screens made me violently sick for a following week (that may have been burnout, but they wouldn’t have accepted that as a reason to give me less work). While I was off sick, Cersei, who had been targeting Laurel to a lesser extent the way she did me, turned the brunt of her ire on Laurel.

    After Cersei harassed me at yet another doctors’ appointment about availability (did I mention she thought I was to be available 24/7 as her convenient emotional punching bag?), I found out she told Laurel to quit using the necessary safety equipment to make the site look pretty to the client. Laurel almost lost her temper. I DID lose my temper and went above my boss’s head to corporate’s Chief Health And Safety Officer, who knew I was dedicated to doing things safely and didn’t talk much to Jaime. And oh boy did the dominoes fall. I triggered a safety audit of the job site, Jaime retaliated against me badly enough that I have a case for filing for unemployment, and I got to see firsthand that most of the office thought Laurel and I were screwups based on Cersei’s opinion of us. Meanwhile, Tormund and Lucas (widely considered unreliable) could do no wrong.

    But my vengeance was slow burning and it was so good (though arguably, maybe less petty? I don’t know, it was very, VERY satisfying). Me standing up to Cersei, and it WORKING, meant Laurel felt like she could, too. (Neither of us wanted to be friends with managers at this point or even on good terms with the ones that protected Cersei — they were always the worst to us. TBH, for all I care, the bad managers can all be unemployed like the wads of soggy, burnt TP they are.) Due to Laurel’s “lack of commitment” (we shared a laugh over this) Cersei switched to using Tormund inside of two months before he was fully trained. Which meant Cersei ran through Laurel because she wouldn’t pretend to be friendly like I did, and immediately went to Tormund…who couldn’t do the work without handholding, and cost the company $$ to let Cersei control someone again. Cersei also had to go back and buy the safety part that she ADMITTED she didn’t buy, DURING THE AUDIT. In FRONT of the safety officer.Laurel documented everything out there after I’d made CYA documentation clear during training, and due to Cersei’s tendency to blame everyone for her problems, Laurel doubled down on documentation for Cersei’s projects, as did I. And because Cersei is lazy and doesn’t read the documentation…she regularly turned notes over to the EPA citing her lack of care for safety regulations. Embarrassment was the worst punishment for Cersei (she could not STAND threats to her image), and I’m certain this is why she continued to harass me from afar after I was removed from her project, but by this point I Did Not Care. The EPA received Laurel’s notes shortly after I quit and Cersei wound up in Boiling Water over her corner-cutting behavior. And she still doesn’t know what I was doing to track the alarms, because she assumed I was incompetent. I taught Laurel what I could, and Tormund, but Tormund didn’t want to learn and Laurel wasn’t going to do extra work for Cersei if she wasn’t in charge.

    So…yes. Vengeance is best served cold and sweet. The truly amazing part started in July, though.

    On top of that, around the time I quit, a fatal accident at another branch (due to their lack of focus on Health and Safety and obsession with quick bucks) caused Hell Company to be seen as incredibly unreliable and risky to hire. It’s wrecked their ability to get any work even at cheap rates. They’re scrambling for contracts! The news of the accident breaking and my annual review being a huge mess of gaslighting and BS pushed me to resign. By email, because Jaime didn’t deserve a phone call, with the health and safety issues as the reason. (I’m certain I earned him several uncomfortable conversations with Corporate. I don’t care if I burnt that bridge. I have a reference who isn’t Jaime or Cersei. Nora is willing, and offered, when I told her what was going on and that I was dealing with Cersei’s threats. I feel absolutely no remorse over reporting Cersei, either. The woman has gone so far as to try to claim I’m incompetent while blaming her issues on the “popular portrayal” of a health condition I actually have — that she harassed me over. I sent the Politest F*** You Imaginable to the HR admin at Corporate.) Give me PTSD and nightmares, will you?

    (Yes, I am talking to a lawyer. And looking for a good therapist. In the meantime I am spending lots of time with my cats and my partner, recovering physically (it took 1.5mo for my flu like symptoms to go away) and looking for jobs with state and county governments.)

    So, my attempt at whistleblowing, and Hell Company’s lack of care for employees, turned into the pettiest, most satisfying revenge imaginable due to circumstantial screw-ups, Cersei’s incompetence, and regulatory thorough checking. Cersei’s incompetence threatened the entire cleanup operation — all because she couldn’t stand to be seen as not knowing something. Jaime wanted to retire last I heard, and was planning on it before all this blew up. As far as I know, he’s still working there trying to put the fires out from his golden goose’s bad choices. This was Very Satisfying to hear. (I keep in touch with Laurel, who couldn’t afford to quit when I did, though she is putting her notice in very soon.)

  272. Tuna Eater*

    Anon for here. A former coworker was a bully. He also made life difficult just be being himself – he was 6’5″, weighed about 300#, and took up even more space – the term “manspread” was invented for him. He also thought he was better at the job than anyone else (hint, he wasn’t.) I spent the entire time we worked together throwing small roadblocks in his way. One of our jobs was inspecting businesses for safety compliance, which we always did in groups of at least two. When I was with him and we’d hit the men’s room, I’d make sure to take the normal height urinal and stick him with the low one if there were only 2 (remember his height?). If we were walking in the hall toward each other, I wouldn’t get against the wall like everyone else did; I’d stay right, but still shoulder block him nearly every time we’d pass. I’d be ready, he wouldn’t because he expected people to let him take the whole hall. I’d make sure to try to get out of the office before him and actually drive the speed limit on the one-lane road out of the plant; AND come to a complete stop at the stop sign at the end. If I knew he was getting ready to print something, the tray in the printer would magically only have a few sheets of paper in it and our cabinet would be out of extra – or there would be a random piece of letterhead mixed in with the blank paper. I was the sometimes unknown bane of his existence at work, and there was nothing he could do or say about the things he knew about because I wasn’t doing anything wrong.

    But what I consider my best revenge was when I learned that he HATED the smell of canned tuna. Now, I’m not a huge fan, but I ate tuna at least twice a week from that day until the day he quit. He’d hide and eat in his office to get away from the smell. Eventually, I started putting an empty, but not rinsed, tuna can inside his computer, sitting on the power supply so every day, after he turned on his computer, the smell of tuna would start to permeate his office. He tore the place apart looking for it, but never found it.

    I don’t miss him at all.

    1. Econobiker*

      “Eventually, I started putting an empty, but not rinsed, tuna can inside his computer, sitting on the power supply so every day, after he turned on his computer, the smell of tuna would start to permeate his office. He tore the place apart looking for it, but never found it.”

      That’s a next LEVEL technique of office combat using technology!
      BRAVO!

  273. Mockingdragon*

    When I worked at a college bookstore, I caught a coworker (subordinate, technically) in grand theft.

    This was one of those people who was just overly friendly with everyone, always a big smile, got you talking about yourself. Relatively well liked, except for the woman who refused to work with him because he had filmed her with her boyfriend (I was inclined to believe her). I had been hired on as an assistant manager for a team that used to have a more permissive management team, which was its own fun.

    While I worked at the main store, I was called over once to do a return for him for an expensive calculator. No receipt – I told him he knew the rules. Store credit only (barnes and nobles gift card), which he declined. In hindsight, we noticed that he seemed to buy stuff with gift cards a lot, snacks and drinks and such, but since it was B&N it wasn’t super suspicious. There are ways to get them pretty regularly. It didn’t register.

    Then I moved over to the satellite location (after the assistant manager a step above me got fired for theft. What a place). After the rush of the beginning of the semester, it was usually just me and maybe one other employee in the store at a time. When this guy was working, he was super friendly, really encouraged me to take my break in the office and relax, promising he’d call me for anything that needed a manager.

    When I noticed his signature on returns, which he was not allowed to do, he was spoken to.

    Then it happened again. And this time, on a day when I wasn’t actually supposed to let him work. He came in wide-eyed with a story about how he had been to the hospital the night before and died before being brought back, and had a doctor’s note excusing his lateness. I hadn’t been trained on anything like this, so I just awkwardly let him stay. But that evening while reconciling I wondered what exactly had been so important that he dragged himself into work after something like that.

    Wouldn’t you know it, I had done inventory the day before. The return was for a particular expensive law book, and we hadn’t sold any since the inventory. But after the return, we had the same number as we’d had before it.

    Turned out he’d been giving himself fake returns for *months*. They caught him for more than $4k.

    Postscript: The day that Loss Prevention came to catch him was close to my last day. Not knowing what was coming, he brought me a 4-inch cake to thank me for being a good supervisor.

    I still ate it.

  274. Lady Knittington*

    Not work related – but from when I did my theatre MA. (Although I have several work related I could also add in).

    There was a lady on the course – Rebecca – who had a reputation for saying that ‘X looked like a lesbian’, or wanting to ask X out, ‘because she looks like a lesbian’. I understand that she had been flirting with a large number of women on the course.

    Half way through the term we did a Meisner workshop. This is a technique for trying to get actors to focus on being in the moment. A has to make an observation about B which B then repeats. A repeats the observation, B repeats etc. until one or other makes a different observation. (If you’re interested, I’m sure there are websites which can explain it more fully).

    I got paired with Rachel – who made the observation “You look like a lesbian”, followed a minute or so later with “You look pissed off because I said you look like a lesbian” – at which point there was an audible gasp and the tutor stopped the exercise.

    Cut to the end of term when we were in the pub discussing the workshop. I asked her why she’d done what she’d done. She replied: “Well, as a lesbian… ” To which I interrupted with “But you don’t *look* like a lesbian”

  275. beentheredonethat*

    Truly, I am not a physically violent person and prefer humor and redirection when in conflict. However….
    I was in the high school orchestra percussion section. Lots of of standing around. The boys thought it was funny to come up behind the girls and grab you around the waist and ‘tickle’ you. So one day, a guy grabbed me, I slammed my elbows together, I had drum mallet in my hand and slammed him in the forehead. The grabbing stopped.
    Later in life, I was a secretary and the salesman kept coming up behind me when I was typing his contract. I suddenly pulled the sticky file drawer and barely missed his knee.

  276. Leila Day*

    The two of us were hired at the same time, same position, same training, same salary, same conditions. It was my first job after having a family and returning to the workplace, and she had been let go from working in a bar previously. She had a very strong personality and was extremely political to the point where she would chew out people for having the “wrong” ideology, “wrong” politics. We got along for the most part as I just ignored it and I am easygoing enough that I just don’t care. After a year a full time position came up which she applied for and I couldn’t (young family) and our boss was removed to another floor. She began to resent me because I would not play political, and I also wouldn’t accept orders from her (since we were the same hiring level just different hours). We were assigned a project for which I busted a gut researching data and making spreadsheets. She complained constantly that she needed a better “professional” living wage and that she didn’t have a husband backing up on the bills, insulting my aspirations. She simultaneously tried to befriend me by saying she never had good female friends, they always hated her, but also began bullying tactics at the same time…and I just ignored it. Every time she would leave me her work to do at the end of her shift when I came in, I would leave it for her to do the next day saying we suddenly got busy. Soon our boss left for an entirely new job and we got a new boss. She applied for a grade level rise, and used my work as her own in her application. After that I lost any remaining respect for her and began looking for a new job. I used references from three people higher up than her to both apply for new jobs and to get accepted to grad school. Everyone congratulated me on my new job and grad school, and I didn’t tell her for a week. The day I emailed her to tell her I was giving notice she could not respond for over six hours she was so upset. I left at the end of a season without training new staff so that she was not only short staffed but also short a manager. This had been a job that it took three months to get to know how to do. They held a leaving lunch party with pizza and cake which was donated by the head boss for me. She tried to dominate the conversation and turn it to her life, her interests. After it was over I quickly boxed up the leftovers for my kids and took them out to the car, as I only had another hour or two to go. Back at the desk she announced that she was taking all the leftovers home, and I was glad I had beaten her to it anonymously. My new job was a director position in a different town. A service provider used to visit both our workplaces, and as I had known him from the original job, occasionally would tell me how she looked, how she was getting on. After a couple months at my new job, he told me how much happier and less stressed I looked. He told me that the previous job environment had been toxic and that even he could see it, that I was the only one who smiled at people there and greeted folks pleasantly. He asked what I thought of my former co-worker and I didn’t badmouth her, but he could see through it and told me that he knew and had the utmost respect for me. Soon I was earning as much as or more than her, with my own autonomy and no boss.

  277. JerseyGrrl*

    The job was supposed to be temporary but I was there for 14 months to do the “regular” work while a major project creating and installing a new system dragged on. The agency that employed me only paid me for the hours I worked with no benefits like paid time off or health insurance. (I complained multiple times to no avail.) I was treated like a second-class employee. Since I had no sick days and had an $850 per month health insurance bill to pay, I had to work while sick several times. As the project wound down, they let me know in mid-November that the job would end after the holidays. The company had a “no exceptions” policy that unused vacation was forfeited after December 31. Most of the regular employees had a lot of vacation yet to burn due to the project’s demands. I was supposed to cover the phones and basic function while nearly everyone else would be gone in the last half of December –and train someone else with no experience to do my complicated job. Just before Thanksgiving my ongoing job search paid off and I accepted a position with more money and generous benefits. On the first of December, I told the manager that I was leaving that day. The director begged me to stay and the agency that employed me called to offer me holiday pay and a few vacation days. I never felt as good at the end of a work day as I did walking out of that place knowing that I threw a wrench into the vacation plans of people who treated me so badly.

  278. ACM*

    A day light to the party, but I have some stories!

    See, for a number of years I was a janitor in a medium-sized office building–eight floors–and there’s a certain segment of the white-collar population who thinks they didn’t get a degree to ever have to listen to what a janitor said on anything. Here’s a few of the times I butted heads with office workers who thought they knew my job better than I did:

    –One person asked me to clean their office’s carpet. That night, I pulled out the chairs, put binders on the floor on their desk, cleaned the carpet, and then replaced everything, using a couple photos on my phone and the marks chair feet left in the carpet to replace everything as it was. Next day, they say they think it wasn’t done because they couldn’t smell any scent (clean doesn’t have a smell. At least the kind of clean I was dishing out) and ‘nothing had been moved’. Orders came from on high to redo it. So, okay, that night, I take twice as long because I was peeved at the insult–but this time I left their office’s chairs any old how and binders on their desk, and I got hold of some cleaner that smelled like something you’d use to shake Sergeant Angua off your trail, in floral scent. This stuff was just vile, it had about the same punch to the sinuses as snorting a box full of Tide detergent and it was meant to be strongly diluted. So I poured a straight drip out in the corner of the room, right against the edge of the door frame, where the open door would hide it, and shut the office. I checked my handiwork the next night and found the binders still on the desk and the fumes still strong enough to gag a pig. Eventually, the fumes equalized out–or our senses of smell gave up and burned out, one.

    -Another time, I had waxed the floor and someone had walked across the wet wax and slipped and scarred the wax, despite me closing the door to the hallway and moving a bench in front of it, floor warning cones on the bench and a warning sign in my neatest handwriting proclaiming wet wax taped to the (closed). So I had to scrub that wax off and then redo it, and this time my warning sign said,
    “DANGER: WET WAX
    FLOOR IS SLIPPERY
    DO NOT CROSS”
    And below, in small letters,

    “so when you walk on it and fall, it’s not our fault. we tried to tell you but you didn’t want to listen”

    The next day, I come in and the security guards tell me someone absolutely lost their cool at this display of snark, and went on a rant about how the janitors shouldn’t even be ‘allowed’ in the building until, in their words, ‘all the real workers had left’ and how they shouldn’t ever have to see trash cans being pulled or hear a vacuum cleaner. It was evidently quite a tear they went on, and the security guards said they had some awfully interesting opinions they voiced at maximum volume.

    -Not white collar, but the security guards would use our office–on the same floor as theirs–to eat their lunch in and one of them liked to nap there during the day. Well, it was a working office and we kept some of our supplies and whatnot in there, including stuff like vacuum cleaners I was maintaining and repairing. It was a functional sort of disorderly. Well, one of the security guards told me it was a disgrace that it was that messy. So, okay. That night, I cleaned that place out. Vacuum cleaners went to closets, bathroom carts went to other closets, and all the comfy chairs we had there (we were janitors, we didn’t throw away good stuff and sometimes folks had barely-used and quite awesome chairs set out because they’d gotten new ones) were hidden in cubicles that also had spare office chairs left in them. Use a forest to hide a tree, you know? I also cleaned the office carpet, gave the walls a scrub, I had that place brightened up a treat and with the only bit of furniture being a small table. My boss called me the next day and they were laughing–Security Guard 40 Winks was absolutely livid and had had to find somewhere to cadge a spare office chair for the day’s naptime and warned me not to throw that chair away. I put everything back–I did need to work in that room after all.

  279. Thoreauvian*

    I grew up in an abusive household, which has caused me to gravitate to abusive situations in other areas of my life. This includes the workplace.

    Several years ago, I got a job where my manager was (insert various obscenities here). I’ll refer to him as Toad. He even looks like one, and I wouldn’t be at all surprised to learn that he’s capable of physically spitting venom.

    Toad ran me through training quickly, expecting me to pick it all up immediately. This proved to be something that he always did. If he told me something once, I was supposed to learn it and retain it perfectly. I asked questions about things I didn’t understand, and he was clearly frustrated at this. The nerve of me, right?

    Toad was everything Alison says a manager shouldn’t be. Among other things:

    * He played favorites. Golden Boy was, well, golden. He could do no wrong. He didn’t even attempt to hide the fact that Golden Boy was his favorite.
    * He and Golden Boy had lunch together almost every day.
    * When I made a factual statement, Toad’s response was always the same: “Golden Boy, is that true?”
    * He brought his problems to work. We all knew not to talk to him when he came flouncing into the workplace, pissy-faced.
    * He had phone calls in the workplace during which he fought with his wife.
    * He had big parties at his place and invited the guys from the workplace, but never any of the women.
    * He was a dyed-in-the-wool misogynist. He knew enough not to make statements about women not being “fit” for certain kinds of work, but it was obvious to everyone that he found male companionship to be far more important than female companionship.
    * He stood over me as I tried to work, criticizing me incessantly in front of everyone.
    * He made me his scapegoat, which he then extended to the only other woman in our section of the workplace.

    As I mentioned above, I come from an abusive background, so I took it for granted that his criticisms and even outright bullying were deserved. I thought I really was a rotten employee. Every time I tried something that I thought was correct, he’d land all over me like a ton of bricks. He developed a trick of saying that a certain job should be done in a certain way, then screaming at me when I did it that way. I would say that I thought he said this was how things should be done. Every time, he denied it.

    I was afraid that if I complained about him, he would fire me. I was also worried – and this is very significant to me, in retrospect – that he would take it out on his wife. I think he’s been abusive to her, too. He rarely went home; he was constantly cheating on her with any women desperate enough to let him near her. He thought of himself as Super Dad because he took the kids on a vacation once a year, while essentially ignoring them the rest of the time.

    In addition to my fear of being fired, HR just wasn’t that good. It had a high turnover, so the chances were excellent that even if I had complained, the complaint would have been taken by one person, handled by that person’s successor, and followed up by the successor’s successor.

    One day, Toad fired me. He had been spending years treating me like shit on the bottom of his shoe, which undoubtedly gave him a sick thrill, but as I said before, he hates women. He was eager to have my job open so he could hire a MAN and have his area full of MEN. (He was also giving all kinds of abuse to the only other woman in our section, including, but not limited to, telling her every day that she’d made a serious mistake. Every day, she would point out that she hadn’t made a mistake, and she would explain what was going on. Every day, he admitted that she was right, but he never apologized. He then did the same thing the next day. She went from being an outgoing, bubbly person to being afraid of her own shadow, constantly telling us all the bad news in world events that day.)

    So he fired me. After I left work that day, I called a friend and told him what had happened.

    This friend is a lawyer. Not only is he a lawyer, he specializes in corporate law.

    He asked me about the particulars of the firing, then told me that Toad had broken the law. In this country, there is no such thing as at-will employment. A manager has to give an employee a certain number of verbal and written warnings before firing them. And the Toad didn’t do that. He was counting on me to be so cowed by his bullying that I wouldn’t question being fired.

    So, Lawyer Friend told me what to do when HR talked to me (as was going to happen, since I’d been fired). I went over it again and again with him until I was confident that I had all of the information.

    HR called me in, and I told them what Lawyer Friend had said – letting them know that, yes, a friend of mine was a lawyer. And I asked for the severance benefits he had recommended. The HR person refused immediately. “No, we’re not going to do that.”

    Later, I called Lawyer Friend and told him. He told me that I had an excellent case for wrongful termination, should I choose to bring a lawsuit. He also told me to wait until I met with HR again.

    The next time I met with HR, Toad was there. He said there, full of himself (which is to say, full of shit), and said, “HR Person has told me that you want this kind of severance. We’re not going to do it.”

    Suddenly, HR Person said, “Oh, yes, we’re going to do that.”

    The Toad almost visibly deflated. All his confidence left him, and he began to stutter and look away from me. I, for my part, kept my eyes fixed on him, only blinking when he looked away. I think even he, idiot that he is, realized I wasn’t buying any of his lies anymore. He tried to tell me that I could receive a warning for this or that behavior. I said nothing and just stared at him.

    I did leave the company, and I do wish I’d taken legal action against the company and him in particular. If I’d sued them for wrongful termination, they would have had to keep on paying me my monthly wages during the lawsuit. And the lawsuit could have dragged out for months, if not years. And I had a perfect case; I never received a single warning, so it was quite clear that the Toad broke the law.

    At the time, though, I just wanted out of there. I got the severance package I asked for, and I hope that the Toad received a serious warning about putting the company at risk of a justified lawsuit.

  280. Ambiguous IT Wizard*

    I work for a very specialised company which deals with a very specific aspect of IT wizardry. I started ten years ago when I finished my BA, and kept working through my MA. In those ten years, I have done every aspect and worked in every sector of our wizardry that doesn’t require actual developmental coding. I am a very skilled multi-elemental wizard, and I can frequently determine what is causing breakdowns because my job is split into three elemental departments at a theoretical 55/25/20, which varies based on what kinds of spells are most needed.

    At around the six year mark, one of the most senior wizards who isn’t often in the wizard workshop saw me one day and was very surprised I was still around, she thought I’d be long gone. This senior wizard is the mother of the CEO. I didn’t think much of it. This was followed by the CEO making my next week an absolute nightmare. Apparently mama wizard was very unhappy with me for reasons unknown, and in turn, he threw a half-dozen large-scale spells on my desk with a four day deadline, clearly expecting me to fail and give reason for termination.

    I take great pride in the fact that in spite of having anxiety, I am a very talented wizard. Using pieces from previous projects, having at least an academic concept of what kind of statistics I would need, and applying cross-elemental logic from my various departments, I was able to complete the pile of spells without doing overtime, and was able to put the most complicated spell into a full blown concept plan complete with hard numbers and spell components- none of which had been asked for. He came to me the morning of the due date, breathing fire and threatening immediate dismissal from the wizard workshop. I started with the smaller spells, and I presented that last spell with all the bells and whistles, and was able to answer every question he asked with nuanced detail. I even managed to troubleshoot various cross-elemental issues and resolve them before he realised they were going to BE issues.

    He said nothing. He turned on his heel, and he left me alone in the office. The next time I saw him, he was happy to pretend that he had never spoken to me and asked a completely benign question unrelated to any of the spells I had been asked to concoct the week before. But since that instance, I am respected (if not paid) as the most capable person as relates to my elemental fields, and my point of view is taken into consideration on par with the developmental wizards, and above the sales wizards, which is no small feat. When I make phone calls to developmental wizards, my spells are given priority. When I raise concerns about how we’re doing certain spells, people check, because I have the reputation of being very, very thorough, and if I’m raising a signal, there must be something to it.

  281. Useful Editorial Person*

    A trade magazine owned by the company I worked for put on an awards event for its readers and advertisers. Everyone who was everyone was invited to this event, apart from the editorial team, who had done much of the promotion and quite a lot of the admin associated with the awards. To add insult to injury they were asked, on top of their usual work, to draw up the menus, the seating plan and the place cards for this party to which they weren’t invited.
    They did this task with what looked like good grace… Except that every single letter O had a tiny dot in the centre, barely noticeable, easily mistaken for a feature of the font used. But if you’d had the QuarkXpress files, you could have checked out those tiny dots and found that each one was a miniscule version of an iconic obscene image.

  282. Fluff*

    When I was an intern (medical) at a well known large hospital system, I took care of a jerk. No excuse, he was one of those that we all dreaded seeing because everything was a complaint; the typical “I’m got tons of money and you all bow down” attitude. During night rounds @ midnight, he was up in the shower, not totally weird since being in the hospital messes with people’s schedules. For some reason, the guy had opened the window and his room was freezing. Me, trying to be nice and being the environmentalist I was, walked in and closed it. I did not realize that the windows are only supposed to open a crack.

    Welp. Turns out – he was sneaking a smoke break and was hiding from me on the roof of the ICU building – this was the one row of pt rooms where windows opened right onto a roof. He had broken the safety latch and was actively hiding. We did not find him until the next vitals check and he was quite the frozen cookie (hospital gown, not the brightest tool). He tried to knock to get in but no one heard it from his room because the shower was running. We did not find him until the next vitals check and he was quite the frozen cookie (in the usual hospital gown, not the brightest tool).

    He was so nice to the whole team afterwards and especially me. None of the windows open anymore – they bolted those things down real fast. I always laughed going by that room.

  283. The Smiling Revenge*

    I once had a terrible manager (Evil Lady). And by terrible I mean – the lack of empathy was truly stunning. It was numbers over people.

    We had some very serious problems with morale and worker safety. It was a new department that was established in relation to the pandemic, think – production of ethanol.

    Evil Lady was the type to smile in team meetings at people reporting these problems “thank you for pointing this out – we will find a solution” and later pull the same people into her office.. Where she would bully them into quitting for being “trouble makers”.

    I was by far the most qualified person on the team and knew very fast that this was a bad place to work. After going through the proper channels inside the company I realised that it would be almost impossible to get rid of Evil Lady. The company had a history of retaining bad managers. The turnover of staff was huge.

    I am generally known as a nice person. I smile a lot, I work hard. But at some point someone in the production reported a Very Serious safety problem. It would not be hard to fix given time, but Evil Lady decided that the extra cancer risk of the workers was just not something to spend time on fixing.

    I got angry. I kept smiling and I kept working. I hatched a plan and started planning my exit.

    I started documenting everything. Im a scientist, I keep very good notes. Dates, times, people present, emails cc’ing higher ups. “at xx date worker Y was exposed to chemical Q, I am told we are too busy to fix the problem. I am told to prioritize task Z- Can you please confirm?”

    I waited for the day before my three months probation periode and then I quit. Citing family health reasons. My contract said I could quit within a day for the first three months, why not take advantage. I kept smiling, I apologized for the short notice and walked away. Evil Lady was shocked, everyone was, many were sad, but I was thanked for my service.

    I got a new job within a few weeks. It was better in all aspects.

    I waited… Revenge is a dish best served cold after all. And since the industry is small I needed to be clear of any fallout.

    Then after a full two months had passed and I was forgotten.. I sent the documentation to my countrys Department of Worker Safety (DWS) anonymously. They are very serious people. And I knew where all the bodies were buried. I sent them detailed instructions on where to look for physical evidence.

    Within two weeks – it hit the fan.

    The place was raided by DWS and word spread through the intire company. It was bad. A year after they are still suffering the consequences and Evil Lady is no longer managing people. She is still employed sadly, but you cannot get everything.

    No one knows it was me. The smiling person. But I know. And I keep smiling.

  284. FemaleEngineer*

    Background: I’m one of 6 female engineers in a company of ~50. Our corporate structure is pretty flat, and we don’t have HR so one of our (male) engineers is in charge of recruiting.

    We had a company party recently, and I ended up in a conversation with our recruiting lead (“Fergus”) and two of our managing partners (aka the two highest people in the company), all men. We were talking about kids, and Fergus says how he sometimes feels outnumbered and out of place in his home with his wife, three daughters, and their nanny, and how he sometimes wishes he had a son. So I leaned forward and said, “Fergus, now you know how I feel at work.” None if the men knew what to say, especially the company president, but the best part was that Fergus’ wife was in the conversation too and she applauded me for telling the men off.

    TBD on whether anything will change, but this is why I have a mug that says “(Fe)male: the original Iron Man.”

  285. Fabulous*

    One of my first non-contract jobs was fairly toxic, looking back. It was a call center, so what can you expect? I had started as a temp worker and was hired on to replace the person that I was originally covering for, Jane. This office was almost entirely made up of black and Hispanic workers, and because I was white with blonde hair, my nickname was apparently Barbie, which whatever, but it was used in a derogatory fashion amongst Jane and her friends. Ultimately, she and another couple of girls ended up getting fired for smoking pot in their car while on their lunch break. Some other highlights from this job were when my much older (and much larger) coworker threatened me in the parking lot for no discernable reason, and when another coworker was freaking out ranting up and down the aisles for drinking possible spoiled milk and went off on me for making a comment to my neighbor about it. Oh, and you can’t forget the time that another coworker asked me how to delete a page in a Word document (like, highlight what you don’t want, hit the delete button.)

    Despite all this disfunction, while I was there, I increased productivity by about 150% and took on two additional spreadsheets that went to senior management, redesigned the filing system, and mapped the approval pattern of documents so things could actually be reprocessed when requested. I was also the only person who didn’t have a phone at their desk, so other departments would have to call my coworkers to seek me out for reprocessing.

    Anyways, my boss was the most hands-off and incompetent manager I’d ever encountered at that point. She wasn’t much older than I was, but had been there for about 10 years at that point. I don’t think she spoke more than two words to me each week when I turned in my reports to her. When I put in my two-week notice, I explained to her that in order to properly train my replacement, they’d need to get someone in by X day because of the way the spreadsheet data is processed. X day came and went and there was still no replacement. I came back to her and asked when I can expect someone to be brought in for training and was told that my role wouldn’t be backfilled. Alright. I went to HR and explained what I was told and asked if it made sense for me to continue working out my notice period. They said nope, you can just head out whenever, so I peaced out that day at lunch and took a full week’s vacation before starting my new job.

    I later heard that a) my boss ended up having to do my report that week herself, and b) they had to hire two additional people to cover everything I did.

  286. Sanity Lost*

    Not a boss or a co-worker but a customer. A few years ago, my life rather imploded and I had to to pack up, sell my house, divorce my ex and move 3 traumatized kids (and a dog) to a new state in the middle of the school year all within 3 months. I was an absolute wreck, and knew I needed a flexible schedule to get things organized, so I took a retail job. Figured it was (comparatively) easier and “less brain work” to deal with at the time.

    It was one of those days that nothing was really going right and the customers were snippy. An older woman with a very smug look on her face told me “that maybe if I got off my butt and went back to school, I could do something with my life.”

    I was all out of patience and told her “well I have 4 degrees including an MBA and no student debt, I’m not sure a Doctorate would help me at the moment, do you?”

    She gawped for a moment and then grabbed her purchases and stomped out.

    No one applauded, but my co-worker after the fact did ask if I really had all those degrees. Turns out he needed help with college applications and was getting frustrated. We managed to get him sorted out.

  287. Azure Jane Lunatic*

    I was working as receptionist and de-facto office manager for an extremely tiny office in a very large city for an extremely large company. (There was another, much larger, office a couple blocks up, but they were running out the lease on a semi-recent acquisition.) My supervisor warned me that this office had a team assistant, Fergusette, who liked to walk all over the receptionists, and to not let her get away with it.

    I did fairly well for a while but eventually the dread of her being crappy to me took over, and I started not pushing back when she did things that she shouldn’t (relocating furniture between floors without permission, relocating decorative items without permission).

    The whole department (including my supervisor, her boss, our director, and me) were working on a big project in the big office and since we were gossiping over pizza during a dinner break I casually mentioned that Fergusette had said something mildly obnoxious to me recently.

    “Fergusette did WHAT?” exclaimed our director, and said that Fergusette had no right to speak to one of his people like that, and I should a) move the furniture back, and b) write up the bad interactions I’d had with her.

    I keep *notes*. I searched the directory for Fergusette’s name and compiled a lovely essay, and did not neglect to point out my own culpability in some of the incidents. Then I moved the furniture and decorative items and waited.

    Fergusette came raging up the stairs and slammed into my lobby, demanding to know what happened to the things, right up in my face and towering over me. “I moved them back upstairs,” I said calmly. “I was wrong to not say something when you moved them in the first place.”

    She was clearly not expecting this, and gaped at me wordlessly for a few seconds before whirling and stomping back downstairs. Not long after that, she moved to a different position in the company.

    One of my co-workers at another old job once said something mildly annoyed to a member of the IT staff who was giving her the run-around (this IT department was notorious for losing tickets and claiming that there was not a problem when multiple people were having a problem). When she got an invitation to a meeting with this IT person, this IT person’s manager, and her own manager, she knew she’d gone over the line and was prepared to take her reprimand with grace.

    Our manager, however, was out for a week or so, so her meetings were being taken by the director. (My first instruction by this manager: “If [director] ever tells you to do something that you think is incorrect, or doesn’t make sense, please run it past me, or any of the other managers — [director] is very enthusiastic and has a habit of throwing wild ideas at the wall and seeing what sticks.” “So, run it by a responsible adult first?” “I wasn’t going to say that, but yes.”)

    Our director bounced into the room last, and before the IT manager could let out a peep, said that he was so excited! That IT was interested in collaborating! And that he had been thinking for a while that the user experience of using IT could be improved! And he had Thoughts on what should be first!

    The meeting continued like that, with our director running the meeting like a Zamboni being driven by ten hamsters on double espresso and IT going along in great bemusement with the new topic of the meeting. My colleague just shut up and let it happen. When our manager came back, she confessed all, and got told to not be snippy with IT again, and also, that it was hilarious and absolutely typical of our director.

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