His Boss Threatened to Fire Him for Leaving for a Dentist Appointment—Then Called Begging Him to Come Back
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Managers should never threaten to fire someone if they aren’t willing to follow through.
What would you do if you had a dentist appointment scheduled, but when you were getting ready to leave, your manager said if you went to it, you would be fired, because it was a busy day?
That is what happened to the guy in this story, so he said that he was ok with that and left to go to the appointment. Later that afternoon, his manager called to get him to come back.
Firing someone is not a good threat because even if it doesn’t come to that, the employees will lose all loyalty to the company. Check out the full story below and see how you think it should have been handled.
Refused to Take Hourly Leave – So I Guess I’m Fired
I worked at a company that did amazing things for the world but had a horrible culture.
Some weeks are just awful.
I had a new product that was going through regulatory approvals at the same time that the machine used for manufacturing broke (so I also needed the replacement to be approved for use, which was a regulatory process of its own).
It was a week from hell, and by Wednesday at 12 pm I had worked my entire 35 hours/week for my salaried office job (Mon-Fri, 9-5).
Going to a dentist appointment is no big deal.
My manager (Ted) had been with me a couple of those nights, he was well aware my team and I were going above and beyond.
I had a dentist appointment at 3pm on Wednesday. My plan was to leave at 2:30, return at 4:00 then work into the night since things still needed to get done. On my way out to my appointment, I have the following conversation with my boss.
Why would Ted make a big deal out of this?
Ted – Where are you going?
Me – I have a dentist’s appointment, then I’ll be back to calibrate the new machine by 4.
Ted – I didn’t approve hourly leave for you today.
He could just go home since he has already put in the week’s work.
Me – I assumed since I’ve worked 37 hours this week and it’s only Wednesday, that it would be okay. I have no meeting for the rest of the day, and again, I’ll be back at 4.
Ted – You know the policy, any leave during office hours besides lunch from 12-1 requires hourly leave request and is taken from your 16 hours of hourly leave for the year.
Me – yeah but again… not really relevant since I’ve banked way more hours this week alone.
Wow, this escalated quickly.
Ted – If you don’t request leave for this appointment I’ll have to terminate you.
Me – OK, thanks, I’ll consider myself terminated. Have a good day.
Then I walked out and went to the dentist. When I got out of the dentist, I went to a coffee shop near the office and sat there, waiting to find out if I should actually drive home.
He called his bluff.
Sure enough at 4:10 I get a call from Ted
Ted – Are you coming back or what?
Me – So, I’m not fired?
Ted – Just come back.
At least things got better.
I came back, and never got asked to file another hourly leave request again. I eventually left, then explained to them if they were only willing to give me the raise I was promised a year before after I actually put in notice, it wasn’t the place I wanted to work.
However, they start treating their engineers a bit better after I left – not sure how long it lasted though.
It is foolish for a manager to threaten to fire someone when they have no intention of following through.
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Read on to see what the people in the comments have to say about what happened here.
Honestly, I agree with this commenter.
Managers like this just don’t make sense.
Workers will always use the system to their advantage.
Now this would have been funny to say.
If you enjoyed this story, check out this post about a longtime bank customer who walked away after the teller gave them a hard time.
This person worked a lot.
Bluffing is not a smart management method, that’s for sure. While the employee should have followed the normal process, the manager shouldn’t have made a huge deal about it.
Responding to a policy violation with anger and threats usually only results in the employees trying to get away with more.
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