Whatever you say, boss…

Sometimes, that’s all you can say when you’re not on the same page as the person calling the shots at your job.

And this is one of those stories!

This tale from Reddit begins with an office worker who eventually got pretty fed up with what was going on at work.

Boss agrees with secretary that I am not the office manager so I stop managing the office.

“When I was doing my articles at a small law firm (internship to be admitted as an attorney) I was the go-to person for everything at the office (setting up computers, buying stationery, paying bills, going to court, seeing clients,etc).

After being admitted as an attorney I continued doing all this because the secretary only did about 20% of what a secretary would usually do and refused to do anything else. My boss does some shady business (don’t pay taxes, etc) so he couldn’t just fire her for fear of her ratting him out. He also never disciplined her. We are not in the US.

It sounds like this was a toxic work environment and the secretary wasn’t doing a whole lot of actual work…and it was taking its toll on this person.

Since we worked from my boss’s mother’s house, the secretary also spent about 50% of her day just chatting to his mother and they became fast friends. Guess who was always the evil one that everyone ganged up on? Yours truly. I was made out to be incompetent at my job and I used to cry a lot and almost became an alcoholic from work stress.

One day the secretary got really upset with me (after I asked her to buy stationery since we didn’t even have staples) and after a heated argument told me that I’m not the office manager and should stop lording it about as if I was (bear in mind I was her senior both as an attorney and in number of years worked at the firm). My boss did nothing and rather got upset with me and so did his mother.

So they decided to only do what their job description entailed and absolutely nothing else.

I decided there and then I am done doing both secretary work and my attorney work because I was working roughly 50-60 hours per week (standard is 40) trying to get everything done without receiving overpay (the unemployment rate in my country is around 30% and in the legal field supply of lawyers exceeds demand). She knew this and my boss knew this but no one cared that I was basically working myself into an early grave.

And then it was time for some malicious compliance!

Cue malicious compliance.

If everyone agrees that I am not the office manager than I will stop managing the flow of the office and only do my attorney work. I stopped paying the bills, buying the stationery, reminding my boss of important meetings, etc.

Within two weeks the electricity was cut off for 10 days because it wasn’t paid and my boss’ elderly mother and the rest of his family had no electricity. We could also not work for those 10 days. Once the electricity went on, the phone lines were cut because of non-payment. We could again not work.

Things got even more out of order around the office.

The post piled up, there were no stationery. We couldn’t do service of court documents because our service providers cut us off. It went on for weeks. I simply worked around the issues and sorted my life out (one example: when the wifi was off I used my cellphone to hotspot my laptop without telling anyone).

And it ended up working out well for this person!

Nice job!

In the end my boss and his mother begged me to do what I used to do but I refused. Since I was focusing more on my actual work my fees increased and my pay increased as well.

Shortly thereafter I moved away from that office to our secondary office and worked alongside lovely colleagues who all did what they got paid to do. I have been at this new office (same firm just a different location) for the last two years.”

And this is what people had to say about this on Reddit.

One reader said this was a job well done.

This person said this can be a double-edged sword.

Another Reddit user shared an interesting work story.

This person talked about how they think their union has gone a little too far.

And this person said they think people just work too darn much.

Sounds like they asked for it, don’t you think?

That’s the truth, ladies and gents!