This article is part of ‘Improve yourself‘ a category designed to show ways people may scam you, how companies trick you and most importantly how you can improve your life by doing something you love doing.
This question was asked on Reddit and here are some of the best responses:
I worked at Boston Market in high school and i had been getting screwed on hours for a month or so. So the new schedule came out and i seen i had 6hrs for the whole week and i was pissed. The last order i had a guy came in and just wanted some kids meals for his two kids. I asked him if he wanted anything for himself but i could tell that he was in a bind with money. Dude paid in all change and barely had enough. Any ways i went to the back and got him a party platter that we use for catering and i gave him atleast 15 peoples worth of food and almost a whole rack of fresh cornbread. i mean i absolutely hooked this guy the fuck up he had more food than he could carry. I put my apron on the counter and helped him carry it to his car , dude started crying and all and after he had it all packed up i just walked home. I think it was a good way to go out.
Working in wings place just out of college as a cook. Start working there and everything is going ok except for the fact that I’m really underpaid. I was making minimum wage as 1 of 2 cooks in the restaurant. Work there for a few months and the manager sits down to talk with me. We discuss a few things and I bring up the fact that I really deserve a raise. I was working 50-60 hours a week and the compensation based on my effort really wasn’t evening out. He basically told me to fuck off and that cooks are a dime a dozen. So I told him I was disappointed with his retort.
Times were tough for me at that time so I bit my lip and just went back to work. The next few months were hell. The manager of the restaurant would openly put me down in front of other employees and constantly berate me for asking for more money. He would put me on back to back to back opening and closing shifts and send people home on purpose so I would be the only one left to clean the kitchen at the end of the night. I was beginning to lose my chill with this job.
So finally super bowl Sunday rolls around and for those unaware, this is a very very busy day for restaurants that make wings. I get into work and everyone is already pissed. I ask what’s up and they tell me the other cook didn’t show up and nothing is prepped for the day. I roll up my sleeves and start working. We get everything set and I start making wings for the orders. I’m working my ass off and my manager comes up to me and starts giving me the same shit. The phones are ringing like crazy and honestly there are more orders than the restaurant can handle. It’s fucking chaos. Then some of the managers friends (not employees) come into the kitchen and start fucking with all my stuff. Moving things, disorganizing stuff, sitting on my prep counters. I tell them to gtfo and my manager storms in and lays the fuck into me. Tells me I’m a worthless piece of shit, I never do anything right, I’m not worth more than minimum wage and I never fucking put in any extra effort.
That was it. My brained just clicked and I stopped giving a fuck about anything. I stood up straight and stretched out my arms wide. Slowly took off my kitchen apron and removed my hat. Starred dead in the managers eyes and calmly but sternly said. “Have an enjoyable super bowl Sunday.” I threw the the apron and my hat in the fry oil basins grabbed my bag and walked passed the rest of the employees who’s mouth were hanging open and out the back to the ever fading ring of phones ringing. Arrived at my home and met up with my room mates. I told them the story and we decided to order 200 wings and watch the game.
Tldr: The wings were under cooked and over sauced, but I was just the right amount of salty. Thanks to https://www.reddit.com/user/watwasthat
This is sort of the opposite, but whatever.
I was working for a tech startup in ’98 that was growing by leaps and bounds, and one day they re-orged the department and promoted this guy, let’s call him Teddy, who had been there for like two weeks to manager. He had four or five people working for him, and he treated them all like shit. They were all self-motivated, senior-level people, and he treated them like children. He micromanaged their work, berating everything they did, complained when they had to leave work for stuff like a dentist appointment or a sick kid. When he first took over, he tried to enforce a policy where none of them could check in code unless he code reviewed it in person and then did the check in himself (that lasted less than two weeks). He reviewed an existing, approved schedule for a software release, decided it wasn’t aggressive enough, told his superiors that they were going to pull it in by three months, and then ordered everyone to work weekends. Not because there was a business need, but because he wanted to show them that he could get stuff done.
After a few months, this woman, let’s call her Kelly, who was working for him gave her two weeks notice, saying that she was offered a managerial job at another company. Teddy lost it. You could hear him screaming through the walls of his office, then as she walked out of the office and he followed her to the exit, shouting at her the whole time: you’re fucking worthless, Kelly, you’re going to fail, don’t come crawling back looking for a job, I’m glad to see you go, now I can hire someone with real skills, etc., etc. For at least a month after she was gone, he would randomly just say shit like “I can’t believe that bitch just up and left, what a cunt” or “Oh, Kelly really fucked things up good. We’re probably going to miss our release date because of how she left things.” HR sat down privately with the guy to talk things over, and then he started bitching about HR. “They’re covering their asses so they don’t get sued. They don’t give a shit about good company men like me.”
A few months later our company was acquired and we went to the welcome meeting that the other company had set up. Their CTO and the VP of Development spent about a half hour each talking about strategic vision, how the changes would affect us, the usual stuff, and then the VP said, “But there will be at least one familiar face to help with the transition. I think most of you know Kelly Johnson, she used to work here, she’ll be the senior manager in charge of the products team moving forward, so…”
Everyone looked back at Teddy, who was white as a sheet and looked like he was about to have a heart attack. He was gone within a month.
Thanks to https://www.reddit.com/user/urge_underkill
Had a summer job at an industrial clothes rental and washing place. Shit comes in from slaughterhouses and similar places, then sits in the summer heat for days before it arrives. There were sometimes open knives in those moldy overall pockets. We had to check those pockets w/o gloves and were yelled at if we cut ourselves and went to get medical attention or just to disinfect the wounds.
After two weeks I started recording what was going on and reported it after another week.
Couple of months later, I testified in court, then heard nothing for years.
At first, it seemed to have no effect, but after talking to the guy who got me the gig, I found out that the owner is in prison for a ton of stuff, breaking labor laws being one of the minor charges.
Not exactly a blaze of glory but rather a small spark that started a slow burn.
Edit: fixed autocorrect
Edit 2: Comprehensive writeup of the story now that I’m not on the phone:
The story takes place in Germany, Summer 2010.
I got a summer job at what is essential an industrial clothes rental and laundry shop (think overalls), total duration of three weeks.
When the clothes arrived at my job, I (along with two others) had to follow this procedure:
dump them into metal bins *sort them by manufacturer, severity and kind of the dirt/stains, manufacturer and colour
check the pockets for loose items like change, wrenches etc. (we didn’t get gloves for this)
scan a barcode that was sewn into the overalls
You had a certain number of codes you had to scan per hour, which would be ok for people who have been properly instructed on the procedure and had some experience (i.e. recognize all of the above shit at a glance).
We all were students aged 16 – 18 who had never really “worked” before, so we were slow at first. This meant that we were yelled at, told to skip our breaks (i.e. clock out for your break, go back to work, clock back in after 30 min.). By the boss himself.
On top of this, one of the main clients is a slaughterhouse that lets the clothes sit in bags for a week before sending them in. In the middle of a summer with 38°c peak temperatures.
They also worked with some knives akin to box cutters which they frequently forgot in their pockets, sometimes wih an open blade, too.
So when those overalls came in, everyone got some cuts on their hands. When we went to report the wounds, get them disinfected and patched up, each of us were told to shut the fuck up and go back to work.
After two weeks, I was fed up and started bringing my digital camera to work, hid it in my clothes and recorded the conditions when we were unsupervised as well as the audio of multiple run-ins with the boss.
After the last week was up, I went to the police with all the evidence and filed charges.
Early in 2011, I was called to court to give my statement but didn’t keep up with the legal proceedings.
Two months ago, I visited my hometown and ran into one of the guys who worked there with me. He told me that the boss/owner was in jail.
During the Investigation, the police found out that on top of endangering workers and breaking labor laws, he was involved with drugs and avoided taxes among other things.
Thanks to https://www.reddit.com/user/Lethalmusic
The full Reddit post can be found on https://www.reddit.com/r/AskReddit/comments/41dkav/redditors_who_quit_their_jobs_in_a_blaze_of_glory/
