Have you ever come across a toxic boss? If not, count yourself lucky. Many people who are in employment suffer in silence because of toxic and mean bosses, and some end up quitting for the sake of their mental health.
Securing a new job is one of the best things.
But many only realize it’s not all rosy when they discover they are in a toxic environment. That’s when anxiety and stress kicks in, and many choose their peace of mind over money. These employees shared their worst stories on Reddit of working for toxic bosses.
Some who couldn’t stand them and got fired; others simply quit! Let’s check out what they had to say. Comments have been edited for grammar and clarity.
u/invisible_23:
Halfway through my two weeks’ notice, I got the flu and tried to call in.
The guy told me he would fire me if I didn’t go to work. So I showed up, and he told me I wasn’t being “cheerful enough” for the customers. So I looked at him, said nothing, grabbed my bag, and walked out the door.
At this point, he followed me and threatened to call my new job and tell them I was a terrible employee. I called my new job to give them a heads-up. They said, We don’t care, you’re hired.
Feel better, we’ll see you Monday.”
u/norcat: Back in the day, when I was still a retail employee at university, I worked in a gift shop that the owner and a manager ran. The owner was more hands-off and came in occasionally to take care of cash and paperwork, while the manager dealt more with the operation/staff side of things. The owner loved me because I was young, quick to learn, and only talked back if something was wrong.
The manager who hired me loved me, too, because even though she’d see me waste time occasionally, I still got things done in less time than other employees. Anyway, the manager who hired me left, and the owner asked me if I wanted to take on the position. I declined because I was going to school and wouldn’t make a career out of retail.
So, the owner hired another manager. I think a coworker must have told her I was asked to fill the position before she got hired, so my existence threatened her. Even after all the talk about how I had no desire to be the manager, she would do little nitpicky things to get me to look bad.
It was no skin off my back. I did as told and ignored her when she berated me in front of customers, coworkers, etc. The only time she wasn’t annoying was when the owner was around.
Then, she developed some inferiority complex about her lack of post-secondary education and started making snide remarks about how spoiled, entitled, and ignorant university students were. Still no skin off my back until one day, she scheduled me for a shift when I’d booked it off for exams. I didn’t show up, and she called (in the middle of my exam) to let me know I was fired for a no-show.
The owner tried to fix it and asked me to come back, and I told her that since summer was coming up anyway, it’d be best if I explored other opportunities related to my degree. u/ArrenPawk:
I asked my bosses if it was possible for me to work from home two days out of the week. I was a copywriter; I could work as long as I had a computer.
They said no and offered no other alternative, assuming that letting me work from home would set a bad precedent for the rest of the company. The graphic designer on our team worked from home full-time. And if that wasn’t enough, one of the employees in sales had recently moved across the country to Wisconsin and was allowed to work remotely from there.
I quit and ended up with a job that pays $10K more, has full, paid benefits, and, more importantly, a boss who knows what she’s doing. u/CrabFarts:
Also, I couldn’t work from home (where we had regular internet access) because the company didn’t trust employees to work from home. On my last day (though I didn’t know it when I walked in that day), I had a doctor’s appointment, which I had emailed him about, but he claimed never to have gotten it.
He’d emailed me about having a meeting the same morning, which I never got. So when I got there after my appointment, I could tell he was pissed, which is usually a good sign to stay out of his way. Finally, we had one last all-out argument when he apparently couldn’t contain himself any longer.
At the end of the argument, he fired me. I’ve never been happier than at my current job. u/eyesdown:
It cut its tail open badly once, and rather than call the emergency vet, he brushed white paint over the wound to stop the bleeding.
He never walked or gave it any training or toys to play with. He aggressively backed my little sister up against the wall while working there as a waitress to shout at her for giving too generous cheese portions on a cheese board he had refused to show her how to assemble. He was in a relationship with the cook and used to be violent towards her, once breaking her wrist in a fight in the kitchen and stealing her handbag so she couldn’t get home.
She ultimately got back her bag and drove away with one hand, running his foot over as he tried to stop her. u/calepto: I worked in retail under an awful supervisor a few years back. He would constantly hit on the young girls and treat the young guys like absolute crap when he saw them as a threat to his “game.”
I remember walking back to a project from the bathroom and stopping for only two minutes to chat with a girl I was friends with.
As I walked up, he shouted, “Is this the bathroom? No? I didn’t think so.” He proceeded to stare at me until I walked away.
u/kotaacub: First, I’d like to preface this by saying I work for a small yet well-known after-school care program. We have nine staff members total, and everyone is relaxed. I got hired at 16, and my boss seemed super chill, except for the fact that I have autism and a seizure disorder, and I didn’t like to be in places where a lot of screaming happens.
I’d worked there for two and a half years without an issue, other than this guy telling me repeatedly that I was not suited for this job and should find another one, constantly favoring his male coworkers over the females. (There was another member of staff who had Tourette syndrome. He got to take breaks whenever he wanted, for as long as he wanted, where I had to fight for a five-minute break after I’d had a seizure)
Anyway, I got hired on for the summer to work in the lunchroom, and the guy started coming in with a megaphone and yelling into it to get the kids to scream, knowing I could not handle loud noises.
I was also required to move equipment myself; even our stronger members could only move with assistance. I got written up when I had a meltdown or asked for help moving the equipment. Also, after he quit suddenly and we got our great new boss, we found out he refused to let someone leave.
When she had come to him to hand in her two weeks’ notice, he wouldn’t take it and told her he would bad mouth her to everyone who called him if she left. u/sowhatsoplenty: A few years ago, I got a job as a bartender for a restaurant. I started my first day and met a new guy who was also hired.
I got there and was sent upstairs to be a waitress. I’ve never waitressed before; I applied to be a bartender. The new guy has never worked behind a bar and has waiting experience but is told to go behind the bar.
There are two managers; the one who hired me wasn’t there, so I asked the other. She tells me that the girls work as waitresses and the guys as bartenders. I was a bit annoyed but figured the other manager would fix it when he was there (he didn’t)!
Anyway, I learned waitressing was not for me. I’m terrible at it! The female manager was getting so frustrated with me, making me more flustered and worse at my job because she constantly shouted at me over my shoulder.
Meanwhile, the guy at the bar who’s never poured a pint before is left alone and making mistakes, and she’s also shouting at him. One night, he was left alone, and a group came in and asked for mojitos. He wasn’t taught how to make them and had no drink guides, so I jumped on the bar and helped him.
As I’m helping him, the manager spots me behind the bar, loses the plot, and starts screaming at me in front of everyone; it is degrading. What made it worse was that everybody else working there loved her, and she’d invite everyone to parties in front of me and be nicey nicey to everyone. I was fired by the manager, whom I’d never seen, because of the feedback from the female manager.
Deleted user: My coworker Mary always worked an extra 15-30 hours a month, making everyone’s life easier. She’s the kindest soul, a real angel. Her drive?
Supporting her three kids after her husband left her. Yesterday, for the first time in years, she was late to work… by a whole two hours! Her eyes were red, she looked shattered (clearly cried all night).
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