Sometimes, the people running the place care more about looking busy than actually doing anything that makes sense.

So, what would you do if your supervisor scolded you for working too fast, and then instructed you to drag out every task just so you “looked busy” for the big boss?

Would you push back? Or would you follow directions and do as you’re told?

In the following story, one student finds himself in this situation and makes a lot of money doing nothing.

Here’s what happened.

I need to work slower and look busy for the Boss? You got it!

I have always been an incredibly hard and efficient worker. I always get things done faster than expected and go above and beyond.

My program for college required us to go to class for 6 months of the year and work full-time in our field for the remaining 6 months.

As a freshman in college, I got my first job at an automotive supplier. My first semester was fairly slow, mainly due to the fact that the person who was supposed to train me went on medical leave my first week there and didn’t come back for almost a year (and wasn’t replaced).

Then, things got even worse.

However, in my second semester, things really took a turn for the worse. Two key things happened at the start of my next semester. 1) I was moved to a new department 2) The company began merging with one of their competitors.

Now, when the company began the merger, they decided they were going to move everything from my site to the other company’s HQ in another nearby city.

The first thing that moved was the vast majority of the equipment my new department used.

The upper management made the brilliant decision to leave the four members of my department (1 Supervisor, 1 tech, and 2 students) at the old site until the move was complete. This meant we had essentially nothing we could work on.

The supervisor was not happy that he got done so quickly.

After about 2 weeks of sitting around, my Supervisor (60F) finally came up with a small task for me. I completed this in about 4 hours, which I thought was pretty good for something I had never done and had little training on, so I went to let her know.

Me: “Hey Super, I’m done!”

Super (Angry and in a panic): “Done? This was supposed to take you all week! I don’t have anything else for you to do now! I need you to look busy in case the Boss walks by. Next time I give you something to do, you need to drag it out longer so that you look busy!”

Now, young, naive me was initially confused by getting reprimanded for working too fast, but what the boss says goes!

He could’ve worked faster, but had to slow it down.

A week or so later, I was given another task. I was to take thousands of these tiny explosive devices we use and dispose of them by detonating them in a concrete box. ( They were too volatile to just throw out, so they had to be discharged first.)

Super: “ And remember, take your time and don’t go through them too fast!”

Now, this was obviously just busy work to get me out of the way, but the great thing with this task was that it had to take place in a back garage that nobody ever went into, to avoid the obvious danger of people walking in while I was setting off controlled explosives.

I could have easily hooked up 20 of these bad boys at a time and set them off every 5-10 minutes, finishing the whole batch in about a week, but I had to “look busy”.

He was so “busy” that he couldn’t help anyone else.

So instead, I set off about 5-10 of these once an hour and spent the rest of the time on my phone playing games, watching Netflix, listening to music, etc., while getting paid over double minimum wage at the time.

I managed to stretch that project for the remaining 2.5 months I was there, finishing just in time for the end of the semester.

Any time someone asked me for help on something else I politely told them i would when I was done but it might be awhile because Super told me not to go through these too fast.

They usually ended up finding some other bored student to help them.

All the students quit at the end of the semester.

I think Super genuinely forgot I worked there by the end because when I stopped into her office in my last week to let her know I had finished the task, she seemed very surprised/confused to see me!

The company ended up paying me over $10,000 (a lot of money for a student at the time) just to sit on my phone all day for 3 months. I sent an email to the Supervisor, Boss, and HR at the end of the semester letting them know that I would not be returning the next semester.

In my best corporate language, I let them know I was leaving to “pursue opportunities that would better utilize my time and skills.”

I found out later, when several of us ran into each other at a job fair, that all but 2 of the other students had also quit at the end of the semester out of boredom and/or uncertainty that we would even have jobs to come back to.

Wow! It sounds like that company was good at wasting money.

Let’s check whether the folks over on Reddit have ever encountered anything like this.

This person was impressed.

Here’s a good point.

According to this reader, it’s a tactic they use.

It sure doesn’t.

He was just following directions!

Next time, the company should plan mergers better.

If you liked this post, check out this story about an employee who got revenge on a co-worker who kept grading their work suspiciously low.