In high-pressure environments, rules are often bent to keep things running smoothly, but sometimes management forgets that.

This developer was working overtime to keep systems running smoothly, but when a new boss decided to cheap out on overtime, she didn’t anticipate the ensuing domino effect.

Read on for the full story.

“You work 8 hours a day and that’s it”

20 years ago, I was a developer for a large financial services company.

This developer was one to go above and beyond to solve problems.

Because we lacked many tools, I was usually tasked with building various tools, scripts, reports, etc. to help automate the environment. I really just worked around the inadequacies of our off-the-shelf tools.

At my peak, I probably had around 300 apps and/or scripts in production.

Due to all their hard work, they ended up working more hours than originally contracted.

Due to the number of asks from leadership and to keep the lights on, I usually booked anywhere from 4 to 10 hours of overtime per week.

One day, management decided to pull the plug on overtime.

After about a year, I got a new boss who decided that she would ensure that I take NO overtime for any reason.

She proclaimed that I would ONLY be allowed to 8-hours per day and not a moment more. “No exceptions”.

I wasn’t a full-time employee, so I didn’t have any grounds to push back.

I usually started at 8, so with my 30-minute lunch, that meant my new hours were 8 to 4:30.

It didn’t take long, though, for management to realize just how big of a mistake this was.

Flash forward to later that SAME WEEK, an upstream system changed their data feed and it corrupted one of our downstream systems.

Stuff like this happened often enough that I had translation tools built to resolve any of those feed-related issues, but even then, I still had to spend a few minutes figuring out what changed in order to adjust my own code.

Anyway, as the operations have come to a halt, my boss and HER boss are looking over my shoulder as I’m diagnosing the feed problem, which I found pretty quickly.

So the developer decides now is a great time to remind them of their new policy.

The clock strikes 4:30 and I lock my computer, stand up from my desk, and say “well, it’s 4:30. That’s my 8 hours. I’ll see you tomorrow.” and walk out.

The look of confusion, rage, and exasperation was just (blows chef’s kiss).

At this point, all of our overnight backups have stopped and WILL NOT RUN until I resolve things.

And management was going to suffer because of it.

This means a global financial institution no longer has any data backups being made for that entire night and will be completely screwed if, well, ANYTHING happens.

Flash forward to the next morning as I walk to my desk at 7:56, as I made sure to never be in a situation where I could be called out as coming in late, my boss’s boss is waiting for me.

Management came back to the developer with their tails between their legs.

He directs me into his office and very calmly says “Moving forward, I’ll manage your time sheet and you can take as many hours as you need.”

I left that job about 4-5 months later and the entire building was laid off about 2 months after that.

Only two of about 200 people weren’t laid off and one of those people was the guy I hired to backfill me as someone had to keep all the code running!

What a satisfying story!

What did Reddit think?

It’s hard to believe how delicately even the largest institutions are held together.

Managers are known for their self-sabotaging tendencies.

The developer missed a huge leverage opportunity!

Of course, not all bosses are awful.

Management learned the hard way that efficiency doesn’t come from cutting corners.

Never mess with the employee keeping the lights on.

If you liked that story, check out this post about a group of employees who got together and why working from home was a good financial decision.