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Share your dilemmas and get honest opinions from other Mumsnetters.

What has your boss said or done that has made you want to quit your job

189 replies

Lorddenning1 · 04/01/2022 23:20

Just been reading an article about this and it inspired me to start a a thread. What has your boss said or done that has made you want to quit on the spot.

Mine was to a colleague of mine, his apartment complex was on fire and it was spreading along to his row, he was evacuated and came into work to grab some things, we all knew what had happened and was all sad for him as he had children, my manager asked him to sort out her computer as he was our IT guy, he basically told her not right now he had bigger things to worry about and she stormed back into our office threw a stop, saying can you believe him, he is too busy to help and I bet he says it's because his flat is on fire. We all sat there like Confused
Safe to say we didn't expect any compassion from her in regards to our personal life.

OP posts:
FreedomFaith · 06/01/2022 16:12

Told me regularly that I needed to work hard and finish work quicker, when I was already being given a third of the time required to do the job by him. I left, the contract was lost not long after. Can't think why...

Sundancerintherain · 06/01/2022 16:46

@muchmorethan he followed me out of the room and apologized.
She was encouraged to take medical retirement.

HR had been keeping tabs on her , I was by no means the first person she bullied, but thank god I was the last.

feemcgee · 06/01/2022 17:37

I had just started working at a mental health charity on a very stressful and emotional project. My manager called me into what I thought was our regular catch-up. A director was also there and my manager asked how I was finding the job, to which I replied that it was hard going but good. She then tore me to shreds in front of the director, criticising every aspect of my work. This was the first I had heard of it and burst into tears. The director was shocked that I hadn't been told what the meeting was about. I had 20 years of experience at that point and just wanted to leave my career entirely after that. I think about it often and have rehearsed what I would have said and done differently to her.

passionfruitpizza · 06/01/2022 17:40

Being told it would be easier for him if I quit so they could hire a full time staff member (I'm PT).

mbosnz · 06/01/2022 18:12

I was working for a not for profit organisational group, that had three, count 'em, three managers. I was the only other full time employee, the others were sales reps on commission. I did everything from the toilets to the taxes. They were never in the office. I had a guy from the Tax Department come to show me how to do something new - he looked over their books and told me that if he were me, he'd be handing in his notice before they landed me in the suds for their shit.

Never a truer word spoken. I knew far too many of their secrets, including one of them's gambling addiction. The next day they called me into a meeting, to go over my fictitious transgressions. I handed in my notice that day, got a new job the day after that, worked out my two weeks notice.

I didn't leave them notes on how to do things. I'd offered, but been told very condescendingly that they were sure they could manage.

First day in my new job, first hour, one of the idiots rang up, asking me how to calculate and process the wages. I told him never to call back, and hung up on him.

HollaHolla · 06/01/2022 18:44

I had an item of furniture thrown at me by a senior manager, as I refused to sign off on a c£100k p.a. spend, when their unit was hemorrhaging money.
It was the last thing in a litany of bullying and harassment, including some on a really personal level.
I went off sick later that week, and ended up never going back. I got quite a lot of money not to take them to an employment tribunal. In hindsight, if I'd felt more resilient, I'd have taken them all of the way, as I had quite a lot of evidence of asking my (useless) boss for help.
Also, since I left, there have been 5 people in the job, in 9 years. No-one can stick working with such an epically dysfunctional group of people.

mumofEandE · 06/01/2022 19:22

When I was pregnant with DS I was told by my (female) manager that I was 'stupid' for asking for 'so much time off'
I had wanted to go for the 20 week scan

I ended up rushing after work to get there before it closed - where the staff there said I was stupid for putting up with my managerConfused

This was 23 years ago!

Idolovetrees · 06/01/2022 19:25

Expect me to get printer ink for her when she was standing closer to the box than I was, oh and wash up her breakfast dishes.

Tigerstripe20 · 06/01/2022 19:35

Ex boss ( thank goodness) too many things to mention.
One that stands out ,when asked if they had seen an email from about four weeks prior " I answer my emails in order of importance and you are not important"
Never met anyone before or since ,with such a bloated sense of importance and typical narcissistic personality disorder.

Chimley · 06/01/2022 21:52

Some of these managers are monsters!

I had a phone call at work from a neighbour of my MIL who said he'd seen MIL leave in an ambulance. Wasn't sure why but thought I should know. Fortunately my work was round the corner from the hospital. When I told my manager she just said 'Go! Don't worry about anything. We'll cover it' So not even my DM and no idea what was wrong but sure it was better for me to be with her than at work (needed appendectomy so semi serious).

Worst boss was lazy shop manager who sat stuffing her face all day whilst we did everything. I was cleaning up one day but we just weren't going to get it done in time before my bus. I asked her for help and she scoffed at my work ethic. I (rudely) questioned hers and she finally got off her arse to have a go at me. I decided I (literally) didn't have time for her shit and quit on the spot.

Couchbettato · 06/01/2022 21:56

Had to have my dog PTS today and I had asked my manager for an hour or so offline and they simply said no it's too busy and if I took the day off I would get sanctioned.

I definitely want to quit now. What uncompassionate twats.

HobgoblinGold · 06/01/2022 22:00

Left medicine in 2016. Some of the absolute bobby dazzlers included...

‘You need to choose between medicine or your family’

‘You need to toughen up’

‘Youre too emotional’

Many more including some absolutely fuck-wittery ‘advice’/comments said to my colleagues.

Strangely all said by men.

G5000 · 06/01/2022 22:04

Not me but a colleague (same manager) had an accident on his way to work, broken bones and all. He called from the ambulance. Boss said that but surely he can still work - if he can't move his arms, because they are youknow, broken, boss will send someone to the hospital to type. So colleague can still work before and after his surgery to fix his broken bones.
Colleague was not working on the final draft of the world peace deal or anything similar, just to be clear.

NeverDropYourMooncup · 06/01/2022 22:16

Redeployed me in a very physical and technical job despite my declaring disability and passing Occupational Health for a desk job originally - but didn't tell me I'd been redeployed until the day - if I had known in advance, I would have told them I couldn't do it a) without adjustments and b) without training and c) I couldn't claim unemployment unless they made me redundant.

When I struggled physically with the demands of the job and mentally with not actually knowing what the fuck I was doing, shouted at me in public about how incompetent I was.

Introduced a blanket ban upon any medical appointments, so I was unable to continue treatment for my condition. When it inevitably flared and I had no choice but to take time off, they referred me for an Occupational Health assessment - not to support me, though, the referral paperwork said -

'Claims to have developed arthritis in response to capability procedures. As too young, please establish falsehood or mental illness.'

They got a rocket back from Occy Health. Had I been able to get a copy of the original referral form, rather than have an extremely irate OH assessor read it out, they would also have got a disability discrimination claim.

If I could have afforded it, I would have walked out a thousand times. But I couldn't.

In the end, I didn't give a fuck anymore. I came in seconds before my start time, I left the instant the clock ticked over to my finish time. I wore clothes entirely appropriate for the role rather than for the non physical roles (which meant instead of a suit and heels, I wore black cargoes, black t-shirt, steel toecaps and a sullen expression). If I didn't have time to finish something, I left it. If I didn't fancy doing something in the giant list of things to do, I didn't bother and stuck to the most important thing. If the lift was locked and the key 'missing', well, nothing's going upstairs then, is it?

Eventually I made through to the second redundancy round and got the extra money. Strangely, they seemed to think that I would bite their hand off for 15 hours a week from 1-4pm instead of a fulltime or 2 days per week position where I could have got a second job to fill the other days/half days. Um, nah. I'll take the redundancy, thanks. Especially because I know you're closing down in seven months don't leave confidential shit on the photocopier, expect me to clean it up and not read what I'm throwing away and the new redundancy payment would be based upon wages for 15 hours, not my current fulltime.

On my last day, as soon as my finish time ticked over, I dumped my work stuff on the office floor, handed my keys and security pass to the caretaker rather than seek out anybody 'important' and walked out the front gate carrying two open bottles of beer and smoking a cigarette.

PlanktonsComputerWife · 06/01/2022 22:24

@Couchbettato

Had to have my dog PTS today and I had asked my manager for an hour or so offline and they simply said no it's too busy and if I took the day off I would get sanctioned.

I definitely want to quit now. What uncompassionate twats.

My God, that's horrific. I'm so very sorry about your dog.
Lorddenning1 · 06/01/2022 22:33

@G5000

Not me but a colleague (same manager) had an accident on his way to work, broken bones and all. He called from the ambulance. Boss said that but surely he can still work - if he can't move his arms, because they are youknow, broken, boss will send someone to the hospital to type. So colleague can still work before and after his surgery to fix his broken bones. Colleague was not working on the final draft of the world peace deal or anything similar, just to be clear.
Shock
OP posts:
Lucia23 · 06/01/2022 22:33

During the pandemic everyone worked extremely hard while working from home. After about 7 months the bosses held a consultation with us to offer more flexible working - which they rescinded months later, forcing everyone back to the office full time, 5 days per week when guidance was still wfh

A week in there was an outbreak and more than half the office got covid. My friend and colleague still suffers with long covid from it. Calls for occasional work from home have been ignored and last month there was another outbreak because an unvaccinated person has caught it twice and spread it twice.

Over half of the company has left over their no flexible working policy since May 2021 including myself last month.

My boss said we shouldn't be scared of covid because, well, you could just as easily be hit by a bus couldnt you? He was an awful person, taking delight in telling us once how he ripped the final pages out of his wife's book on holiday because he needed to make a fire...

I left to work hybrid at a company that values and treats people with respect.

Astrak · 06/01/2022 22:41

My partner was killed in an industrial accident. When I was informed, I was on my way to work. I stopped to inform my boss. She said " you needn't bother coming in. We're going to get rid of you soon, anyway."
Some months later, I met a colleague who had been in the office when this incident had occurred. She told me that my colleagues were horrified, and that the woman concerned had been sacked soon after and subsequently had left the profession.

Lurkeycakewoman · 06/01/2022 22:43

After 16 months off having chemo and radiation after being diagnosed with breast cancer in march 2020 one of my managers made a comment along the lines I'd missed all of covid Confused I'm pretty sure I'd have preferred to work on a covid ward 7 days a week than go through what I did Hmm

gwenneh · 06/01/2022 22:50

Relatively minor, but enough to make me update my CV.

My manager called someone who held my role previously (about a decade ago) for input on a project I have been putting together. Previous employee does not currently work in my field or have the background I do, and no experience in doing this kind of project at all apart from hiring a vendor to do it when they held the post.

It tells me neither my voice nor my experience is valued and it may be time to move along.

YorkshirePuddingsGreatestFan · 06/01/2022 22:56

I used to work in an office from 9am-1pm daily. I wasn't tied to those hours and I had the flexibility to move them if I needed to.

When my son was two years old, he was really poorly. One evening he stopped breathing. I managed to resuscitate him and rang for an ambulance. It was touch and go if he would make it through the night, so I stayed at the hospital with him. I dozed a bit in a chair at times but didn't really sleep.

I rang work in the morning and explained what had happened and that I'd been at the hospital all night. My boss showed no sympathy whatsoever and said it was fine to do my four shift whenever I wanted that day, as long as I did my four hours.

So I quit and looked after my son.

GrandTheftWalrus · 06/01/2022 23:49

These bosses are awful!

I had the opposite in 2020 when I was going through a miscarriage, I thought it had happened not long after I got the tablets but it took another week or so during which I was still going to work. So one night I started getting very painful contractions so had to tell my manager.

She was completely horrified I had even came in to work never mind apologising for having to take the following night off.

GrandTheftWalrus · 06/01/2022 23:53

However I have had another boss that when I called to cancel my shift 8hrs before I started (and I lived 2.5hrs away so they could get local staff no bother) because my daughter was ill he was raging with me, shouting at me on the phone etc. Saying I had committed to those hours so I should be doing them etc.

I told him my daughter comes first, so he replied "oh is that right?" And hung up on me!

I was going to quit but then covid hit and I went on furlough. Then they sacked me for being pregnant 1 year ago, however they worded it carefully. They also sacked dh for being cev.

Crankley · 07/01/2022 00:36

Years ago, American boss in London, he used to shout and swear at anything and anyone when he was in a mood. I was recruiting new staff, had done something which didn't please him (not difficult) he came into my office in the middle of an interview, shouting and screaming, opened one of my filing cabinets and proceeded to throw the files all over the floor.

I picked up my bag and coat and walked out, never went back.

Whitefire · 07/01/2022 01:04

One did make me quit, but then during my notice period I came to my senses, contacted my union rep and reported her for bullying. In a bit of negotiation, I was offered an alternative job for it to go no further. However this actually worked out to be a good thing, as it opened up a different door for me and led me to a much happier job role. This was all in the weeks before my wedding though. 18 years on and her name still brings me out in a flutter, professionally I can avoid her, if I ever need to avail her of her job role for my children, then DH will be solely responsible for any contact.

My current manager is wonderful, I'm off sick at the moment and I know I am truly supported by her.