Nobody likes to be micromanaged.

But this person took compliance to whole new heights.

Let’s get into the nitty gritty details…

Manager wanted everything I do during a workday written down. Request granted

Some context. I work in an outsourcing company. Before I joined, there were 2 people doing my job. Both left before I joined. I was alone doing the job of 2 people.

Weekly reports were sent to client “head,” and client would visit the job site once a year.

So here goes. As a means of control and reporting, there was a general mailbox where client should send all requests that needed to be addressed.

I had to deal with 30 to 40 different people from the client side plus client”head.” They didn’t give a hoot about said mailbox, would always email my inbox ignoring said general one.

Ugh, seems like a classic case of downsizing beyond a reasonable measure.

Since I was alone doing the work of 2 people, I was almost always behind on the workload and would get the idiots on the other side constantly complaining to the client “head.”

The “head” would in turn would complain to my managers: “How is it possible that OP can’t deal with 7 or 8 daily emails and be behind on his work?”

Never feels good to have an unsupportive superior.

Weekly report stated I was only getting 7/8 emails from the client a day, completely ignoring the freaking phone, personal inbox, and Skype chat, which were the ways people were contacting me every day.

So client “head” complains to managers and escalates me for being a lazy idiot that can’t even handle a handful of emails a day.

Managers set up meeting to grill me.

Hope OP doesn’t get roasted during this grilling…

“OP you always look so busy and you’re only getting a handful of emails a day and constantly behind on your work. How is this possible? Client isn’t happy and you either have to improve dramatically or client wants us to replace you.”

I explained that general mailbox wasn’t the only thing I did, mentioning all other means through which client idiots were requesting things.

At least the employee got a chance to explain themselves…

So solution to show client “head” what was being done, I was told I needed to register on an excel sheet everything, EVERYTHING, I did during the day. I asked for clarification, you mean emails and calls right?

No, no EVERYTHING. And email the excel at the end of workday.

Seems a bit excessive.

So here goes my malicious compliance. I did exactly what I was told, wrote down everything I did during the workday, even including bathroom, smoke and coffee breaks.

Client writes on Skype, I write down timestamp when client asks for something and timestamp each and every reply, adding it all to an excel at around 500 lines every day  – with my personal favorite of adding a line at the end “time wasted to fill in sheet, 1 hour.”

Well, can’t fault the guy for following directions.

One manager laughs when he sees my full compliance, other one not so much but knows can’t do anything cause I did what I was told.

A few months later when client “head” visits, he tells me he flipping loved it.

Was told to stop doing it on the 3rd day. They were now aware of what I did during the day 🙂

This employee followed their bosses’ instructions to a T. Sounds like some of them were not amused by the rather, uh, strict adherence.

Let’s hear from the comments section.

This person says the minutiae could be even more minute by minute.

Here’s another commenter’s version of malicious compliance:

Another commenter did a similar thing.

Someone else points out, this happens more than it should.

This person did a similar thing but on a life or death level.

If you logged every detail of your life, do you think your boss would give you a pat on the back or a kick in the pants?

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.