Now, this is how you maliciously comply when you’re faced with a conundrum at work!

Read on and learn how this Reddit user GOT PAID…even though his managers probably weren’t crazy about it.

Get started now!

You want me to stick to 40 hours a week with absolutely NO OVERTIME? Are you sure?

“I work for a major Silicon Valley tech corporation. They are big. You have heard of them, and you probably have some of their hardware in your computer right now.

I am involved in creative marketing. We support the top level officers in the company and I have been on the road many times developing presentation materials for people that you have heard of.

I have been working there three years, but they have not converted me from contract into a full-time employee.

This sounds frustrating…

In that time, the stock has soared and I could have made quite a bit of money but they refused to bring me on board because they said “you are already here and we are focusing man-power dollars on people who are not in the door yet“.

They passed me over several times so that they could bring in people from the outside.

No worries, I understand, I can remain hourly as long as they want. At my rate, I bring in a decent amount of money and I bring in an absurd amount of money when overtime is involved.

And overtime is involved often, as these large events require an incredible amount of work and I am the only guy here that does what I do.

Now for the story…

They’re really busy!

In the past, when we have large events, I have worked upwards of 80 hours per week. That’s a lot of extra money. In fact, when they put me on the road, they need to pay me my hourly rate plus overtime for travel time, so a 12 hour flight is eight hours of pay and four hours of overtime. Just to sit on the plane.

Naturally, the higher-ups (VP level and execs) in the company had a heart attack after a couple of these events went by and I raked in upwards of $10,000 in one week.

Totally understandable, but they could have avoided all this if they just hired me. Oh well. They came down hard on the two or three people that are above me in the hierarchy. Naturally, they freaked out as well.

They got some new orders.

I was told, for our most recent show, I was not to work more than 40 hours a week. No exceptions. No overtime, and no budgetary overruns. I replied “no problem, I will do as much of the work as I can in my 40 hours.”

I even said it with an honest smile. And I worked my *** off 40 hours every week. No more, no less.

The four weeks leading up to the show were insane for everyone but me. All of my salaried coworkers were spending vast amounts of overtime and not getting paid for it.

See ya later!

Nights and weekends were the standard, and I just went home every day at 5 o’clock and told them that I wish I could help.

Our immediate team totally understood, and they thought it was great the way I was handling everything. We have a pretty good team for the most part.

In the last week before the show, I was told that I needed to complete a pretty large amount of work. I told them that this amount of work is unachievable in 40 hours, and they had a choice to either bring someone else in to help me or pay me for the hours I would need to spend to complete it.

I don’t work for free.

Because the department is so poorly run, many contractors have decided to no longer work with us. It was near impossible for them to find anyone to come in and help me.

So it really came down to this; my bosses could please the top level management by allowing me to get the work done, or explain to them why they could not deliver. I think you can see where this is going.

Booyah!

I worked 119 hours that week. That was 40 hours of regular, 40 hours of overtime, and 39 hours of double overtime. That came to a grand total of somewhere around $17,000 for one week of work (before taxes).

It was glorious, but it also was extremely exhausting. Although, I must admit, cramming all that work into one week was much better than spreading it out and sweating for a full month.

At the end of the show, I was praised personally by the CEO for all the great work that I did. They are still freakish about overtime, but they realize that they need to either hire me or continue to pay my overtime rates.

Personally, I don’t care which one they choose. Stock is worthless to me at the price it is at right now.

They tried to tell ’em!

I have since told them that, if they bring me on board as a salaried employee, I will demand $180,000 a year. They said “that’s outrageous, why would we ever pay you that much!“

“You have been paying me that much for three years now. That’s my price. If you’d like to talk, I sit right over there.”

I’m still hourly, but I’m sitting on a beach in Belize sipping some awesome rum as I write this.”

Reddit users spoke up.

This person shared their thoughts.

Another reader was impressed.

And this Reddit user spoke up.

Sometimes, it’s worth it to work crazy amounts of overtime.

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.