Please tell me batshit things about your work.

[TheLightSideOfTheMoon]

I am unwell and hunkering down with MN and TT for the day.

I’ve just started a new job (today is a day off), it’s all new, I’m not settling in as well as I’d like (I’ve gone from a tiny place to a HUGE one) and I’m kind of hyper-focussed on different work practices right now.

Funny stories will cheer me up.

I’ll start.

At my new work they use poly pockets/polywallets UPSIDE-DOWN!

They go in upside-down and they slide the paperwork upwards into it.

I find it so, so weird. Each time I look at them I’m like, WTAF?

Anyway, that’s mine. Please share yours. Entertain me with batshitness. I beg you.

Not a workplace, but reminds me of a teacher in my DD’s primary school who seemingly can’t bear the sound of people blowing their nose. Any child has a sniffle, they have to put their hand up and ask to leave the room in order to blow their nose…

Civil service. Our life is a never ending stream of meetings.
Monday morn - whole team meeting to discuss the week ahead and.....
Monday afternoon Reps from each team meet with management to discuss new things with the expectation that team reps will update their teams.
Weds Whole team meeting to discuss everything from the management meeting. Thursday whole team email with information from other teams in other places.
Back to Monday when Thursdays email is read out to make sure everyone is up to date.... plus of course the week ahead stuff.

When I started working in the Civil Service (1975) there were a couple of women there, prob retirement age or a bit older, who insisted on being addressed as Miss <Surname>. Then we got an HEO who decreed first names for everyone, her included; which was fine except for those women, because everyone was too scared of them to call them by anything but their preferred title.

Incidentally, that was the job where I learned that you can do nothing at all to someone but that still doesn't prevent them hating your guts simply because of what you are (young, in this case).

At my first job (on a Fleet Street newspaper) there was an actual, private pub as part of the office. There was a telephone on the bar top where your colleagues could contact you if you were needed back in your particular newsroom.

Not surprisingly, there were a lot of alcoholics.

A good friend of mine worked in Shell Mex house on the South Bank - which had a rifle range!

I left a major organisation a few years back.

Every Monday we had an entire office meeting that took until lunchtime and everyone had to say why they were excited about working at the organisation that week. So it was filled with sycophants (who invariably got promoted and were the CEO pets) who said things like; 'I'm passionate about our cause' in various incarnations.

We had a new starter in my team and the CEO said to her on her first morning (she'd been there like 12 minutes) ' JILL!!!!! Tell us all why you have come to join the [name of org] family and why you decided to work with us!!! '

Cue new starter like deer in headlights choking; 'umm.... ummm..... ' eventually she came out with; 'Because I applied for 26 jobs and you were the people who gave me one.... '

CEO NOT happy.

She was with us 8 years and was one of the best people I have ever worked with.

truthful, too.

(whoops. Shell Centre, not Shell Mex)

I had to rename and relabel all my work reports so that they had the format YMD_filename because that's how my boss did it.

Everyone in my work is named after a famous film series.

All emails begin “Hello, Wizards”

It’s like a cult and is bizarre. But it’s a tech firm with all meals provided for, unlimited leave, free snacks and free gifts.

Normal in the Civil Service because things can drop out or in a pile of papers other things can get attached. As a PP says we had to use pins, woven in so points were hidden inside.

I took a big step down as part of a career change and ended up working for a small charity with a CEO who had no common sense whatsoever.

Me: "X is a big risk here, beneficiaries could be seriously injured or die"
Her: "Thank you for sharing your feedback"
Me (a few weeks later): "X is still a risk here and now Y has happened. Beneficiaries could be seriously injured or die. Could you go and look? Its not my area of expertise"
Her: "I'm a bit busy at the moment working on spelling and grammar CPD so I can't go and look at it for myself"
Me (a few weeks later): "We have had a really serious near miss, I am thinking of doing a whistleblowing complaint"
Her: "Maybe we need to have our meetings in a different format to encourage collaboration"
Me: "So, here's my whistleblowing complaint"
Her: "A couple of minor things have been upheld but we aren't doing anything else because of lack of evidence"
Me: "Have you looked for evidence?"
Her: ..................................
More than 70% of the team leave in 18 months, loads of staff complaints, shit hits the fan
Her: "Why did no one tell me about X"

Not just about one issue but about several. It was absolutely insane! Like watching a car crash happen in slow motion. Since I left they've been through 3 staff in my old position, currently recruiting again now. No change in CEO though.

We also have a bar where everything is free in the office. It’s just normal to grab a drink. We also have dogs in the office. There’s a wall dedicated to the dogs as employees and they all have professional photos taken - kids aren’t allowed in - that tickles me as it makes my colleague who hates dogs but has 3 kids very mad.

My boss was on A/L. Her best friend, worked there 2 days a week doing admin arrived one day to ask what time the candidates were arriving? I had no idea what she was talking about!

My boss had organised for me and her friend to interview multiple candidates for a job- and apparently I'd be line managing this person! I hadn't been told any of this, nor been allowed to review the CV's, shortlist myself etc. I'd never even seen a JD, so wasn't sure what the job was going to entail.

When the person actually started, it became apparent that I wasn't allowed to manage her at all and she was only to work with my boss!

🤣🤣🤣

Oh God, I used to be a PA and had to do this for my boss. I'd spend a good hour every morning standing at the printer printing off their entire inbox. Then I had to sit in front of her while she read them aloud and told me what to do with them (usually bin), or file. She had whole filing cabinets full of filed printed out emails. WHY???! I used to have such rage.

Local civil service, Reading, 1980s. My first job. Ted was in charge of stationery. If you wanted a new pen you had to take the old one to him otherwise he wouldn’t give you one. A request for Tipp ex came with the response that Brad had had the same bottle for five years, and we should be less profligate.

Moved to the Foreign Office. Shared large office with two people who didn’t speak to each other, apart from to say “Did you have a nice weekend?” on Monday and “Have a nice weekend” on Friday. Changed to another, much more cheerful department, where we used to lock up the office at midday on a Friday, go to the pub and wouldn’t go back to the office.

Hope you feel better soon, OP. And great thread by the way!

@Iloverockntroll ... I want this to be true!!!! Have you put in a request for your favourite fruit for tomorrow?

I had a part time job as a teenager in a well known pub chain. You weren't allowed any bank holiday off for any reason e.g. having Christmas morning off to attend church service if you were very religious. You also had to carry three plates at all times when it was busy (one in one hand, one on your forearm and one in your other arm), only when all staff were working i.e. on the bank holidays when no one was allowed a day off, there weren't enough tea towels to put on your forearm. I still have scars up my arm from carrying scorching hot plates of Christmas Dinner and pudding without being allowed anything to cover my forearm.

This batshittery is melting icebergs. We have a rule, no ‘thank yous’.

Makes me think of an aged aunt who would be inclined to write a than you note for your thank you note. Where does it stop?!

@PuttingDownRoots Haha and I bet it's called HMS something too right? Seen this. Love that they pipe the CO into the building, does he get saluted as well. Hopefully not a 21 gun salute 🤣🤣

At mine we still have actual timed coffee breaks - we down tools at 10.45am and go into the kitchen and have a brew and a chat, like we work at the Trumpton biscuit factory. Have never had that before but I love it.

I once had a manager that tried to get the whole team to do ‘community volunteering’ by clearing weeds around a pond at her golf club! She also tried to get us to pay for lunch at the club house. Sadly for me I was awaiting surgery and not well enough to do such intense physical labour.

That’s not weird, it is discipline , so when they are on ship they are not wandering around working out what to do.

A colleague once printed off a lot of pages for a meeting. She printed them single sided. Her manager said that the meeting attendees would take a dim view of the single sided printing, as it’s more environmentally friendly to print on both sides. Instead of apologising to the attendees for the error, my manager instructed my colleague to bin the pages and print it all again double sided.