People Are Speaking Out About The Corruption They Faced At Their Former Jobs, And I Hope You Never Have To Experience Anything Like It
Some workplaces are no walk in the park. From tyrannical bosses to unfair (and in some cases, illegal) policies, it's no wonder some employees get fed up and walk out. We recently covered a Reddit thread about people quitting their horrible jobs on the spot, and those stories inspired commenters to share even wilder and more upsetting workplace drama. Here are some workplaces that probably need to be shut the hell down for their messed-up practices:
Warning: This post contains mentions of racism, sexual harassment, and physical violence.
1."I worked at a pet supply store. I was responsible for the live animals they had there. The animals were kept in truly awful conditions. They’d put too many animals into the same small enclosures so they’d start to attack each other. Once when an animal had a wound, they tried to get me to put it in the freezer to kill it because it wouldn’t sell! I refused and notified the SPCA, but they did nothing to stop it. I quit after they found someone else willing to do the horrible work."
2."I worked at a bank and stayed there for three years because I felt like I had to prove to them and myself that I was not stupid. Here are a few of the things I dealt with there: 1) I got a calculator chucked at my face. 2) I was knocked on the back of the head. 3) I was whacked on the forehead with a rolled-up piece of paper. 4) I was yelled at and embarrassed in front of everybody for not telling one of my managers to check her email. 5) I was used as a scapegoat. 6) I was repeatedly called an idiot. Fun times."
3."I had a director at a former job tell me I had to stay at my phone for eight hours and could not leave my desk to eat or use the restroom. Coworkers brought me snacks, but eventually I had to go pee. The (male) director followed me to the ladies' room and stood outside the door screaming while I was inside. This was not a staff-only bathroom; it was on a busy hallway at a small university, and there were students everywhere. No one did anything to the director."
4."When I was 16, I worked at country club and was illegally bartending the entire time I was there. My boss liked me a lot, so in addition to events, he let me work in the club member restaurant and men’s bar. I asked for one Saturday off a month in advance so I could go to my school's homecoming, and the day before, he told me he needed me to fill in for the woman who opened the downstairs on Saturday. He wanted me, a 16-year-old girl, to open the entire bar alone, which would be filled with old golfers drinking at 10 a.m. My parents told me to call in sick the next day. I didn’t quit until months later when I was finally sick of getting harassed by men without any help or support from my manager. The final straw was when I left one night and someone followed me all the way home. I drove around my block four times before he left me alone."
5."I used to work as an account executive for a small marketing and PR firm that was owned by an older, rich, white couple. I worked directly with both of them, but mainly with the woman, as she was more involved in the communications and fashion aspects. They would get into horrific fights where the man would lay hands on the woman in the middle of the office. When I was hiring interns, I was told I could never hire men or anyone 'too different.' I also experienced a lot of racism in that job as a young Black woman, including when one of our clients refused to talk to me or acknowledge me after he found out I was Black. This was after he sang my praises for helping him with a website and social media for weeks over the phone. I hated that job so much, but the straw that broke the camel’s back was that I was being paid $450 a week under the table in NYC in a job that would’ve earned me a $65K salary easily anywhere else."
6."I came in to work the day after putting my childhood dog to sleep. I was obviously quiet and my voice was different. I was shattered. My manager asked what was wrong, and I told him. He then looked me up and down and said, 'Well, at least you look hot.' Bruh."
7."I was hired to replace a woman who was managing a team of designers because she was moving out of the country. I settled into my new position, and she came back two months later. I had some questions, and wondered if this meant she was now going to be reporting to me. Well, my boss made us SHARE the role. I gave my notice immediately. I ended up moving on to bigger and better things anyway!"
8."In another job I had, the CEO of this small company would hire a person for one department, and then months later decide he wanted them in another department and force them to trade jobs. If they didn’t like it, then they’d have to quit their job! Someone who was hired to do sales could be moved to become a receptionist, which is a significant pay decrease. If they didn't want the job change, they would have to give their notice and forfeit unemployment. I can't believe he got away with this so often."
9."For my first job when I was 19, I worked in the prize room for one of those arcades with a pizza parlor and go-kart center. I made minimum wage and was only allowed one 30-minute break (unpaid) that we were granted after working for eight hours straight. We didn't get any discounts, there was no space for us to put any lunches or snacks, and we could only have a drink if it was from the soda fountain and inside of a company mug. We paid for the mug out of our paychecks, by the way. My manager referred to me almost exclusively as 'Pakistani girl' and would 'joke' that if we needed something, we'd need to blow him. The final straw, though, was when I was closing with a male coworker and he patted the counter we were standing by and said, 'You know, if I wanted to, I could take you right here, and there'd be nothing you could do about it.' He also offered to walk me to my car afterward. I quit and said it was to focus on school."
10."My company never took the pandemic seriously and treated anyone who did like they were overreacting. We were not essential workers, but our business stayed open, and we were forced to be there while everything else was shut down. When my coworkers and I expressed concerns about our safety during the pandemic (such as no sneeze guards, no mask requirements, barely any sanitization protocols, etc.), management's response was just to shrug us off and tell us to stop being dramatic. After putting up with this for over a year, when it came time for our annual review, the supervisors in charge intentionally found little things they could nitpick to justify not granting hazard pay to any of the employees, even though we were there every single day of the pandemic. And to top everything off, they told us we shouldn't wear face masks around customers because, 'It might make them uncomfortable to be here.'"
11."There were three very clear red flags at my last job. First, when I was promoted to management, the salary they offered me was actually a pay DECREASE. I fought for it to be changed and got it, but definitely thought, 'This is worrisome.' The next red flag: I took a sick day, and after the next team meeting, my boss took me aside and said, 'I notice you take a sick day every month. Do you have some sort of medical condition I should know about?' Not only is that NOT OK to ask, but my previous sick day had been three months prior. My thought at the time was, 'Oh, I'm going to have to leave this place.' Then, a few months later, we got a policy update that quietly removed a form of compensation. We had an on-call rotation, and our compensation for being available 24/7 was a day off afterward. This new policy removed the day off. That's when I realized, 'Oh, I'm going to have to leave this place NOW.'"
"I started applying for new jobs that week, and am now at a MUCH better job."
12."I worked at a company as a tech associate. It was an OK job, but every Friday, my supervisor basically made me ask for my pay. Then, two weeks running, he made me wait until the following Monday to get paid because of 'cash flow problems.' Then, he came into my office one day and asked, 'So, when did we agree to pay you less?' I left that day and didn’t go back. I had to badger him for my last paycheck, but it was worth it to be OUT."
13."I was an assistant manager at Blockbuster. My head manager didn’t like me because all the employees liked working with me and not him. He secretly changed my schedule without telling me. Well, I saw the change and showed up. I told another manager about it, and she said, 'Yeah, he did that because he wants to fire you.' The next day I was scheduled to work from 4 p.m. until midnight. I walked in at 3:45, dropped off my uniform, and said, 'I quit.' Never felt better about quitting in my life."
14."I never took this job, but the brief pre-interview was enough to see how toxic it was. I applied to be a dental assistant, and the dentist’s other assistant showed me around before disclosing, 'You better not be the type of person who cries easily because he is extremely demanding of his staff.' She told me this in a genuine way, not a dismissive way, as if to warn me not to get involved if I was a sensitive type. I declined the interview and left."
15."My boss was sleeping with all the women at the restaurant. One night, one of the women got drunk after hours, cussed me out, and tried to physically assault me. My boss tried to turn it back on me because he wanted to keep sleeping with her. I quit an hour later. Blocked everyone."
16."I worked for a hospice company that has staff sit with patients as they’re actively dying until they pass. A nice idea, but they didn’t have the staff to meet the need. So I ended up staying up for 24 hours straight at one point because I worked a full eight-hour shift, and then sat with a patient all night since there was no one to relieve me. I got docked for not going into work the next day as well. They expected me to stay awake for 32 hours straight for 40K a year with no overtime. No, ma’am."
17."I worked in a retail setting making barely over minimum wage. The store manager was racist and homophobic, among other things, but she’d try to pass her offensive comments off as jokes. There were a lot of things built up, so I called our district manager to file a complaint. A few weeks later, I found out that she called my store manager and told her everything I had told her in confidence, but didn't admonish or discipline her. I was done at that point. I handed in my keys a few days later and quit."
18."I was a lifeguard at a YMCA in my early 20s. The rest of the guards on staff took advantage of the fact I was new and would leave me on stand for hours without a break while they relaxed in the break room with AC. The last straw was when they had me watching the water for three guards while they hung out with our supervisor. Three pools to one guard. I stopped showing up after that."
19.Finally: "My first job as an adult was so toxic, and I was too young and inexperienced to realize it. Managers would regularly make me cover for them and miss events so their friends could go instead, place blame on me for things that weren’t my fault, and give me the worst clients who were known for being violent or verbally abusive. Then, they found out I was thinking of leaving to go back to school, and they got even worse. Finally, they put me on a performance action plan without warning because so many clients were 'dissatisfied with me.' Half of the clients didn’t like me because I was someone new, because I was a woman, or because I told them I couldn’t do something that I legitimately couldn’t do. I turned in my notice, and suddenly they were super nice, addressing concerns I’d had for years, etc."
Have you ever worked for a toxic boss or organization? Were you ever pushed to the point of quitting on the spot? We want to hear your story! Tell us about your experience in the comments below!
Note: Submissions have been edited for length and/or clarity.
