When an employee is trained really well on the correct way to do their job, the boss should trust that they know how to do their job correctly. Unfortunately, that doesn’t always happen.

This guy’s boss got himself in trouble because he wouldn’t believe his employee.

Find out how things got worse when he called in the professionals.

Leave things as the professionals set it

About a decade ago I worked for a big name company electrostatic powder coating semi wheels.

The GM (who was actually a really good boss) got a trainer to come in and teach me what I was doing right and wrong.

He was doing pretty well…

After a week we got things narrowed down with the settings on the machines that my quality improved a lot and my quantity of wheels I could paint in a day improved by about 5-10 per day.

I was now averaging anywhere from 50-65 wheels a day.

I used those same setting for almost a year before that same GM started messing with them.

This is where it gets interesting!

I had a few wheels from a trash company come to me covered in dried mud one day.

Not the first time and wasn’t going to be the last.

I had knocked off as much as I could before stripping them and did my best to blow off what dust was left.

I still missed some spots on the edges. Usually when this happens I end up with tiny holes on the edges of the rims.

He tried to explain the situation to this boss.

That day the GM had come back to get a count of paint to see what needed to be ordered.

GM: “What’s with all the holes on the edges of these wheels?”

Me: “It’s from dirt. I didn’t get it all off when I blew off the wheels.”

GM: “Dirt doesn’t cause this. I think your settings are the issue.”

Me: “I’m telling you it’s dirt. Every time we get these customers wheels in with dried mud all over them this is what happens.”

Boss wouldn’t listen!

GM: “Dirt doesn’t cause this. I’ll have some people come in to check this out.”

He left after that.

Fast forward to next week and he meets me in the morning with about 4 other people.

GM: “These guys are going to look over the machines and adjust things so we no longer have issues.”

Me: “I told you it was dirt.”

The GM still wouldn’t listen.

GM: “The professionals are going to adjust the settings and you will leave them where they are at. If you don’t you will get written up. This is not up for discussion.”

Ok. Message heard loud and clear. I’ll leave it to the professionals and not touch a thing.

Thankfully my powder gun had multiple settings.

I asked the “professional” to set his new settings on another preset.

There’s a new problem.

The next day I noticed the wheels I painted were coming out yellow. I also noticed that the paint was very thin in certain spots.

Due to my new settings the positive charge was blasting powdered paint away from the wheels.

A few days go by GM comes back and sees all my new painted white wheels yellow and asks why everything is coming out yellow.

I told him it was because the oven was set to high

He had the perfect explanation.

GM: “Why didn’t you change it? That’s over a 100 wheels that need to be redone!”

Me: “I was told not to change the settings the professionals set so I didn’t touch it.”

He walked over and turned it down and told me to leave it.

The GM has a problem.

A week later I get called into the office.

One of our biggest customers was complaining that their wheels needed to be removed and repainted after a week or two due to starting to rust.

We delivered over 150 wheels a week to them.

GM: “What is going on here? The paint too thin and the customer is complaining. Do I need to call the professionals back in to look things over?”

Finally, he’s told he can make a change!

Me: “It wouldn’t change much cause I haven’t touched anything on the machines since they were out last time.”

GM: “Just fix it. I don’t care what you do just fix it.”

He never questioned me again when it came to powdered coating.

YIKES! That must have been embarrassing for the boss!

Why wouldn’t he listen to his employee?

Let’s find out what folks on Reddit have to say about this story.

This user can relate to this story.

This user has a sarcastic take on the story!

This user is curious about some technicalities.

This user has a better suggestion for a response!

That’s right! This user knows that some people can do their jobs better than lab professionals.

He knew how to do his job better than the “professionals.”

If you liked that story, check out this post about an oblivious CEO who tells a web developer to “act his wage”… and it results in 30% of the workforce being laid off.