To ask what is the shortest you stayed in a job?

[Jax07]

And why you left?

Mine was 4 months and I left because the commuting. (2hrs each way) I thought I could do it but I couldn't... it also didn't help that my boss was hard work.

4 weeks before I got the sack! (Only time ever)
TBF the person I was replacing was supposed to spend the first 2 weeks training me but didnt. She couldnt wait to leave!

I was the only one in the office and hadnt a clue about half the stuff (agricultural machinery company with repairs section and other branches elsewhere) no experience of invoicing as nobody could write anything down for me apparently, working out how much random bits of steel rods/nuts and bolts would cost for a repair! Filing system was random!

Boss was having an affair and brought her to work to sit in his office/go out for dinner with and later his wife would come in and he was all lovey dovey! Sleeze ball of a man.

I had a very long walk from the bus stop to work and all the sales guys would sail past me on the way in their company cars without offering me a lift just a wave as they went past.

I was never so relieved in my life.

(If another job was easier to come by I would have walked out of my current one within a month! Toxic bat shit place and management.)

3 months another time in Admin.
There didn't seem to be an actual job for me, I stayed because I needed the money but knew I was leaving do go travelling.
My actual work was done in an hour, they asked me to archive their back paperwork.
Yep, I sat in the archiving room reading most of the day and shredded the paperwork.

Until my first coffee break, so a couple of hours? Training was quick, perfunctory and incomplete, and then I was left on my own on an entire floor without the first clue how to find anything or work the till. At coffee time I found the woman who'd "trained" me and told her I was going home and not coming back. She didn't seem surprised.

A year. For my first ever job and the one before my current. Left both times due to relocation with DH’s job.

I can see myself doing another year at least in my current role, then hopefully will be going on ML in the next 18 months.

About 3 hours in a cold calling telesales job when I was 17. Very suspect company.

Oh and let's not forget the six weeks in a famous Toffee factory. The smell still makes me gag. I spent an eight hour shift with a bucket of Brazil nuts popping them in the top of toffees passing on a conveyer belt. One day for a change I got to screw the lids on the jars.
Never eaten that brand again and quickly learned that going back to education wouldn't be a bad thing.

2 weeks job was not what I was told it was

Two nights in a nightclub serving drinks. Killed me. Loud music, couldn’t hear the customers, had no training on what went in any of the drinks, had to wear a shiny top and plastic cowgirl hat that made my head sweat. Then had to wait around for an hour until 3:30am for the taxi.

Two days. It was a summer job at a potato factory, it was awful! I really never realised just how gross potatos could be!

An hour. The job centre sent me for what they claimed was a graduate finance job. On the first day I was given a huge pile of receipts and told to enter the receipt number, print a copy, then staple the copy to the original. After an hour my fingers were hurting so I asked if I could do something else for a while. The manager told me that receipt copying was the full extent of my job. All day, every day, for ever

I said I thought I was hired for a finance job and he said it is a finance job because they’re financial receipts. I said yes but I was told it was a graduate finance job, and he said it is a graduate job because you’re a graduate and that’s your job.

I went “to the loo” and just walked out

2 hours 30 minutes.
It was care work.
I shadowed a lady who loved her job. She was so kind to her 'charges'.
After about 20 minutes I realised that the level of hands on care we
were expected to provide was way beyond anything I could cope with. Plus, I have got a dodgy back and there's no way I could physically do it.
I must have been nuts. In my defence, I was desperate to find work.
Thankfully I secured an admin role shortly afterwards.

One day as a waitress/general help in a cafe. Took it on as a second job with a view to make some extra money quickly.

Watched like a hawk the entire day, criticised for not being fast enough or as good as the lady who'd been there over ten years yet no direction given, personal comments from a rude customer, managers sniggering in their own language so I couldn't understand what they were saying.

Needless to say I didn't go back.

4 days. I was recruited to manage two guys who were both perfectly capable of doing the job. The md didn’t want to lose the one he didn’t promote so he hired me instead.
Completely unnecessary hire, and they both hated me for taking “their job”. It wasn’t worth the grief.

Stoat why did you turn down the cinema usher job?! I always quite fancied doing that.

I lasted a day at a music shop - now defunct - after they wouldn't give me the day off for my university graduation, even though they'd previously agreed

There's 2.

1. Age 17. One Hour. Bean sprout packing factory. I tried to be friendly, smiled at folk. Said hello. Was ignored. After an hour someone slid up next to me and said ''It's like the streets in here. Better watch your step. We don't take to strangers ...........''.

WTF? In a bloody bean sprout factory?? I took off my net hat, placed it down and walked out.

2. 5 years ago. One night shift. Tesco shelf filling. I got a night job filling shelves at the Tesco where i do my usual shop. Bit of extra money i thought. I'll cope with the hours i thought. DH didn't want me to do it. But i thought - give it a go. The tesco is a big one, 2 floors. Staff on the night shift are not allowed to talk to each other. I was assigned tidying the shelves of the whole upper floor on my own. On my first shift! It was surreal. The lights were on very low up there and the escalator was turned off and so was the music. No customers came up all night and i clapped eyes on no one else from about 9pm or something till 1am, when i went for break time (2 other people on break reading) and then back up there 2am till 7am. At 3am i was actually sobbing quietly while tidying the bathroom accessory aisle. I couldn't hack it AT ALL. Thinking about my family fast asleep at home and why the hell was i up here in Tesco all alone in the gloom at half past bloody 3in the morning! I handed my notice in at the end of the shift. I think of it now, when i'm up there doing the weekly shop during a normal day with DCs ect in tow. It feels like a bad dream. I also feel for those who hate it but have to stick it out. I admit i'm a woose.

2 hours in a department store. It was a part time job when I was a student. I was supposed to be working in a fashion dept but they put me in the canteen and said i might be able to move in a few months. It was so boring, basically just clearing tables. I walked out after my break, told no one and was highly surprised when they paid me for my 2 hours the following week!

Just realised I had an even shorter job. Ten minutes! I was a library assistant at school, used to help put books back on the shelf at lunchtime because it was better than going out in the yard to have the shit kicked out of me Aged 18 a temp agency sent me to a company who wanted to create a new company library. They wanted me to select, catalogue and classify an entire library of books, setup a checkout system and be able to tell them what databases and equipment they needed to buy and where to buy it, and get it all up and running. And they genuinely thought they could hire an 18yo on min wage to do this, because I had “Lunchtime School Library Helper” on my CV.

I said “Erm, you need a qualified librarian mate” and legged it!

Laiste PMSL - I used to do picking and packing and it was exactly the same

I managed ten months at Greggs when I was a student. I really needed the money at the time and it was when the recession was in full swing so I daren’t lose it until I had a new one in place. It was the worst job I’ve ever had in my life. Some customers went beyond rude and I felt so degraded.

So it’s worth noting that Greggs staff look miserable for a reason! It’s a shit place to work.

I lasted just two weeks on the menswear department at a well known department store. Hated all of it but the worst thing was having to push the store cards on people whilst managers were breathing down your neck. Just awful.

3 hours Took an early lunch and didn't go back!

A few weeks. It was as a waitress and housekeeper. The owner thought he could shout as us younger ones and also stole everyones tips. He was really pervy too.

Three months, but it was a zero hour stopgap between finishing my MA and starting a full time salaried job. Mind you that full time salaried job turned out to be utterly dreadful, with the worst management I have ever experiences anywhere, and I wanted to leave immediately. If I hadn't had dc to support or if DH had been in better work I would have done so. I never thought any job would be worse than 8 hour shifts picking black bits out of sweetcorn in a frozen food factory, but that one was.

I worked in a large US corporate for 2 weeks before quitting. I was supposed to be working in their recruitment department but what I was actually assigned for those 2 weeks was sitting by myself in a room and to go through online training (mind-numbingly boring and basic - 'if there's a car coming, do you cross the road' kind of standard). I would go to the canteen by myself, eat lunch by myself and not get to say a word to anyone for those two weeks.

When I gave notice to quit, they were horrified (I'd got another job via a friend and didn't need to interview, very lucky) and tried to keep me to my post-probationary notice period. I gave them 3 days notice, they didn't argue in the end, and I left.

The role was totally different from what was expected. I'd been told that my ideas for recruiting staff were great (lots of internet-based ideas), that I'd get to do all sorts of things. I turned up on day one and the 'lovely, engaging' boss turned out to be a political nightmare unless you were a higher up and was told that they simply don't use the internet for their recruitment (which was a big part of what I'd sold - this was back in 2006).

I was also told on day one that I'd have to park in a staff car park a 20-minute walk away from the onsite car park, as that was for people who had longer tenure. It really was a shit two weeks.