We all have our strengths and weaknesses in life. Part of being an adult is being able to recognize which is which, but also being willing to work on your weaknesses if doing so will benefit you in some way.

OP worked for a company that held a holiday decorating competition between departments.

Several years ago, I was working for an organization, and they were having their annual holiday decorating competition between the different departments.

There were a couple of departments that basically took turns winning every year because a few of the staff there went absolutely nutty with decorating.

The departments gave a little budget toward this event, but a few staffers from those 2 departments put in their own $$ on top of the department funds and just created some insane, over-the-top displays.

I saw pics from a few years. Some of them were very cool, but also probably took a few staffers a few days to set up…and probably cost at least $500 or more (for decorations, that’s not counting the staff hours that went into it).

She wasn’t personally into it, and said so when her boss asked her to tackle some of it on her own.

So my department had its own new office that year (in previous years we had been in a small area BEHIND another department….some people didn’t even know we were there).

But that year we were in a nice office space AND on the ground floor. So my executive director decides we are gonna compete…I think she just wanted to show off to her boss…

So she tells me: CageyCapybara, since you’ll be in the office working this weekend, you can make a good start on decorating the office for the competition…

Me: I will be in the office this weekend, but that’s because I’ll be working on these projects….remember, we need to be in a good place with these projects before the New Year….

Boss: well no reason you can’t do both. Spend a few hours decorating and the rest working

I had only planned to be in the office about 4-5 hours anyway, so “a few hours decorating” wouldn’t leave me much time to devote to the projects

But, she sucked it up.

Me: I’d like to get these projects to a good place before our holiday. I’m also not much of a decorator (this is actually true, I moved 14 times in about 17 years, I think it killed any desire I may have had to decorate. And I’m a tomboy – not very feminine in how I dress or present myself, which I think always bothered boss lady, and not very good with decorating)

Boss: Are you refusing to help your coworkers with this?

Note: “refusing to help coworkers” was a phrase she pulled out most any time someone pushed back on her ideas….she came from the business world to a different industry and wanted to incorporate business ideas that didn’t always work.

Me: Nope, I’ll try to spend some time decorating then

I think her boss would rather go back in time and listen to her.

That weekend, I stopped at a dollar store and bought several rolls of wrapping paper, put it on the department credit card.

When I went into the office, I spent about 2 or 3 hours wrapping everything I could think of that was a stable object – wrapped most of our desks, our filing cabinets, some bookshelves, some end tables we had in the front office area…

Basically making them unusable.

Someone would have to break through the wrapping paper and “ruin” the decoration to get into their desk…or the filing cabinets…or the book shelves.

Everyone spent the next week not being able to functionally do some of their work because they couldn’t get into their desk or filing cabinet.

Our office had a very easy week right before the holiday.

We didn’t even place in the competition 😂 and I heard boss lady got scolded the next month by her boss because we were behind on the projects.

Perfection. Chef’s kiss!

This person says OP could have continued to push back.

But this commenter thinks OP got it right the first time.

They say there was more the boss wasn’t saying.

People are so brave when it’s not their job on the line!

Although she could have gone even further.

This woman is a hero, y’all.

I would love to have heard her boss’s response that next morning.

If you liked this post, check out this story about an employee who got revenge on a co-worker who kept grading their work suspiciously low.