More often than ideal, a new manager thinks they don’t need to watch how things work before making changes.

In this case, Kevin, a new director of operations, decided that every single purchase requisition at a busy industrial repair shop needed his physical signature. On paper.

It didn’t matter whether the item cost $5 or $10,000.

Every request had to be printed on a specific form, physically delivered to Kevin’s office, and personally signed before anyone could order the part.

That did not work well.

The lead technician warned him that this was going to create a massive bottleneck.

Kevin insisted he wanted to see every request.

So the technician decided to make sure he did exactly that.

Read the full story below.

You want a physical signature for every single requisition? Hope you brought a comfortable chair.

Hey, myself Ethan and I work as a lead technician for a specialized industrial firm where we handle heavy machinery repairs.

Now, because parts are expensive and often custom ordered, our old system was simple.

I’d email my manager, “hey, we need a $4,000 hydraulic seal,” he’d reply “approved,” and I’d order it. Quick, efficient, and everyone was happy.

Enters Kevin. Kevin is a new efficiency consultant turned director of operations.

Kevin thinks email is for lazy people and decided that to curb unauthorized spending, every single requisition regardless of cost, now requires a physical, ink on paper signature on a specific form 402, hand delivered to his office.

He tried reasoning with Kevin.

I told Kevin this was a bad idea because we are a high volume shop.

On a busy Monday, I might order 40 different items ranging from $5 bolts to $10,000 engines.

Kevin’s response: ‘If it’s not signed by me in person, the company isn’t paying for it. No exceptions, I don’t care if it’s a nickel or a grand, I want to see every request that crosses your desk’

I realized Kevin didn’t quite grasp what every request meant.

And he didn’t care to ask, either. Oh, well.

I usually batch my orders or handle the small stuff (washers, lubricants, safety goggles) through a general shop fund, but not anymore.

Monday morning comes, instead of batching my needs into one list, I treated every single individual component as a separate requisition.

Need 10 specific bolts? That’s one form.

Need a bottle of degreaser? That’s a form.

Need a replacement lightbulb for the breakroom? Form.

Kevin was going to learn the hard way.

By 10am, I had a stack of 64 individual forms.

I walked into Kevin’s office, he was on a conference call. I waited and when he hung up, I laid the stack down.

Kevin: what is this?

Me: the requisitions for the morning. You said you wanted to see every request, I need these signed so I can get the shop running.

It took him 20 minutes to sign them all because he insisted on reading each one.

Things needed to change.

By the time he finished, I was back with 15 more. By tuesday, he was visibly annoyed and by wednesday, the fallout began.

Because I was spending half my day walking back and forth to his office and waiting for him to finish meetings to get signatures, the actual repair work slowed to a crawl.

Three major clients called to ask why their machines weren’t ready.

The breaking point was the emergency overnight, a local plant had a massive failure and we needed a $12 O-ring to fix a $200,000 pump.

It was around 4:45pm, Kevin had already headed out for a networking dinner.

Oh, well!

Now, under the old rules, I’d just buy it and get reimbursed but under Kevin’s no exceptions rule, I couldn’t.

I told the client, I’m sorry, I don’t have authorization to purchase the part until it’s physically signed off by the director.

Never Miss a Story

Sign up to get our BEST stories of the week straight to your inbox.

The client was furious, they called the CEO.

The CEO called Kevin at his dinner. Kevin told the CEO he’d handle it in the morning.

The CEO told Kevin to get his behind back to the office now.

Not so fun now, huh, Kevin?

Kevin had to drive 45 minutes back to the office, in his suit, just to sign a single piece of paper for a $12 part.

The next morning, a company-wide memo went out. “Digital approvals via email are reinstated for all items under $5,000.”

Kevin doesn’t look at me anymore when I walk past his office.

I still make sure to bring him a physical form for anything over $5,001, and I always make sure to wait until he’s right in the middle of a very important lunch.

After all, he wanted to see every request.

What did Reddit think?

This is funny.

Yup.

Yikes.

If you enjoyed this story, check out this post about a restaurant employee who decided to put the staff over customers despite the official policy.

A reader shares their thoughts.

Odd choice, indeed.

In my opinion, Kevin just liked signing stuff and feeling important.