| Worst boss you've ever had, and why? 09:47 - Dec 18 with 7551 views | unbelievablue |
Had a review meeting this morning with my manager. She's brilliant and it got me thinking just how terrible some of my managers have been, even at this relatively early stage of my career.
So, here's your chance to rant about previous (or current, if you're brave) bosses. |  |
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| Worst boss you've ever had, and why? on 09:48 - Dec 18 with 5815 views | Reuser_is_God |
Only ever had 2 bosses & genuinely can't find fault in either of them. |  |
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| Worst boss you've ever had, and why? on 09:52 - Dec 18 with 5785 views | BlueBadger |
I was briefly self-employed and the boss wouldn't STOP touching me up. |  |
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| Worst boss you've ever had, and why? on 10:04 - Dec 18 with 5751 views | tractordownsouth |
My second ever boss was at a waiting job when I was 16 years old. He had many faults.
His target market was casually racist pensioners, and he would roll his eyes whenever any children made their way in. It was essentially a mini UKIP conference, every morning he would make comments such as " we need to close the borders" and " why can't the Syrians all stay in France".
He was also a bit stupid with his politics. During the 2015 election, I am told he had a poster up for the Conservative candidate ( now MP) Derek Thomas, a creatonist Christian who is against gay marriage, yet my boss was gay.
Another highlight was on my last day before being fired. I have a fairly severe nut allergy, and I had informed him on my first day that I wouldn't be able to serve Carrot Cake to customers. However, on my last day, when I explained this to him again, he exclaimed " it's not going to jump up and bite you." Absolute C unit.
We were all paid dirt cheap wages - every member of staff was on £4 an hour until the age of 18. The funny thing about that now is that he has such a bad reputation as an employer that he now pays his staff over double that, because no one will work for him otherwise.
I do laugh about it now, but he ruled by fear ( regularly shouting at staff in front of customers) and it did damage my confidence in the work environment for a long time and I do wonder if that has contributed to my anxiety in that area. So yeah, not a great bloke. |  |
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| Worst boss you've ever had, and why? on 10:07 - Dec 18 with 5735 views | Durovigutum |
I've only got twenty minutes, I'll bookmark this thread and come back to it when I've got enough time... |  | | |
| Worst boss you've ever had, and why? on 10:11 - Dec 18 with 5718 views | GeoffSentence |
Can't say I have ever had a bad boss, I have had some with unusual traits like, the one who would burst into tears if she was challenged vigorously, or the skipper of the ship on my very short lived nautical career who was cross-eyed, making wonder how he kept the ship on a straight course, and who had his cock in one hand when I was first introduced to him, having been in the middle of taking leak over the side. |  |
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| Worst boss you've ever had, and why? on 10:19 - Dec 18 with 5687 views | DanTheMan |
The only one I can think of would be my first manager, although they weren't my direct line manager.
He was just a tool overall. Everyone at the company disliked him, so much so that when a few of us left the company in quick succession, we made sure to let the only reasonable Director that he was a large cause of the problems there.
The one distinct memory I had was when I wanted to get to move into a mid-level Developer role (I was a Junior at the time). He seemed open to the idea and arranged a meeting to go over it.
So I go to this meeting with him and he presents me with the job specs from Motorola for the various levels of Engineers they had there. He once worked at Motorola and brought it up at basically every opportunity he had to do so.
He then proceeded to go through all of the stuff a mid level developer needed to do at Motorola and what I was not doing. None of it really had anything to do with the job I was doing and there were at the time 4 developers at the company. So being a mid level there was nothing at all like Motorola. Just came away from it feeling incredibly deflated. |  |
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| Worst boss you've ever had, and why? on 10:30 - Dec 18 with 5645 views | SaleAway |
Not me, but my wife's boss. She'd been unfairly dismissed from her previous job, had a big legal battle etc, before they settled out of court. It had knocked her confidence a lot though. So in her next job, she had a 6 month probation period, and although she was doing ok, she was a bit timid, her boss decided to come out with the immortal line
" you seem a bit anxious, we're not sure we're quite getting the best of you, so we're going to extend your probation period". Of course, this just made her more anxious, and she decided to leave... over her notice period, she relaxed, and actually started performing at a level that was much better, she got another job, but her boss tried to get her to stay on. It was a perfect example of how not to manage someone. |  |
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| Worst boss you've ever had, and why? on 10:30 - Dec 18 with 5643 views | Ryorry |
I can't reveal my rl ID, but that Jose is the worst one I ever had, I'm so happy he's gone - I might get some game time now  |  |
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| Worst boss you've ever had, and why? on 10:57 - Dec 18 with 5561 views | Pinewoodblue |
Had a boss , late 1960's, he was losing it Closed the office and had a staff meeting told everyone they were not pulling their weight and he wanted everything done by the book. There was. Procedure manual which clearly stated all information should be checked before given to clients or members of the public.
Took him over a week to realise what was happening he was furrious and held another meeting. He was , in future, only going to talk to staff in his office and then only to sack them.
Ten minutes after the meeting I was called into his office, I worked in the legal department he had received a notice of intended prosecution for speeding g and needed help.
Although I was able to resolve the matter by making a phone call to the local constabulary I didn't tell him there was going to be no further action just that he might, in the next six months, receive a summons
The organisation I worked for had good connections.
He survived in his job for another ten years.. |  |
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| Worst boss you've ever had, and why? on 11:12 - Dec 18 with 5528 views | Keno |
My current boss is a right dickhead, couldn't manage a p'ss up in a brewery |  |
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| Worst boss you've ever had, and why? on 12:01 - Dec 18 with 5417 views | MJallday |
At a previous workplace, i had a boss whom i can only describe as a bully and a manipulator. (i more accurately describe him below)
his bullying behavior carried on for a couple of years, most notably to my colleagues rather than me, but as is with all bullies, eventually the behavior spilled out towards my good self. Basically it was along the lines of talking about people behind their back, deliberately disclosing them, giving them unrealistic deadline , personal comments and basically just horrible behavior towards them.
id been there a few years and eventually after i could tolerate it no more - id made the decision to leave. so i handed my noticed in. said boss was not happy. i tried to negotiate a 4 week exit (rather than 12 weeks as per my contract) but he refused - so i basically sat there and did f**k all. - except post on here. so he set out to make my life hell
about 6 weeks in (with 6 weeks to go) they pulled up my internet history and hauled me into the office. i believe i created a post on here about how much of a tool said boss was. (i think i ended up asking gav to delete it because it was deliberately that contentious) - but i knew he was watching. (which is why i did it)
said boss basically tried to go down a disciplnary route just to be spiteful (they didnt like it that i was taking my knowledge with me) - so i basically told them to f**k off and that i wanted to go now. as HR were present they agreed and he had no choice. he said to HR at the time "i want a moment alone with MJ" - HR refused.
i left that very day.
i received word about 6 months ago said boss died. i visited his linked in page to see people wax lyrical over him. i simply wrote - im glad the bullying c**t is dead. 7 former colleagues of mine "liked" the comment
he was the most horrible individual i have ever had the misfortune to work for/with but it taught me one lesson - never be like him. [Post edited 18 Dec 2018 12:03]
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| Worst boss you've ever had, and why? on 12:39 - Dec 18 with 5331 views | uefacup81 |
Used to work under an odious woman at a local housing association in a fairly simple admin role.
It was p*ss-easy and rather boring, so I'd kill a fair bit of time on here. The issue of my internet use was raised, and my probation period extended because of it. I was told that it would be reviewed in January and, as long as my internet usage outside of breaks stopped, I'd be fine.
So I stopped.
I got a notification the week before Christmas that my review had been moved forward to the last working day before Christmas. She was away, so another manager would chair the meeting. At the meeting I was told that as my internet usage hadn't stopped, my contract was not being extended. I responded that it had, in fact, and if they cared to check with IT it would back up that fact.
The meeting was adjourned, whilst they checked with IT.
I was called back in, and given the good news that IT had confirmed what I was saying to be true. However, it didn't change the fact that I had previously been using the internet on company time, and so I was still being dismissed.
The cow had clearly rearranged the meeting for Christmas week for maximum impact, and didn't even have the guts to conduct it herself. Earlier that year she'd dismissed a colleague who'd been working for the association for six months with no issues, because one of her references had belatedly come back negatively.
Following my dismissal, she hounded out an older colleague who was approaching retirement age, and subsequently lost an unfair dismissal claim to the tune of about £15,000.
She's since moved into the NHS where, as I understand it, such behaviour is actively encouraged. |  |
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| Worst boss you've ever had, and why? on 12:39 - Dec 18 with 5331 views | mos |
Not a boss, however my very opinionated English teacher once told us that we should all be wearing poppies for remembrance week. I quickly asked her “Why?”, she said that we should all wear one to commemorate all British soldiers that had died over the years.
“What about the British soldiers that killed my ancestors in the 1970s in Ireland?” I queried.
*Awfully awkward silence for the rest of the lesson* |  |
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| Worst boss you've ever had, and why? on 12:42 - Dec 18 with 5310 views | BlueBadger |
| Worst boss you've ever had, and why? on 12:39 - Dec 18 by mos |
Not a boss, however my very opinionated English teacher once told us that we should all be wearing poppies for remembrance week. I quickly asked her “Why?”, she said that we should all wear one to commemorate all British soldiers that had died over the years.
“What about the British soldiers that killed my ancestors in the 1970s in Ireland?” I queried.
*Awfully awkward silence for the rest of the lesson* |
Well done lad, you've just guaranteed a ten-pager. | |
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| Worst boss you've ever had, and why? on 12:43 - Dec 18 with 5303 views | uefacup81 |
| Worst boss you've ever had, and why? on 12:39 - Dec 18 by uefacup81 |
Used to work under an odious woman at a local housing association in a fairly simple admin role.
It was p*ss-easy and rather boring, so I'd kill a fair bit of time on here. The issue of my internet use was raised, and my probation period extended because of it. I was told that it would be reviewed in January and, as long as my internet usage outside of breaks stopped, I'd be fine.
So I stopped.
I got a notification the week before Christmas that my review had been moved forward to the last working day before Christmas. She was away, so another manager would chair the meeting. At the meeting I was told that as my internet usage hadn't stopped, my contract was not being extended. I responded that it had, in fact, and if they cared to check with IT it would back up that fact.
The meeting was adjourned, whilst they checked with IT.
I was called back in, and given the good news that IT had confirmed what I was saying to be true. However, it didn't change the fact that I had previously been using the internet on company time, and so I was still being dismissed.
The cow had clearly rearranged the meeting for Christmas week for maximum impact, and didn't even have the guts to conduct it herself. Earlier that year she'd dismissed a colleague who'd been working for the association for six months with no issues, because one of her references had belatedly come back negatively.
Following my dismissal, she hounded out an older colleague who was approaching retirement age, and subsequently lost an unfair dismissal claim to the tune of about £15,000.
She's since moved into the NHS where, as I understand it, such behaviour is actively encouraged. |
Likewise I'm fairly convinced that she actively tried to sabotage my trying to move into other permanent roles elsewhere in the organisation. She even went as far as trying to issue me with a formal warning for not telling her I'd applied for an internal vacancy elsewhere - it quickly disappeared when I asked her to provide the policy document which required me to do this. | |
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| Worst boss you've ever had, and why? on 12:47 - Dec 18 with 5275 views | mos |
| Worst boss you've ever had, and why? on 12:42 - Dec 18 by BlueBadger |
Well done lad, you've just guaranteed a ten-pager. |
If it was just for WW1 and 2, and the sole intention was to simply commemorate and remember the good people from ALL nations that were forced into war, but unfortunately lost their lives. Then I’d be all for it.
Sadly it isn’t, and I’d rather not commemorate the people whom murdered my distant relatives.
Edit - But it’s Christmas, and would rather have this topic not be replied to, to save unrest! [Post edited 18 Dec 2018 12:52]
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| Worst boss you've ever had, and why? on 13:07 - Dec 18 with 5187 views | J2BLUE |
I've had two real c unit bosses.
One was when I was 16 and working for a well known local estate agent. The owner was a complete knob. Employed on the extortionate wage of £2.75 an hour as an office junior he used to have us do things like wash his car. He was just an a grade c unit who actually sacked the other office junior once the minimum wage went to £3 per hour. Luckily by then I had moved to another job where I was earning £6.50 an hour.
The other was at a small logistics company where 3/4 directors were complete pr1cks. The one who was my boss was an incredibly arrogant man who thought he was god's gift. The entire vibe of the office was awful. In our section there were 4 of us. One was the boss, one was ok in small doses but overall just like the rest and the other one was the spoilt brat of the office who had no life outside of work and would try and chat up random people from other companies over the phone by offering to send them chocolate and a copy of his CD. My boss was on the phone to someone and he said, word for word, "an hour of my time is worth two of anyone else's". Mega cringe. I was there two months. After the first month they loved me and said no one had ever learnt the job that fast. After the second month they sacked me because I just didn't fit in with the office culture of everyone is a tw@t, lets all treat each other like sh1t. Genuinely the worst decision of my life to join this company. I was sorting my life out at the company I was at before. I'll leave it there or I might genuinely start sobbing  |  |
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| Worst boss you've ever had, and why? on 13:10 - Dec 18 with 5178 views | Clapham_Junction |
Until recently I'd always had excellent bosses and had been very happy at work. Unfortunately this has changed in the last 18 months since my new Head of Service joined, as she is the worst person I've ever come across in the workplace.
She tries to micromanage everyone (approx 100 staff), meaning she has no time to do her own work. As a result, she misses most of her emails and then comes to people in a panic when she realises something she was asked for three weeks ago is due today and forces them to drop everything to do it. We've potentially racked up tens of thousands of pounds in late invoice payment claims because she can't keep track of her approvals.
She delivers b0llockings to staff in an open plan office and once stood behind me and dictated the entire minutes of a meeting as she wasn't happy with the original minutes I'd written.
Four of the five people that reported directly to her have left (with a combined service of over 50 years), some without even having an alternative job lined up. The one that hasn't left has had to take time off with stress. Several people two or three levels below her have also left because they can't stand her (I've considered it on many occasions even though I generally love my job). And because she's so rubbish at her own job (which includes recruitment), we've had loads of posts left empty for months on end - my boss's post was left unfilled for almost a year - which creates more stress.
Morale is on the floor and we're just wondering how bad it has to get for her boss to do something about it... |  | | |
| Worst boss you've ever had, and why? on 13:15 - Dec 18 with 5144 views | BlueBadger |
| Worst boss you've ever had, and why? on 13:10 - Dec 18 by Clapham_Junction |
Until recently I'd always had excellent bosses and had been very happy at work. Unfortunately this has changed in the last 18 months since my new Head of Service joined, as she is the worst person I've ever come across in the workplace.
She tries to micromanage everyone (approx 100 staff), meaning she has no time to do her own work. As a result, she misses most of her emails and then comes to people in a panic when she realises something she was asked for three weeks ago is due today and forces them to drop everything to do it. We've potentially racked up tens of thousands of pounds in late invoice payment claims because she can't keep track of her approvals.
She delivers b0llockings to staff in an open plan office and once stood behind me and dictated the entire minutes of a meeting as she wasn't happy with the original minutes I'd written.
Four of the five people that reported directly to her have left (with a combined service of over 50 years), some without even having an alternative job lined up. The one that hasn't left has had to take time off with stress. Several people two or three levels below her have also left because they can't stand her (I've considered it on many occasions even though I generally love my job). And because she's so rubbish at her own job (which includes recruitment), we've had loads of posts left empty for months on end - my boss's post was left unfilled for almost a year - which creates more stress.
Morale is on the floor and we're just wondering how bad it has to get for her boss to do something about it... |
Obvious question I know, but have you all taken your concerns over her head to her manager? | |
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| Worst boss you've ever had, and why? on 13:19 - Dec 18 with 5122 views | Clapham_Junction |
| Worst boss you've ever had, and why? on 13:15 - Dec 18 by BlueBadger |
Obvious question I know, but have you all taken your concerns over her head to her manager? |
It's been discussed a lot, but no-one's really sure how to do it, or whether he would be interested.
Apparently the last guy that left did file a formal complaint with our HR department, but it's not clear what's going to happen as a result. | | | |
| Worst boss you've ever had, and why? on 13:20 - Dec 18 with 5115 views | JimmyJazz |
Had a manager who never passed any of his team when it came to appraisals. The appraisal had a final mark, 3-5 meant you were entitled to be considered for a rise and bonus. A mark of 3 basically meant you were doing your job satisfactorily.
Every member of this guy's team had a rating of 2, and this was then repeated a second year. So none of his team had a raise or bonus for 2 years, when most everyone else was getting at least standard 2% raises.
The rating of 2 indicated that there was room for improvement. Even if a person had satisfied all their objectives. When it came to 1-1 objective review it would be a good meeting, doing well, met objectives etc. But then the final review was submitted without our sign-off with the rating of 2.
After the second year this was reported to his manager and consequently to HR. The argument being that objectives were pointless as we would all be marked down regardless.
The next year we all had the most basic, easy objectives and he actually encouraged us after completing a simple task to enter it as an objective so it could be signed off as completed. No idea where this ploy was heading as he was let go before the third year ended.
I consider him a bully, but if anyone dared to face up to him he tended to crumble, although you knew he'd get his own back by issuing you with some demeaning task as a consequence.
The worst part was that to anyone outside his team he made out as a likeable clown. Other senior staff members would comment how he must be a good boss to work for. No one in his team agreed. |  |
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| Worst boss you've ever had, and why? on 13:23 - Dec 18 with 5093 views | JimmyJazz |
| Worst boss you've ever had, and why? on 13:19 - Dec 18 by Clapham_Junction |
It's been discussed a lot, but no-one's really sure how to do it, or whether he would be interested.
Apparently the last guy that left did file a formal complaint with our HR department, but it's not clear what's going to happen as a result. |
Was busy getting my own gripes down, but that is exactly what I did. I'd been at the company quite a while so maybe that helped but my manager's manager already had some misgivings about my manager, so this was just welcome fuel to her own fire. She admitted this wasn't necessarily new news, but she hadn't realised how far it had been taken
My manager acted like a clown to cover up his incompetence [Post edited 18 Dec 2018 13:24]
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| Worst boss you've ever had, and why? on 13:27 - Dec 18 with 5067 views | BlueBadger |
Used to work with a surgical consultant who made a habit of having affairs with his juniors behind his wife's back. It all ended one day when a couple of his conquests, after a few years out in training posts Elsewhere, returned to the trust as senior registrars, ratted him out to the current one, who then proceeded to noisily call him out in the canteen one lunch.
She ended up with a mild b0llocking from HR over 'professional conduct' he ended up suspended for a while, as turned out he'd been conducting a lot of his extra-curricular activities on Trust time. | |
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| Worst boss you've ever had, and why? on 14:35 - Dec 18 with 4930 views | MattinLondon |
| Worst boss you've ever had, and why? on 13:27 - Dec 18 by BlueBadger |
Used to work with a surgical consultant who made a habit of having affairs with his juniors behind his wife's back. It all ended one day when a couple of his conquests, after a few years out in training posts Elsewhere, returned to the trust as senior registrars, ratted him out to the current one, who then proceeded to noisily call him out in the canteen one lunch.
She ended up with a mild b0llocking from HR over 'professional conduct' he ended up suspended for a while, as turned out he'd been conducting a lot of his extra-curricular activities on Trust time. |
Did his ‘conquests’ know that he was married? If so what have they got to be angry about? |  | | |
| Worst boss you've ever had, and why? on 15:04 - Dec 18 with 4851 views | unbelievablue |
| Worst boss you've ever had, and why? on 12:01 - Dec 18 by MJallday |
At a previous workplace, i had a boss whom i can only describe as a bully and a manipulator. (i more accurately describe him below)
his bullying behavior carried on for a couple of years, most notably to my colleagues rather than me, but as is with all bullies, eventually the behavior spilled out towards my good self. Basically it was along the lines of talking about people behind their back, deliberately disclosing them, giving them unrealistic deadline , personal comments and basically just horrible behavior towards them.
id been there a few years and eventually after i could tolerate it no more - id made the decision to leave. so i handed my noticed in. said boss was not happy. i tried to negotiate a 4 week exit (rather than 12 weeks as per my contract) but he refused - so i basically sat there and did f**k all. - except post on here. so he set out to make my life hell
about 6 weeks in (with 6 weeks to go) they pulled up my internet history and hauled me into the office. i believe i created a post on here about how much of a tool said boss was. (i think i ended up asking gav to delete it because it was deliberately that contentious) - but i knew he was watching. (which is why i did it)
said boss basically tried to go down a disciplnary route just to be spiteful (they didnt like it that i was taking my knowledge with me) - so i basically told them to f**k off and that i wanted to go now. as HR were present they agreed and he had no choice. he said to HR at the time "i want a moment alone with MJ" - HR refused.
i left that very day.
i received word about 6 months ago said boss died. i visited his linked in page to see people wax lyrical over him. i simply wrote - im glad the bullying c**t is dead. 7 former colleagues of mine "liked" the comment
he was the most horrible individual i have ever had the misfortune to work for/with but it taught me one lesson - never be like him. [Post edited 18 Dec 2018 12:03]
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 [Post edited 18 Dec 2018 15:04]
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