Management can be so focused on policy that they forget how to lead.

So, what would you do if your job punished you for being honest about leaving early, and then admitted you wouldn’t have been in trouble if you had just lied?

Would you just forget about the whole situation?

Or would you let the system collapse under its own rules?

In today’s story, one employee finds themselves facing this very decision and decides to do something about it.

Here’s what they did.

Written up for being nice

This happened years ago when I worked in a distribution center.

It was one of those days when they were trying to cram 50 people’s work into 25 people, which is typical in these places.

I was tired of it and had sick time, so I went to my supervisor before lunch break and said, “Hey, I’m gonna leave after lunch.”

We usually told him when we were going to do this, so that over our lunch, he had time to move people around and cover the empty work slot.

Well, I was on a hit list with a person in upper management, and they wanted to use this to burn me.

They called me into the office the next day.

Not believing what he just heard, he asked for clarification.

“You told him you were going to leave well before you left? How did you know ahead of time you would be sick after lunch? Sick time is for being sick only, so if you use it without being sick, you are stealing company time.”

And that’s what they wrote me up for.

“So if I had lied and said I felt sick and was going home immediately, I wouldn’t have been in trouble?”

I asked, to which they actually replied, “Yes.”

Well, I told everyone at work (150+ people) that if you notify them that you are leaving ahead of time, you will get written up for time theft.

No one ever did it again.

This put upper management in quite a bind.

From that point on, it was, “I don’t feel good, I’m going home,” from anyone who wanted to.

This meant their job position went unmanned for the 30 minutes it takes to restructure and reassign job tasks.

This meant that every day, 2-3 times a day, they would have to take someone from another job and put them in a backed-up mess, which led to more call-offs.

It got so bad that upper management started an intimidation campaign, saying things like, “I’m starting to see a pattern” whenever people left early more than once a year.

I now have a new job that is a million times better, but I thought I’d share this here.

Wow! Most companies wouldn’t have admitted that.

Let’s see what the people over at Reddit have to say about this.

This person finds their threats to be a joke.

Here’s someone who’s confused by the supervisor.

According to this person, there was no leaving if you weren’t sick at their job.

Great point!

She was right for doing that!

There’s nothing worse than someone trying to make an example out of you.

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.