Some people are so threatened by their others that it spills over into their work environment…
And that’s not good for anyone!
I’m sure you’ve been there, right?
So has this person, but they ended up getting some serious revenge on their manager.
Let’s take a look…
You should have given me the job instead.
“I am a Chemist by trade. I work in a lab mixing chemicals together to make viable products for consumers.
I once worked for a company that made all types of plastic. They were in serious need of a chemist and a friend (whom is the VP) recommended I interview.
The job was to be the lab manager. I would be responsible for 3 other chemists and two QC employees.
Things got complicated…
I went through the very long interview process and was offered a job.
However, it was not the job that I interviewed for. The management “team” decided that I was too young (I was 25) so they gave to the job to someone else who was older.
That person would be the manger (we’ll call him AH). I was given a chemist job. It was a good job and it paid well, so whatever.
So my first day on the job I am introduced to AH. Upon meeting him, he seemed to relish in the fact that he got the management job over me, and immediately started to show it.
The lab was going through somewhat of a transformation. The previous manager was a pack rat. As in, he kept every single piece of paper that was ever handed to him.
So my first assigned task was to go through every single piece of paper to see if it was relevant.
I had to physically remove each piece of paper from the box and scan it over for said relevant info, even though the box clearly said 1972 on it, and all it was was pamphlets from shows or old chemical brochures, I still had to go through it.
Ugh…
This took me weeks. I was the only person assigned this task, everyone else did their normal job.
In the mean time, he was busy showing up for work late, leaving early for his two hour lunch, disappearing for and hour and a half after lunch, and leaving work early.
He maybe was seen visible working for one hour a day.
Fast forward to me finishing my assigned task, AH finally allows me to do some actual chemistry work.
This is when I found out that he has no real experience working in a chemistry lab. Or being a chemist.
Jeez!
How do I know? Because AH decided to mix a couple of chemicals that don’t “play nicely with each other” and then proceeds to throw it in the microwave.
60 seconds later we were short one microwave and had a new respect for the fire extinguisher.
He followed this up with leaving industrial sized mixers on high speed while unattended (big no no, they could kill someone), starting another small fire in the plant and completely ruined an industrial sized mill.
After a couple months of his unsafe lab practices (they continued), I started noticing some changes in his personality.
Specifically towards people that he deemed a threat to his authority.
This guy was something else…
He got into a very loud verbal argument with our first production manager, who then quit, then proceeded to get into an almost physical argument with one of our salesmen, whom also quit.
Once those two were off his list, he turned his attention towards me.
Now for a little back story. I mentioned earlier that I was friends with the VP. (I still am) I have worked for him before and I enjoyed it a lot.
Hence the reason I applied for the job. I am the type of person that shows up early and leaves late.
Always have, always will.
I take great pride in doing good work. Well AH took our friendship and my work ethic as a threat to his authority and made it his life’s goal to mess with every single part of my day.
This was getting ugly…
He would assign me jobs to do, I would do them, and then he would berate me in front of everyone about how I did it wrong.
Then he would tell me how to do it “right”, and I would fix my mistake and do it exactly how he told me to and he would come back and berate me again in front of everyone about how it was still messed up.
He did this for EVERYTHING.
The best part about all of this was the end of day “meetings.”
These “meetings” consisted of me going into his office, closing the door, and him yelling and swearing at me for at least 30 mins.
Topics you ask? Think of one, it was probably my fault in some way.
He finally had enough.
This went on 2-3 months until I cracked. I cracked because he got physical, as in shoved me when my back was turned.
Now, I am not a small person. I am athletically built. I played football, I ran track, and I lifted weights.
I don’t know what got into him but it got into him in a big way. I was shocked. I had never had a boss do that before.
I don’t know why, but I just let it happen.
So when he was done screaming in my face, I just left and went straight to the bar and had a drink, and another, and another.
That was the day I decided that I had had enough. I wasn’t putting up with any more bull ****.
I am admittedly not a very creative person when it comes to revenge, so the only type of revenge on a boss that I had ever seen (way before Reddit) was from the movie Office Space.
Two can play at that game!
I literally did what that guy did. I just showed up and did absolutely nothing. I came and went when I wanted. I took 45 minute smoke breaks, 2 hour lunches, came late and left early.
This drove AH insane. And every time he tried to talk to me about it I did exactly what the guy on the movie did, I just never stopped and walked right past him.
Every time he wanted another “meeting” I just never showed up. I just went home instead.
So after a week or two of this, I happen to be wandering around the office and I stumble into my VP friend. He seemed stressed out and I inquired as to why.
“The safety inspector is here and he will be doing a walk through of the plant.” he said.
He told me “to let everyone in the lab know that he was here and NOT to mess up.” His words, not mine.
Well because I had literally quit doing what I supposed to do and AH had to do what I was supposed to do, and seeing that he is a walking disaster, I took off for my 2 hour lunch.
Uh oh…
I wander back into the plant after my 2 hour lunch (my food was excellent) and **** has hit the fan. Every big wig in the company is in there and they are all freaking out.
I walk up and the first thing the VP asked me was “what did you see!!!???” Being friends with him I replied “I didn’t see ****, what happened?”
So word on the street is this.
AH decided that he owned the place that day and went out and used one of the industrial stand up mixers (think kitchen aid mixer that makes cookies but 8 feet tall) to mix something in a 1 gallon container (I was suppose to be working on this project but obviously wasn’t).
Now, these things are made for containers that hold 500-1,000 gallon containers.
So he puts this container under this gigantic mixer and realizes that the container cant be strapped down with heavy duty chains. (side note: you need to strap down the containers.
These things spin at 3000-5000 rpm. I have seen 1000 gallon containers spin that weight 4,000lbs. That’s some scary stuff).
So what does AH do? He grabs a roll of duct tape and tapes that thing on of course!
Once he plasters that thing with duct tape, he cranks it up to full blast and walks away.
(Also a big no no. For those of you that don’t know, all machines in any industrial shop have to manned at all times, no exceptions)
Here it comes…
About 2 minutes into this act of stupidity, in walks the safety inspector.
One of the production guys sees this gigantic fine running and promptly runs over and shuts the machine down right as the safety inspector sees it.
Over walks the inspector to inquire into what the hell is going on right as AH walks out of the lab freaking out. Asking who shut off HIS mixer and of course cussing and swearing.
He then proceeds to turn the mixer back on, cuss out the production worker, and asks the safety inspector “what the **** are you looking at?” and walks away.
It was time to come clean.
So once I am got done laughing my *** off, I calmly inform my VP and all the other big wigs that I am not surprised.
I inform them of their lost microwave, the fires, the destroyed mill (they knew about the mill, they just didn’t know how it happened).
I told them about the confrontation that occurred in his office, and I told them the truth about some other things they didn’t know about. (bottle of scotch in his desk, wasted on the job, etc. etc.).
The fire in my VP friend’s eyes was burning hot enough to destroy worlds at this point and he turns around and tells everyone that there will be a meeting regarding today’s events in the morning and orders everyone (40+ people) to go home.
Gotcha!
We show up the next day and AH was no where to be found.
The point of the meeting was to inform everyone that AH was not allowed within 500 ft of the building and that if we saw him near the building, we needed to call the police.
What I found out later was that the police already had him. When my VP friend went to fire him, AH got physical, and the security guards with my VP friend got physical back.
He was charged with a whole slew of stuff, to much to remember.
Later that day I was promoted to lab manager and given a raise. We celebrated with a glass of scotch that found in AH’s desk.”
Here’s what people had to say about this story on Reddit.
This reader asked a question.
Another individual was impressed.
This reader chimed in.
Another person spoke up.
Some people need to learn the hard way…
It’s exhausting.
If you thought that was an interesting story, check out what happened when a family gave their in-laws a free place to stay in exchange for babysitting, but things changed when they don’t hold up their end of the bargain.