In many workplaces, tone matters just as much as tasks.

So when a junior employee doing her job by the book kept getting belittled by a hostile secretary, she looped in her boss just like she was told to.

What started as petty email drama was about to become a stern ultimatum.

Keep reading for the full story!

Make sure you CC your boss on all our emails.

Last year, I worked for a subpart of a large realtor company, and my boss just so happened to be my very overprotective aunt.

She took me under her wing as her “Client Care Coordinator,” a glorified word for assistant.

This just meant that I dealt with all her clients and communicated very closely with the Big Boss’s secretary, who we will call Linda.

Linda was not a joy to work with.

Linda was always very rude to me, but I didn’t take it to heart because, well, I just didn’t care.

So, into the story: One lovely morning, I had to turn in a timesheet.

Linda decided to hold a petty grudge against this employee.

Linda was already mad because I had called her on her lunch, which I was not aware of because we worked in two different buildings in two different cities.

So I sent off the email containing that two weeks’ timesheet and almost immediately got a very condescending and rude email back saying something along the lines of, “I already told you to stop CCing Big Boss on timesheets” (which my boss told me I was supposed to do, and I was told by Big Boss myself I was supposed to) and “You always fill out your timesheets wrong!”

The employee tries to cover their behind to their boss, who was on her side.

I told my boss what Linda had written as I didn’t see what I did wrong filling out the timesheet. She was mad but rolled her eyes and gave me permission to give her attitude back, so I did.

I got an email: “CC your boss on every email you send me from now on. She won’t be happy with your attitude.” Wish granted, Linda.

So that’s exactly what this employee did.

I CCed my boss on EVERYTHING sent to Linda.

Two weeks later, after other rude messages from Linda, timesheets came around, and I got pretty much the same message as before.

I told my aunt to read the messages she had been CCed on. She was ticked.

Linda was about to get a big talking to.

She immediately got up and told her partner that she needed to go speak to the Big Boss.

She pretty much went to the other office, tore Linda a new one, then showed all email conversations to Big Boss.

Linda got in a lot of trouble. The Big Boss said if we have to have another meeting about courtesy, you will be terminated.

A week later, my aunt told me Big Boss wanted me to train for a new job opening… It was Linda’s job.

Clearly Linda should have chosen someone else to mess with.

What did Reddit have to say?

This commenter vouches for the accuracy of this story.

Linda’s behavior just wasn’t appropriate for the workplace.

This commenter also questions Linda’s logic.

Some people think they’re a lot more indispensable than they actually are.

The only CC needed here was a career change for this rude secretary!

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.