When a company needs to save money, they often think that firing employees is the first way to do it.

What would you do if your boss said that you and most of your team were fired, but only after you finished a project that was set up to take two weeks?

That is what happened to the supervisor in this story, so he made sure his employees and he used all their sick time and lined up interviews while still getting paid.

Fired! In Two Weeks.

I worked for five years as a federal contractor and eventually rose through the ranks—through blood, sweat, and tears—to a low-level supervisor.

This sounds like a great job.

I managed a team of 13 working two federal contracts. Both contracts were new, and I was supposed to make them successful so the contracts would be renewed. This started right before COVID.

Even before the poop hit the fan, my second contract was going BADLY. The agency flooded us with work, and my boss repeatedly refused to ask them to slow it down. (That was literally his only job.)

This would be quite frustrating.

As a result, late work began piling up and costing the company lots of money. We did our best to keep up, which in reality meant a ton of unpaid overtime for me.

Then COVID hit, and things only got worse. My staff asked almost daily if there would be layoffs, and my boss’ response (to them) was “We don’t know.”

Well, at least he has a job.

To me, the answer was that my job was secure but the others’ weren’t. If the contract failed, he said, I’d have a place on another team.

Obviously, the contract failed. My boss personally fired me, and (unbeknownst to me) most of my team.

What a horrible way to learn about this.

I learned who was staying and who was going by talking with each of them personally. No one knew it was going to happen to them until it happened, and they were all shocked that I’d been fired as well. This was August 2020. Panic ensued.

After firing me, my boss (who until that day I’d considered a very good friend) had the stones to call and ask me if I’d “help him end the contract on a high note.” (I got fired two weeks before my official last day, because that company is run by sadists.) I told him I’d do my job.

Don’t leave any benefits on the table.

As a proud Slytherin, I immediately began doing everything I could, within the rules of course, to send my fired staff home in the best shape possible. We all knew our unused PTO would cash out, but sick time wouldn’t.

Everyone was sick those last two weeks, and my boss ended up doing most of the work himself. I also sent a ton of people to work from home with “COVID-like” symptoms so they could use their time to interview for jobs etc.

Things worked out well for him.

I was immediately hired by another federal contractor, and I brought my best former employee along with me.

Since then, she and I poached about a dozen employees away from our former employer, who eventually threatened to sue her if she headhunted anyone else.

This must be so satisfying.

I’m proud to say that our revenge-fueled efforts have taken so many of their good employees that the company is now openly failing and will soon go out of business.

If companies would just treat their employees right, people wouldn’t hate them so much.

Let’s see what the people in the comments have to say about this story.

Yeah, this is always sad.

Companies often forget this.

There is nothing they can do.

He landed on his feet.

This is good advice.

Did the evil boss really expect them to work hard for the last two weeks?

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.