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AIBU?

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Original poster

To ask for your stories of fucking up on your first day at a new job?

79 replies

SussexMedley · 20/10/2017 19:20

Started a new job today (it's funny hours that include weekends). Fucked up. I'm smarter than my anxiety disorder has me appear sometimes, but anyway I fucked up on my very first day of a job I really really want.

Please tell me your tales of fucking up on your first day. Happy endings or shit endings, I don't mind. They'll make me feel better either way.

Thank you.

OP posts:
YogiYoni · 20/10/2017 19:23

What did you do wrong? I bet it’s nowhere near as bad as you fear.

travailtotravel · 20/10/2017 19:24

I was late. Due to traffic. But late is not great.

YogiYoni · 20/10/2017 19:28

Late is not great, but you can fix that for next time. It doesn’t mean you fucked up the job. How did the job itself go?

MarciaBlaine · 20/10/2017 19:30

Not fucked up exactly, but in my much younger years I was collected from reception by someone who told me that “George” who was handing over to me, well his wife had died the day before. I was nervous anyway and didn’t have a clue what to do/say, whether to wait for him to mention it or what. 😟 I’d never met him before, was quite shocked he was even in the office, and of course everyone around was sad and subdued.i just mumbled something about being very sorry and still cringe that I didn’t handle it better years on.

numbmum83 · 20/10/2017 19:31

I started a new job this week and it's not going well . It's in retail and I can't get my head around all the system . It's so confusing and I hate it already . I can see others getting frustrated due to their targets .
I don't cope well under pressure so god help Xmas when it gets so busy.

wheresmyliveship · 20/10/2017 19:33

Fell down a flight of stairs and had to be rescued as I was holding myself up with an overhang of ceiling.

justshruggingreally · 20/10/2017 19:33

I'm a paramedic, on my first shift qualified (also my first shift driving) I reversed into a parked car at a nursing home and smashed the brake light.

I wanted the ground to swallow me up, it was so awful! Then had to go in and find our patient and also confess to the staff with them. Then deal with the patient then on my meal break fill out a long form detailing my fuck up. Aaaargh.

Anyway that was 6 years ago and I could reverse up a bike lane now if I needed to- chin up and keep going OP!

DailyMailBestForBums · 20/10/2017 19:33

Before I begin, fuck off Daily Mail.

I started work in a stadium. On the first day, boss gave me his keys to lock up the area I had been working in. The bunch of keys was about the size of my head and opened every lock in the place. Guess who knocked them in a drain... Halloween Blush

ScissorBow · 20/10/2017 19:34

I was very very late having got lost on my first day. Then I parked in the wrong spot in the car park and got a shitty note on the window which I was told to read out to the office.

6 long months later I left. Karma really.

I hope your story is much much happier Flowers

Booagain · 20/10/2017 19:34

I had given my friends my new email in advance. On my first day, during training with my predecessor and also boss on my computer, my friend emailed and up it popped on the screen for us all to see. ‘Cockflaps’. That was it.
Mortifying!!

confusedlittleone · 20/10/2017 19:36

My bra broke and I was wearing a rather sheer white top- my boss got an eyeful

MarciaBlaine · 20/10/2017 19:36
Grin
Twodogsandahooch · 20/10/2017 19:37

Cockflaps😂

Invisimamma · 20/10/2017 19:38

On my first day back from maternity leave we had an external training event, I wrote my sons name on my name label instead of my own Blush

oldlaundbooth · 20/10/2017 19:38

Not fucked up exactly but I did wear a heavy black suit on my first day as I wanted to look professional.

It was around 35 degrees in the shade.

Everyone else was in cream shift dresses and stuff.

thenightsky · 20/10/2017 19:39

My third day as a medical secretary and I projectile vomited over not one Consultant Psychiatrist, but two. All in one heave.

oldlaundbooth · 20/10/2017 19:39

Also kept mentioning Christmas to the Jewish boss. Didn't last long there 🤔

mumonashoestring · 20/10/2017 19:40

I had a lovely temp start with me today. We were chatting about appearances vs personality and she told me about her first day in a clinical research department which had a dementia research project running. She arrived, walked in, and a nice little old man pointed her at an unoccupied (but obviously used regularly by someone) desk and said 'You can sit here dear'. She thought he was one of the study subjects so she said "THANK YOU BUT I THINK I'LL JUST WAIT FOR (person she had been told would come and fetch her)" in a nice, clear, friendly voice. He looked a bit put out. Later, he came and dropped off some work for her to do. Turned out he was one of the most eminent and senior researchers his field has ever seen Grin

c3pu · 20/10/2017 19:44

I moved into a new IT based role, and had to go fix a computer...

I knew what was wrong with it, I was more than experienced and competent enough to change the settings needed to fix the issue, but for some reason it just wasn't having any of it.

I had to go cap in hand to one of my new colleagues and ask for help fixing the very simple problem... She promptly sorted it by TURNING THE FUCKING THING OFF AND ON AGAIN

My new colleague was totally unfazed, but I was secretly mortified that I had forgotten the oldest trick in the book, and that my new job was basically an episode of the IT crowd.

donajimena · 20/10/2017 19:46

Does it have to be a first day? As a tour rep I neglected to book on a couple on an excursion to Valencia. I saw the friendly couple standing outside my hotel with a packed lunch in hand and I did the 'ooh off anywhere nice?' When she said 'Valencia' my innards dropped realising what I had done. I calmly replied 'how lovely' and walked around the corner and started to flag down coaches. Luckily one stopped and they had room for two so I had to walk briskly back to the hotel and inform them that I had given them the incorrect pick up point. They were none the wiser and thanked me for a lovely time.
If anyone is wondering how I just happened to flag down a coach I worked for Thomsons in the 90's and in Benidorm there were always loads of excursions from lots of hotels.

EnglishRose13 · 20/10/2017 19:49

Second day. Water infection. Had to leave.

FindoGask · 20/10/2017 19:49

I had to phone in sick on my first day. With a cold.

FindoGask · 20/10/2017 19:51

(OP - I would think mistakes when you are new in post are to be expected! it's how you learn from them that's the important thing).

annandale · 20/10/2017 19:54

You can't do worse than a lad I recruited for a fantastic postgraduate entry level job with decent pay, training and prospects, who rang in sick. On the first day. And not intensive care/broken hip kind of sick, just feeling a bit crap sick. IIRC he turned up once that week. We had a crisis meeting and he said he couldn't afford to travel to work so I lent him the money for a week's ticket, he turned up one day the following week and the third day he came in we sacked him. Obviously I never saw a penny of the money back, presumably he smoked it. Tosser.

If you turned up and paid for your own travel, you're way ahead.

CatalpaTree · 20/10/2017 20:03

I got bird flu. Made it in for 4 hours then collapsed. Off for three weeks with complications.

My boss got it and was off for two weeks and his boss got it and was off for nearly a month. So I obliterated the department on my first day.

The office had to be cleared of people and paper and professionally cleaned and fumigated.

The teasing when I actually turned up was awful. Everyone knew my name even though I’d never met them. So I’d introduce myself and they’d say OMG you’re Catalpa!!