Craziest things a boss has done

[GerbilsForever24]

Inspired by the "craziest reasons to sulk" thread, I thought it might be entertaining (and cathartic?) to do similar with bosses? The weird/crazy/irrational things a boss has done?

I'll start with a male boss with a team of 7 women. He would regularly send his PA or the most junior member of the team into the bathroom to "find" anyone who was in the toilet when he wanted to speak to them.

[no, as a rule, no one was spending hours in the toilet - we were hard working, conscientious, busy people. Also, it was a very busy office so it wasn't unusual to hold the need for a bathroom break to unacceptable levels.] He did this on more than one occasion to almost everyone in the office except me (most likely because he knew I'd have taken it straight to HR).

My manager, who was the CEO, tried to get me to handle a situation with a fellow manager, who was my peer and her direct report - she didn’t want to do it as they were friends. I wouldn’t, so she had to, managed it badly, then told me it was my fault she was on medication for anxiety.

I had the most bonkers boss a few years ago. This is very outing to anyone that knows me but here goes...

I knew within a week of starting that it wasn't the average work place as he used to tell us all to down tools and head to the pub about 11am every day. At most maybe two hours of the day were productive. It wasn't unusual to find him asleep at his desk all afternoon.

On one occasion we were at an industry event and went for drinks at the end of the first day. As we had early starts we headed back to the hotel, or so we thought. Turns out the boss got changed, went back out and met the same people we'd been chatting to but pretended to be his twin brother 😂

When the madness became too much I handed my notice in and he was furious. On my last day, to steal my thunder, he faked a collapse and had us call an ambulance which duly turned up to find nothing wrong. We called his wife while we waited for the ambulance but she wasn't bothered really! I thought I was being too cynical when I thought he was faking but after he'd left it was clear everyone in the team had the same view - he was lying just a little too neatly, and his 'coming around' was just too much.

We're actually on really good terms now and I see him from time to time at events, and have met him for lunch etc., but he's still something else. Last time I saw him he stood up and sang me a song in Costa!

I've had some psychotic bosses but there is a special place in hell for the Class Teacher Mentor I had on my last teaching placement who made my life a misery for weeks. At the end of my first week on placement, I bought a box of chocolate biscuits for the staff room with a note to everyone to say thank you for making me feel welcome during my first week (through gritted teeth, everyone had been lovely bar her who'd done nothing but be awful from day 1.) Anyway, she hauled me to one side and told me it was unprofessional to have bought biscuits. I've had so many horrible bosses in my time but for some reason that incident still sticks in my head, even though totally minor in the scheme of things.

I really need to know the songs he made up before I decide if this is weird or actually so funny😂

My boss used to send his PA (my friend) out shopping to buy birthday cards and presents for his wife, because he couldn't be bothered said she would know what his wife would like better than he did.

So sorry for your double loss.
We were talking about a previous manager who l liked once, when my then boss said well he wouldn't have given you a week off work just because your dad died. Just because!! You could have heard a pin drop. Nasty cunt.

Boss invited us all to his son’s birthday party. Then allocated us all jobs, food prep, photographer etc. Needless to say he described the office as “like family”.

There was one who would fake fire people. She would call them in her office, tell them they were fired, hand them a box to put their things and walk them to the door before she would shout "Just kidding!"

She said she just enjoyed firing people.

As a schoolgirl I had a weekend job in a busy newsagents next door to a supermarket. One day a customer left a carrier bag with a big shoulder of lamb in it on the floor next to the till. It must have cost her a lot.

The manager stole it! He decided to keep it and told me not to say anything. The woman came back looking for her lamb and he lied to her and said we hadn't found it. She didn't believe him and argued but he wouldn't admit it. I left that job soon after.

She had a reputation for being a spiteful bastard and proved herself conclusively for me when she refused to let DH (we worked at the same place) come with me to hospital when I miscarried at work. She insisted a supervisor came with me despite the supervisor being fully capable of covering DH's job instead so he could be with me, it was pure spite.

The place before that was where DH and I met, there was no rule against employees having relationships or anything but we chose not to make it public knowledge when we got together. We had two managers who both took an unhealthy interest in my personal life at the best of times but seemed to develop some kind of obsession when they began to suspect DH and I were seeing each other.

It culminated in one of them ringing my house (I still lived with my parents) one weekend and asking for 'DH's name', presumably in the hope whoever answered would confirm he was there with me. They weren't smart enough to withhold their number so I knew exactly what they were up to though. Then the following week I'd just come out of the office and was walking downstairs to the toilet and I heard a text message come in on my phone (this was back in the old Nokia times and those things were loud!) which I'd left in my coat pocket. I headed straight back up to grab it as I knew it was probably DH and by this time knew I couldn't trust my managers not to snoop. Sure enough manager 1 was just scurrying away from my desk and when I got my phone from my pocket it was unlocked (no passcodes on those phones, you just had to hit 2 buttons in sequence and it was the same on any phone) and they'd started to go into the message.

It was utterly batshit as if they'd just asked me directly I would have told them we were together! We started job hunting at that point and had both left within a few weeks, I couldn't get out of there fast enough tbh.

Stamped his foot in the middle of the shop because I wouldn't leave the selfscan checkout unattended to move a cage off the shop floor.

Arranged a disciplinary because I lost two grandparents in a month and took bereavement leave- the manager who took the disciplinary was wtf, I'm not doing this.

Told me to go up a ladder so that they could look up my skirt. I declined and asked him what he thought my dh would say when he heard.

Told me to practise filling a mop bucket- I was over 40 and had managed to run my own home, including cleaning, for more than 20 years.

All different managers.

I was hired as a booker at a model agency in London, on the basis of my star sign. Was then put in charge of office feng shui. (Yeah, got fired in the end).

Locked us in the building( because she didn’t do her walk round check of the giant building before locking up) then tried to complain to us that she had to come back to let us out. It was her bloody fault!

Do you work in a sales operations/sales finance role by any chance? Sounds so close to the crap I used to endure

I’m a carer out in the comunity first day (previously worked in a care home) was ment to be shadowing a manager got to the first call waited outside for a hour before she phoned to say she forgot do just do it on my own. Was a hour late for everyone so great first impressions. She then later tried to make an example of me being late for everyone that day. She didn’t like me much because I had certificates she didn’t (care homes have LOTS more training)

Tiny media-related company. I knew the company was in difficulties, but no-one said anything to me (admin role), until on the last Friday of the month, at 5pm, the boss called me in to his office and said he was sorry but they couldn't afford to keep me on, and not to come back in on Monday. I was pretty upset and went to my desk and started packing my stuff up and getting my coat. The boss said, 'aren't you going to stay until 6 o'clock?' - which was the normal end of the day. I just looked at him and said, no I don't think I will.

Worked for a company that was taken over by an American company. They had the sales team jog around the car park in a morning “to get their adrenaline pumping for the day ahead”. Then if they hadn’t made a sale by the end of the day (it was all sales men as no woman put up their bullshit) they would cut whoever’s tie off and pin it the notice board.

Another boss didn’t allow us to buy tippex because we weren’t allowed to make mistakes.

Another manager didn’t allow any one to listen to a radio because he didn’t like radio waves coming in to the building 🤣

There was one who would fake fire people. She would call them in her office, tell them they were fired, hand them a box to put their things and walk them to the door before she would shout "Just kidding!"

^

This is so Ricky Gervais

Who cares about the serious meeting if one of you committed a serious crime?! 🤣🤣🤣🤦‍♀️

In my time at HMRC I've had some awful managers.

One made a cup of black coffee in a morning, which he drank all day, never went to the kitchen to make another, he filled it up with whisky from a flask. Eventually he went off long-term sick & the other managers in the department cleared his desk which was full of empty whisky bottles & hardcore pounds. He was a complete bastard to work for, he always picked someone whose life he would make a misery, he picked on me for ages until my dad seeing me come home in tears rang the management inspector to tell him unless either him or me was moved there would be big trouble. I was moved the next morning, it was my first job & I was only 18, my boyfriend waited one night for him to come out of work & gave him a few choice words that included he knew where he lived & if he upset me again there would be trouble, if I saw him in the office after that, he shot in the men's toilet to hide.

Another manager I had was the office bike, she had shagged most of the single & some of the married men in the office, we always knew when she was at it with someone new, they would disappear on long lunches together or if they had spent the night together one of them would walk round the block to make it look like they had arrived separately but we had all been looking out the office window & had seen them separate before coming in to work. She got caught shagging one bloke in one of the pool cars in the basement car park.

Ex boss received a spam email about weight loss pills. He forwarded it to his PA and asked her to print off X number of copies, and then he proceeded to address each copy to overweight staff members and hand them out to them - with their names on.

The loo seat one. That’s appalling!

I had a boss who each day would bring in a bag, clanking with bottles. Throughout the day he would proceed to get drunk in his office, culminating in him spending the afternoon playing his guitar and singing.

I was a temp and on my last day I went into his office to say goodbye. He was laying flat on the floor, unconscious / asleep. In a panic I called in one of the senior guys who nudged him with his foot and said 'Nah, he's ok.'

So many of these are 😲 😯

I hope you reported this to the Information Commissioner's Office

*UK GDPR guidance and resources | ICO

ico.org.uk/for-organisations/uk-gdpr-guidance-and-resources/*
🌹