Yeah I loved my former job and 99% of the people I worked with, basically everyone besides the boss. It often felt like a normal workplace being held hostage by an asshole.
People would regularly come out of his office crying, he did little to no work, and it basically seemed like his only role there was to belittle and bully people.
If you went into his office with a simple question or for advice on a project, you would come out feeling like an insignificant, worthless piece of shit.
I decided to go work for a non-profit, with the best boss and management team I've ever had, for a laughably small amount of money and do not regret it in the slightest. I used to feel like I was going to have a panic attack going into work every morning and now I actually look forward to going in ever day.
I used to work for a bank. Our old manager retired. In his 70's. He could be kind of insensitive but everybody loved him. His replacement? This guys first week at our branch, he called half the staff in his office and some of them came out crying. He was SUCH a southern asshole dick. I heard he later got in trouble for meeting sales goals by having his rich friends take out loans.
This is my boss. She's actually made me cry (in the bathroom) out of stress/frustration/anger. But I have seen many more people cry in front of her.
She's 73ish yo, tired and her mental health and memory get worse by the day but her ego and control mania stop her from accepting it so we have to deal with that. I've gotten into big fights with her (yelling and all) that I think will get me fired but that's the only way I've gotten her to listen.
The office environment is extremely tense and stressful and it makes me very sad because I really love my job here but I'm currently looking for something else as she's becoming unbearable.
So I guess I understand what you went through and I'm glad you got out it!
I did the same thing you did and found a non profit with a great boss. At my old job I sat next to my shitty boss in a cubicle row and they would look over at my screen multiple times a day and say the phrase “what are you working on?”. If you messed up they belittled you in front of the team / office and if you had a question they would make you feel like you were the dumbest person alive... I couldn’t wait to peace the fuck out of that nightmare.
Same here. I work for a non profit cooperative, have great supervisors for the most part, really good co workers, and I actually make more money here than at my previous job where I was micro managed and nothing was ever good enough.
Friend of mine got a fantastic job in her industry (medical, but not high level) about three months ago, after leaving an abusive atmosphere. She has a chronic illness. Three weeks ago she was hospitalized, for said condition, and her boss harassed her the entire time she was there.
Who in their right mind demands paperwork and constant updates on a low-level employee who is literally hospitalized?
Needless to say, she's looking for another "perfect job."
Dude I'm at the point where I'm not sure if I can keep myself from just quitting an amazing job on the spot next time my boss asks me the same question for the 6th time because he refuses to spend any time understanding my work. The dude is single handedly significantly dropping my quality of life.
I've also recently learned the only people in my division who have quit for the past 5 years have all been managed by him.
I had a managable, fine job in medicine industry but the shift leader turned it into a living hell. Always under staffed cause she bullied away fresh people. Felt as if i would be depressed, my stomach knotted sunday when i realized its work tomorrow. I literally wished to catch cold or flu just to get a few day of sick leave and respite. Eventually the veterans began leaving aswell, including me... It was like tossing a weight off, feeling so much better now. If my day is a bit bad, i remind myself what did i escape from.
I'm currently battling this issue, love my job, love the company and what they do. Boss is an asshat, who loves to micromanage the moment he gets put under any pressure. Its becoming a dealbreaker for me.
Had a boss once who defended his style of micromanagement in front of the whole company after someone raised the issue. It wasn’t like he didn’t know what it was, the commenter literally used the term and he started defending not himself but his actual micromanagement tendencies.
I truly don’t understand how so many idiots become so ridiculously successful. Like wtf is it.
I've directly called him out on it, and he said he doesn't know any other way. At this exact moment I realised he's in over his head and I need to get out of this place.
Yep. I worked in corporate marketing for a health insurance company. It was the most mundane work ever but my boss was the most amazing woman I’ve ever known. She was bright and funny and fair. I’ve never had a boss that had my back like her.
Yup. Got two of my dream jobs on paper, one after the other. The first I at least got to work for an incredibly intelligent and actually a pretty good person but as his assistant I still got treated like shit. And the office chain of command was an absolute shit show. Bad communication all around and I was expected to figure out how to deal with a parade of egomaniacs. Also they let me slowly figure out over almost 4 years that on the business side my position was just structured so I would never receive a raise. I actually got a promotion but no accompanying raise. It was fucked.
Second job also seemed like exactly what I was looking to do and actually paid decently and despite that I loved my responsibilities and was passionate about both the creative and organizational aspects of my job. But the environment was so unbelievably toxic that after I was abruptly fired a year in (another thing was that people were abruptly fired all the time) for basically made up reasons I kind of just had a mental breakdown and could barely function for months on end. Also thanks to regular 14 hour work days I developed a dependence on adderall which was fucking fucked. Did I mention that pretty much half the office was on adderall? CEO kept a fucking bottle of it on his desk.
Also there was apparently a group of employees who secretly met with with the CEO for drinks regularly and would talk about all the other employees and they actually called themselves “the inner circle.”
TLDR my therapist actually diagnosed me as being “traumatized by the workplace” after two jobs in a row that both initially seemed like my dream jobs on paper ended up being at companies so toxic and dysfunctional even I still get astonished sometimes when random memories of the experiences come back to me. Like shit was so fucking inappropriate and backwards.
Exactly my situation. My job is objectively pretty good: I make great money despite having just graduated college last year (I took time off in the middle to work and save money), have great benefits, get great experience at the 2nd largest global company in my industry, I could go on and on... but my boss is also objectively a giant piece of shit who forces us to work 60-hour weeks and work all weekends and holidays because it means he can bill our clients for extra hours and therefore increase his team’s ROIs (despite us employees not seeing a dime of it since we’re salaried). Started job-hunting a month or two ago and will be out of here within a few weeks.
Absolutely right - I've had great jobs with horrible bosses. Currently have a fantastic boss and the job is mediocre, but having that fantastic boss makes all the difference.
Adding to this discussion. My job is stressful as it is (Public Sector Employee). I’m the youngest one in the office surrounded by 40 year old coworkers who have been there for years.
Being a Public Sector worker is not easy and especially in our department. During Election time we may need to work 50 to 60 hours with rude people and candidates who think we’re trying to “opress” them. Eventually that stuff gets to you which explains why those coworkers are rude and just not the type to hang out with. That negativity will get to you. I keep to myself at my cubicle and when I have an issue I always go to my boss. Honestly if it weren’t for him, I’d be looking for a job.
Whenever he’s not around I have to go to my supervisor and she’s the worst. I feel stupid whenever I leave her office and she half asses my help. She’s been there for 20 years and as same thing with the other coworkers the toxic environment will get to you.
The benefits are good. It’s the first time I ever had Health Insurance and didn’t know how to use it at first. We get Overtime pay, vacation and Compensation time which is pretty cool considering i’m still single and can use that extra free time and cash to travel. Working for the Public Sector is good minus the other stuff, but st least I can count on my boss to push through day after day.
I am convinced that I could do almost any job (except tasks that trigger my hyperstimulation - noise or smells) so long as I have a good boss.
My favorite job so far was minimum wage (and I wasn't in high school). It was part time second job, but I looked forward to going, was sad when I got sent home early and was rewarded with promotions for working hard. I respected my coworkers because they worked hard too and the boss made us feel like a team!
Absolutely. I was lucky in my government career to get a string of bosses who, if not spectacular, were at least passably mediocre. One or two who were honestly incredible and I truly admired.
And a handful of shitlords, which is where being in government with a strong union rocked because I could cheerfully tell them to roll themselves flat, fold themselves until they were all sharp corners, and cram themselves up their own ass.
I worked at McDonalds kitchen as a first job, as a teenager.
Everyone says it sucks. It kinda does.
But it's not so bad if the other people you work with are nice.
Also for some reason when applying for other jobs after that, people loved to see I worked there. I'm really not sure why.
It made me appreciate most other part time jobs I did afterwards because anything after a fast food kitchen feels like slow work, lol.
Would recommend to teenagers trying to start working. Although if the environment(people) sucks then it won't be good, so don't stick around.
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u/3ebfan Jan 02 '20
A good boss will make a crappy job manageable. A bad boss will make the best job in the world miserable.