FacebookTwitter
Hatrack River Forum   
my profile login | search | faq | forum home

  next oldest topic   next newest topic
» Hatrack River Forum » Active Forums » Books, Films, Food and Culture » Leaving jobs: share your stories

   
Author Topic: Leaving jobs: share your stories
Toretha
Member
Member # 2233

 - posted      Profile for Toretha   Email Toretha         Edit/Delete Post 
I was just wondering, I'm sure most people here have at some point or another had really really crappy jobs. Did you stick with it, or did you leave? And if you left, did you leave politely? Did you ever actually say the the job people your real reasons for leaving? Did you ever tell them off? Was it satisfying, or just a letdown?

Tell me your stories!

Posts: 3493 | Registered: Jul 2001  |  IP: Logged | Report this post to a Moderator
Synesthesia
Member
Member # 4774

 - posted      Profile for Synesthesia   Email Synesthesia         Edit/Delete Post 
I stuck with the same crappy job for nearly 2 years. Bagging groceries. I think it was due to my fear of offices, but then I worked temp in an office setting and realized it wasn't so bad. Free coffee, the cafeteria was like college. It was nice! And when that ended I went nuts having to my boring job making no money and being miserable.
So once I got this 4 month long job, I quit and it felt so good not having to work 7 days a week.

Posts: 9942 | Registered: Mar 2003  |  IP: Logged | Report this post to a Moderator
Tante Shvester
Member
Member # 8202

 - posted      Profile for Tante Shvester   Email Tante Shvester         Edit/Delete Post 
I hear these stories all the time. Part of my current job is interviewing prospective hires. And I always like to ask, "Why did you leave your last job?" I get some awesome stories. This is from an interview last week:

"Well, my boss, we didn't see eye to eye. She always wants me to do this or do that, and I told her that I do my job and no more and no less, and then when I was taking some time off, she went and gave my job to some suck up who does every little thing they ask. So they called me and told me not to come back. Can you believe it?"

"How long were you taking off when they called you?"

"I don't know, a couple few months."

She was not offered a position.

Posts: 10397 | Registered: Jun 2005  |  IP: Logged | Report this post to a Moderator
Toretha
Member
Member # 2233

 - posted      Profile for Toretha   Email Toretha         Edit/Delete Post 
And they actually TELL those stories????

I mean, I told people at work my bad job story after they'd hired me back, and exactly how mean I'd been back to the people, but I'd not have done that had they not already known me, my work ethic, and my skills. What kind of idiot tells you all that when trying to get a new job???

Posts: 3493 | Registered: Jul 2001  |  IP: Logged | Report this post to a Moderator
quidscribis
Member
Member # 5124

 - posted      Profile for quidscribis   Email quidscribis         Edit/Delete Post 
The last job I had as an employee was terrible. Verbal abuse was a daily constant, and I was doing the job of 4 people. My bosses refused to give me the raises I was promised (and had more than earned). It was... a really, really bad place to work.

I'd had enough, so one day, I typed up my resignation letter which said "Effectively immediately, my employment with this company is terminated." I offered no reasons, nothing. It was a single sentence termination letter.

I did the payroll, so I did this the day that my paycheque went into my account, along with all my vacation pay. Had to make sure they wouldn't stiff me. Previously, they'd tried deducting two weeks wages off employees who gave insufficient notice. Employees in Canada, with the occasional exception of upper management, are not required to provide any notice whatsoever, so deducting wages is clearly illegal. And yet, they tried to get away with it. [Roll Eyes] Whatever. Money in bank, time to go.

Couldn't find my boss - okay, I only looked for about a minute - so I left the note on her desk, grabbed my purse (I'd already removed what little personal effects I'd had at the office) and walked out the door. In the middle of the work day. And drove off.

Later that evening, I received a message under my apartment door hand delivered by another employee. The letter was from the president of the company and they were threatening to come into my home and search it for any company material, stolen or otherwise. (I had previously, for a few months, done payroll from home on my own computer because it was quieter and I could get it done quicker than at work - but that was with their permission, and it ended more than half a year before.)

I wrote them a note back telling them that none of them would ever be allowed in my home, and not only had I no work materials at home, I had not since the last time I did payroll. If they felt it necessary, they could certainly seek a court order, but short of that, they could screw themselves. All very politely, of course, but also very firmly.

They were the biggest @##@!! I've ever known. They regularly broke every labor law that applied to their company and got away with it. They lied and provided falsified documents to investigators from the Employment Standards Board when employees filed complaints. They lied to Employment Canada about why employees were fired or quit. They lied to prevent employees from getting unemployment insurance not because it affected them, but to drive a stake through the ex-employee yet again for having the audacity to quit.

Quitting from that hell job was the best thing I could have ever done.

Posts: 8355 | Registered: Apr 2003  |  IP: Logged | Report this post to a Moderator
Scott R
Member
Member # 567

 - posted      Profile for Scott R   Email Scott R         Edit/Delete Post 
Hmm. . . no horror stories from my jobs. I left my network security job because I wanted a little change from working with customers daily.

I actually loved that job because of the people I worked with. I hated the 2 hour commute, though.

Now I've cut it down to 1.5 hours. [Smile]

Posts: 14554 | Registered: Dec 1999  |  IP: Logged | Report this post to a Moderator
Avadaru
Member
Member # 3026

 - posted      Profile for Avadaru   Email Avadaru         Edit/Delete Post 
Quitting my last job was a spur-of-the-moment thing, though my discomfort with the company had been growing for awhile. I went into work and found one dead puppy and another one dying, and my boss doing absolutely nothing about it. I told my coworkers that I loved them all, but that they were hypocrites (for claiming to love animals, yet watching as these animals got sick and died with no treatment) if they stayed at that job any longer, and I walked out. My boss called me the next day to try to get me to come back, so I politely told him that I basically thought what he did was evil and I wanted nothing to do with his company ever again.
Posts: 1225 | Registered: Feb 2002  |  IP: Logged | Report this post to a Moderator
whiskysunrise
Member
Member # 6819

 - posted      Profile for whiskysunrise   Email whiskysunrise         Edit/Delete Post 
I worked at a dry cleaners. My brother was getting married. I asked for time off to go to a bridal shower for my soon to be sister-in-law. I was willing to make up the time. My supervisor told me that they felt like people were taking advantage of them. She didn't want me to take that evening off. I told her if that was the way they felt about it I was quitting. She said I hope you are planning on giving notice. I replied that's what this is.
Posts: 747 | Registered: Aug 2004  |  IP: Logged | Report this post to a Moderator
HollowEarth
Member
Member # 2586

 - posted      Profile for HollowEarth   Email HollowEarth         Edit/Delete Post 
I don't know if its a horror story really, but the shoes I wore when for work at Wendy's grew mold all over them shortly after I quit (to go back to school) and left them in the closet for ~month.
Posts: 1621 | Registered: Oct 2001  |  IP: Logged | Report this post to a Moderator
esl
Member
Member # 3143

 - posted      Profile for esl   Email esl         Edit/Delete Post 
Great timing in thread creation. Little off topic here, sorry. I don't plan on leaving my job, but I might be terminated.. I'm a student, and it's for spending money basically, so being fired won't be as terrible as it may sound. I just don't want to be fired.

I received an email from my boss today, requesting a talk with me about a very unsatisfied customer. Problem is, I don't remember half the things the customer is complaining about. (it was in an email) They didn't happen. And I'm afraid of coming off too defensive, and saying something wrong. stupid jobs.

Posts: 1056 | Registered: Mar 2002  |  IP: Logged | Report this post to a Moderator
Icarus
Member
Member # 3162

 - posted      Profile for Icarus   Email Icarus         Edit/Delete Post 
I worked at a very exclusive private school in Coral Gables, Florida, where the rich and famous send their kids. The owners of the school were white trash nouveau riche who wanted to put on airs of being old money (silly little things like referring to the city as Miamuh, and a bunch of other things, but it occurs to me that I should not get specific here). There was an endemic attitude throughout the place that your worth was equal to your wealth. If you were a surgeon's wife and worked to avoid boredom, then you were worth a lot. If you were a career teacher with no rich husband or family money, you were a servant. This attitude was prevalent from the families of the students to the administration, but the administration fostered it with subservient treatment that they asked us to give the kids, like opening their doors for them when they were driven up in the morning and picked up in the afternoon. It was a private school, so the customer was always right. We used to say that as a teacher, you were only as good as your last parent conference. I remember having the owner just dress me down in the hallway during a teacher workday, before my second year there began (i.e., I had not had a chance yet to do anything wrong in months) and even though there were students around. My father, my wife, and I all worked there, and if they got pissed off at one person, they would take it out on family members. (I saw this happen with other families who worked there; it's like they figured they had found a slave, because you had all your eggs in one basket. In fact, I was a student at this school in the 1970s when my father worked there, and they would take it out on me when they were mad at him back then, too.) Around 1998 or so, Cor and I tried to move to the Orlando area, because we had always wanted to live there, but it did not work out for us. The next year, they took away all of our good classes and gave us all low-level classes in retaliation for us daring to consider leaving.

They also threatened to fire me when I took family leave when we got the girls. I had to gently point out to them that the law said they had to let me. Apparently no male employee had ever taken family leave before.

Bargaining was not done collectively, and I was too timid a negotiator, so during my last year there I discovered that a first year teacher was making more than I was.

For the longest time, neither Cor, my father, nor I left. Lots of other people did; we would have 35 to 40% turnover every year. I'm not sure why my father stuck around as long as he did. For myself, I was never a "grass is greener on the other side" type of person. I figured there was every likelihood that I would go somewhere else and they would treat me just as crappy, only now I would be the lowest man on the totem pole. I figured it was just a fact of life that employers treated employees like dirt.

The only reason Cor and I finally left was because we moved out of Miami. We had dreamed of living in Celebration for years, and when we saw a way to make it happen, we jumped--blindly. I didn't expect to like my new job any better. I actually had pretty much made up my mind to leave education and go back to programming. I gave this school one shot because it was a mile from my home, and the programming job I was offered--at about twice my annual salary--was on the space coast, over an hour's commute away. (Looking at how the bottom has since fallen out of the tech industry, maybe I was incredibly lucky not to take the higher paying job.)

My father had left earlier that year because he had finally had enough. He completely flamed out when he left. He found a job, gave notice (6 weeks was mandatory. If you gave less than six weeks, or if you gave 6 weeks but they didn't like your reason, they had the right according to our contracts to charge you back 10% of your annual income. I understand from people that I keep in contact with that the mandatory notice is up to twelve weeks now.) He spent the next several weeks doing everything in his power to make them want to release him before the six weeks were up. Actually, it didn't take him long at all before they told him to get the hell out of there. [Evil Laugh]

I don't know if it was because of my father or because they knew that we were leaving, but they spent that last year making life as miserable for us as possible. It got to the point where, by the end of the year, I was looking to break my contract and leave before the year ended. In the end, this didn't happen, though.

Since I knew my bridges were burnt, I didn't bother trying to play nice. When I saw something crappy, I let people know it was crappy. When I was unfairly reprimanded, I threw evidence of their inconsistency in their faces and demanded that they hold others to the same standard. (I was reamed out because they said my lesson plans were inadequate. For each day, I wrote down the objective, the relevant page numbers in the books, and the activities I would be doing, along with when the next assessment was. The principal told me I needed to be writing up a half-page-minimum narrative per day. I told her nobody else was, and she insisted that they all were. She asked my department head for verification of this, and the department head nodded stupidly. That night, I bought a Canon personal copier at Office Max, came in to school and used my key to enter the rooms of all the other math teachers around me. I xeroxed their lesson plans, which all showed less detail than mine did, and which were all initialed by the department head indicating that she had checked them and found them adequate. I presented these to the principal and told her that they clearly needed to do an inservice on lesson planning, because their expectations were clearly not being communicated successfully. She told me angrily that what other people were getting away with was irrelevant, and that I had no business looking at anyone else's lesson plans. I shrugged and said I needed to see other lesson plans because mine were inadequate and I needed an example to learn from.

I didn't go out of my way to be nasty while I was waiting for the year to end, but everyone I knew was unhappy, and so people felt it was safe to talk to me about it, since I was leaving anyway. At our last departmental meeting of the year, they gave me, as a going away present, a picture frame. In it, as a gag, was a picture of the school's owner. On my last day, my principal asked me if it had been all bad. I shrugged.

When Cor and I had our exit interviews with human resources, we told them everything that we had been unhappy about. My father, on the other hand, did not bother. He told them he knew they didn't give a damn and had no intention of changing anything, so he had better things to do with his time. I think he was correct, but it was cathartic for me to be able to tell them to their faces, sort of, that I had been unhappy, and why, and that I was glad to be rid of them. I know they haven't changed, but it did me good.

(It helps that by this point I already had a job lined up.)

-o-

I'm grateful to that horrible job in that horrible school. They taught me how to document myself so thoroughly that nobody could possibly fault me. They taught me to be assertive. They taught me to confront problems as soon as possible, because things don't get better when you ignore them.

Most of all, though, they taught me perspective. At the 1.5 jobs I've had since then (one school that split into two after my second year there, and I went with the new school) I've been surrounded by people who have been incredibly unhappy and angry. Many of them have never worked anywhere else. Hell, maybe my school is as bad as they say. To me, it's wonderful. I say they have no idea what a lousy work environment is.

Then again, my current school seems to treat me a lot better than they treat some other people. Maybe it's because I'm happy to be there. Maybe it's because I love my job. Maybe I work a little harder because I'm a lot happier. People have been telling me for years that I am the golden child. I think that's pretty cool.

I feel like my employers value me, and like they think I am very good at my job. For me, that's a world away from my prior situation.

-o-

Based on looking around my current job, the first thing I would say to someone who feels their environment is toxic is to take a good long look at what makes them unhappy, and decide if it's really personal, or if its stuff that's intrinsic to the job. Talk to people who work elsewhere (in the same kind of job, or in the kind of job you think you might like to switch to) and find out if they have the same problems as you do, or what problems they do have. Find out if they are happy. Maybe the grass isn't greener elsewhere.

But maybe it is. If you look around and it's inescapable that your employers don't treat you with dignity, then get the hell out. My first job really was toxic. It wasn't in my head. I got out, and it's certainly in the top five list of the best things I have ever done for myself.

[Smile]

EDITED to add details and hunt down a pesky typo. [Grumble]

[ December 06, 2005, 11:40 AM: Message edited by: Icarus ]

Posts: 13680 | Registered: Mar 2002  |  IP: Logged | Report this post to a Moderator
Uprooted
Member
Member # 8353

 - posted      Profile for Uprooted   Email Uprooted         Edit/Delete Post 
Very cool post, Icarus, thanks.
Posts: 3149 | Registered: Jul 2005  |  IP: Logged | Report this post to a Moderator
Icarus
Member
Member # 3162

 - posted      Profile for Icarus   Email Icarus         Edit/Delete Post 
Thank you! [Smile]

-o-

You know, it must be writing about that place so late, but last night I dreamt that I returned to work there again. [Angst]

Posts: 13680 | Registered: Mar 2002  |  IP: Logged | Report this post to a Moderator
plaid
Member
Member # 2393

 - posted      Profile for plaid   Email plaid         Edit/Delete Post 
The best/worst story I've ever heard: there was a Greyhound bus driver who was fed up with his job. As he was driving and complaining to a passenger, the passenger egged him on, and finally the driver decided to quit -- he pulled over to the side of the road, took the keys, and walked away from the bus, leaving a busload of passengers stranded...
Posts: 2911 | Registered: Aug 2001  |  IP: Logged | Report this post to a Moderator
edgardu
Member
Member # 242

 - posted      Profile for edgardu           Edit/Delete Post 
Quidscribs, that's a great story. I would loved to have been there when they found your note.

I think it's unfair that you can get fired at moments notice but you can't leave that way. Canada's got it right. Maybe I should move there.

Posts: 176 | Registered: Aug 1999  |  IP: Logged | Report this post to a Moderator
Icarus
Member
Member # 3162

 - posted      Profile for Icarus   Email Icarus         Edit/Delete Post 
Well, to be fair, I can't be fired at a moment's notice except in extreme circumstances.

But yeah, the balance of power is still a bit off.

Posts: 13680 | Registered: Mar 2002  |  IP: Logged | Report this post to a Moderator
Tstorm
Member
Member # 1871

 - posted      Profile for Tstorm   Email Tstorm         Edit/Delete Post 
quote:
I think it's unfair that you can get fired at moments notice but you can't leave that way. Canada's got it right. Maybe I should move there.
You can also move to Kansas, where the same is true. Or just google "right to work" states for the whole list.
Posts: 1813 | Registered: Apr 2001  |  IP: Logged | Report this post to a Moderator
Icarus
Member
Member # 3162

 - posted      Profile for Icarus   Email Icarus         Edit/Delete Post 
erm, that's *not* what "right to work" means. We [Florida] are a right to work state.

In general, employees have fewer rights in a "right to work" state. The only significant right you gain is the right not to belong to your union.

"right to work" = newspeak for "right to screw employees"

Posts: 13680 | Registered: Mar 2002  |  IP: Logged | Report this post to a Moderator
TomDavidson
Member
Member # 124

 - posted      Profile for TomDavidson   Email TomDavidson         Edit/Delete Post 
Icky's entirely right. My mother lives in Florida as well, and "right to work" has definitely translated in her experience to "right to be screwed over, misused, and fired for no stated reason."
Posts: 37449 | Registered: May 1999  |  IP: Logged | Report this post to a Moderator
mackillian
Member
Member # 586

 - posted      Profile for mackillian   Email mackillian         Edit/Delete Post 
New Hampshire is also a right to work state.

...

I've quit two jobs. The first job I ever quit, I had worked for the place two previous summers (it was a summer camp). I loved the camp and the kids and my job. I loved what I did. The third summer I worked there, I moved from counselor to Boating Director (meaning I was on the senior staff and ran the boating activities all day. This is a ton of responsibility as you've got to maintain boats, safety, and training for all counselors, as well as putting together programs for kids to learn to use all the boats). I loved it. I love teaching counselors and fixing boats. I loved seeing everything run well, no one getting lost, kids gaining new knowledge (we had kids actually sailing, in the summers before, the counselors had barely known how to sail themselves, much less teach the kids). I'd gotten donations of two new (to us) sailboats, a fourteen foot O'Day and a seventeen foot Flying Scot (nice boats). I ran the area with a light touch. I hate micromanaging and it doesn't really work to anyone's advantage unless you happen to like power (which I don't). I knew what my counselors were capable of, gave them the instructions they needed, and let them go. I was also cautious. We were on a sizeable lake and it had weather patterns you could learn. You could see a storm coming (the currents would change direction, the wind would, etc). When there's a storm coming, you get the hell off the water. I grew up around water (ocean and lakes) and I've seen lightning strike the water and I know the adage to be damn true.

The camp's director didn't quite see it that way. She insisted that I keep the kids on the water for as long as possible, even if I saw a storm coming.

o_O

What? I explained things, I explained I had to keep the kids safe.

She said the kids needed to have all their boating time.

I agreed, but they also needed to be safe and I wasn't going to compromise on safety.

The issue was dropped.

Another issue got taken up. She decided I didn't scold my counselors enough or raise my voice.

o_O

She explained this by having the program director (her assistant) come down to my area and proceed to berate me in front of campers and counselors. [Mad] This was as I was calling people in because a storm was coming (which ended up breaking 20 minutes later). And the program director also launched into berating me for calling the kids in.

Did I mention that 20 minutes after I called the boats in (mind you, we also have to secure all the boats to make sure they don't get carried off), the storm broke? A nasty summer evening thunderstorm. [Wall Bash]

I was sick of it. Sick of being scolded for refusing to put kids and counselors in danger. So I quit. I gave four weeks notice (as we were required to) and I was told to leave on the spot. The camp was a residential camp. I was forced to pack up and leave on the spot without being given a chance to find lodging or anything. [Mad]

I ended up being the first in a long line of people to quit that summer. Thirty percent of the staff ended up quitting.
...

The second job was my first right out of college. I worked in a group home for foster kids (most of whom were in counseling, etc). First I was hired as a shift supervisor and then was hired to become the case manager.

This is the situation that eventually lead to me quitting:

A youth worker returns back to the home with one child after having taken that child to see the psychiatrist for a medication update. (His former foster family had stopped all his meds. Not good). The psychiatrist said she couldn't and wouldn't prescribe any meds to him until he'd had a mental health evaluation at the local mental health center.

Right. Now, for the past week, youth workers had been documenting that this kid was seeing/hearing things, which was why we took him to the psychiatrist.

Anyway, this youth worker had returned with said child while the area director was at the house (area director visits once every two weeks to see how stuff is going). Area director has a masters in education and no clinical training. Area director declares, "He doesn't need to have an evaluation."

o_O

I made a mistake. I said, "But the psychiatrist said so."

She turned a glare on me and said, "He doesn't need to be seen."

*sigh* I shouldn't have disagreed with her in front of the youth worker. My bad. I let it drop and we continued to watch the kid.

I spoke with his social worker at DSS the next day (this is in my job description, I link kids to needed services outside the home, as we aren't equipped to handle the harder mental health cases) gave her the update (she'd also spoken with the psychiatrist). She wasn't happy, but said she'd be okay with us continuing to monitor and document.

As the week went on, the kid got worse. [Frown]

The area director came back, insisted he was doing it for attention.

o_O What? We can tell the difference, especially when we've been working in close contact with a kid for as long as we had with him. The little guy was terrified. He wasn't pulling punches, he would barely even talk about it. It was even documented in his file that when he was taken off meds, he would see and hear things. [Frown]

Finally it happened that he started threatening to hurt himself. Because he was hearing/seeing things, is impulsive, and had plans, he really had to be seen. He was a danger to himself. I spoke with his DSS worker about it, she asked that he be taken. The group home director spoke with the area director who said to her over the phone, "JAMIE IS NOT TO TAKE HIM TO THE HOSPITAL. SOMEONE ELSE WILL HAVE TO."

...it's part of my job to take them when they need to go. The area director had also yelled that instruction so that I could hear it across the room. Over the phone.

Before I had become a case manager, whenever a child was taken for an evaluation, they were always sent back to the group home. We weren't a mental health facility, we didn't even have a clinician on staff. When you're looking at the mental health safety of a kid who is treatening suicide (or homicide for that matter), you look at 1) do they have a plan? 2) are they capable of carrying it out? 3) are they highly impulsive?

Answer yes to two of those three questions, and a kid needs a higher level of care (at the very least, a facility with a clinician on staff). Youth workers aren't trained in that, I was. I knew about the conditions, I knew about the higher level of care. I knew what to say and how to talk. I didn't take it lightly. I also took copies of the kid's file for the evaluator to look at themselves, so they could make their decision and it wouldn't be mine.

Anyway, so whenever I took a kid, they were either placed in a new facility with a clinician there, and a couple were hospitalized for their own safety.

So. The poor group home director (who was clueless and caught in the middle), threw her hands up. No one else was available to take the kid. She told me to take him. I did.

Knowing that I would be accused of slewing information, I gave the clinician the file and she spoke to the kid without me present. While there, he reported hearing things, he flipped out and attacked a nurse. Needless to say, he was admitted and even transported by ambulance. The clinician herself was horrified that he hadn't been seen sooner. He was a very sick little boy. [Frown]

Next day. i go to work, relay more information to DSS worker. DSS worker informs me that the area director had been there and was on her way to the group home and I was going to get thrown under the bus. She also said that the office and the DSS people who knew of the case all agreed that I had done the right thing.

Mmm. Fantastic. Area director arrives. I certainly DO get thrown under the bus. She "spoke" with me (read: yelled and scolded) me for five hours, until she had to leave. Whereupon she informed me that we would start this again tomorrow until I learned what my place and job were. She told me I wasn't allowed to talk to DSS, to doctors, to anyone outside the home. Basically, I wasn't to do my job, I was to come to work and sit around and do...nothing. Except listen to All She Had To Say.

Right. On my way home, I called the union rep and explained everything. He told me not to go in, there wasn't a reason other than to continued getting scolded and that was ridiculous.

This becomes mediated over two months time. The union was incredibly pissed (this was one of many complaints against this area director) and finally threatened to go to the press if they didn't terminate this area director.

She ended up getting fired.

I gave my notice a week later. [Smile]

Now, the job itself, without the administration, I loved. I loved working with the kids, good times and bad.

[Frown]

Posts: 14745 | Registered: Dec 1999  |  IP: Logged | Report this post to a Moderator
edgardu
Member
Member # 242

 - posted      Profile for edgardu           Edit/Delete Post 
Tstorm, I guess you meant "employment at will". Not that I knew that already; I came across the term after I googled "right to work"
Posts: 176 | Registered: Aug 1999  |  IP: Logged | Report this post to a Moderator
Tstorm
Member
Member # 1871

 - posted      Profile for Tstorm   Email Tstorm         Edit/Delete Post 
Edit: Trying for the 3rd time to delete this duplicate post.

[ December 06, 2005, 03:55 PM: Message edited by: Tstorm ]

Posts: 1813 | Registered: Apr 2001  |  IP: Logged | Report this post to a Moderator
Tstorm
Member
Member # 1871

 - posted      Profile for Tstorm   Email Tstorm         Edit/Delete Post 
That's what I meant. The employer can sure screw you over, no doubt about it. I won't argue that. But I'll take the option of having a choice any day. Unions never sounded particularly pleasant to me, though I understand their usefulness in some situations.

I'm thoroughly glad I can quit my current job at any moment I choose. I don't expect my employer to keep me around any longer than they have to. They'll drop me like a dead mouse the minute it occurs to them they'll make more money without me around. I've seen them do it to other employees before.

Posts: 1813 | Registered: Apr 2001  |  IP: Logged | Report this post to a Moderator
Katarain
Member
Member # 6659

 - posted      Profile for Katarain   Email Katarain         Edit/Delete Post 
mackillian, if she was fired, why quit ifyou loved the job? Wasn't she the main problem?
Posts: 2880 | Registered: Jun 2004  |  IP: Logged | Report this post to a Moderator
Stone_Wolf_
Member
Member # 8299

 - posted      Profile for Stone_Wolf_           Edit/Delete Post 
I gave notice at my job yesterday. I work for a gated community as a gate guard, and my work schedule bounces crazily around my school schedule (that's why I don't post much, no time). The abuses we put up with are...crazy. The HOA (home owner's association) is new, and my manager, she won't hire more people and works a post there probably 5 days a week. I've been waiting to quit to be able to pass a drug test (don't smoke pot kids, you can't get a good job) but because of some other drama in my life, my Mom and Uncle were going to give me some of my inheritance early, so, since I hated my job so much, I decide to quit. I gave notice, as I said, and lo and behold, my boss calls me up (at work) and offers me the shift I've been wanting, that my coworkers had been wanting to give me, graveyard. Well, since I can't get another job just yet, still waiting for the THC to clear my system, I've agreed. Strangely enough, this is not the first time this has happened (at different jobs), where I offer my resignation and then was given whatever it was that was the reason I was quitting. *shrug* I have another story to tell, that is very much on topic, but golly, I have to go get ready for work, heh. I still have to finish out my "normal" schedule this week before I get my new one.

Edit: Sorry about the quadruple post there, I was downloading the new WoW patch and it totally made my IE go wacky.

[ December 07, 2005, 02:10 AM: Message edited by: Stone_Wolf_ ]

Posts: 6683 | Registered: Jun 2005  |  IP: Logged | Report this post to a Moderator
Anna
Member
Member # 2582

 - posted      Profile for Anna           Edit/Delete Post 
I'm in a (sort of) crappy job, but I learnt today my colleagues want me out - so, contradiction spirit leading me, I decided to do anything to stay.
Quiting is one thing, getting fired is another.

Posts: 3526 | Registered: Oct 2001  |  IP: Logged | Report this post to a Moderator
Anna
Member
Member # 2582

 - posted      Profile for Anna           Edit/Delete Post 
I'm in a (sort of) crappy job, but I learnt today my colleagues want me out - so, contradiction spirit leading me, I decided to do anything to stay.
Quiting is one thing, getting fired is another.

Posts: 3526 | Registered: Oct 2001  |  IP: Logged | Report this post to a Moderator
Sterling
Member
Member # 8096

 - posted      Profile for Sterling   Email Sterling         Edit/Delete Post 
I worked for a while at a certain consumer electronics store that will remain nameless. Let's just say: you know it.

This store was in the University District in Seattle. Which meant, you got a lot of people coming in for batteries for their gizmos, fuses and circuit boards for engineering projects, the occasional phone or cd player or radio. Very little of the "big ticket" items- the remote controlled cars, computers, televisions, stereo components, and so on. This was a minimum-wage-plus-commission job, in a store where hardly anyone EVER made commission.

Now, a couple of miles away, there was another branch of this store in an upscale mall in a upper-middle class neighborhood. You would think a monkey- let alone someone who presumably had some manner of business degree- would understand that this store would do better numbers than the store I worked at.

Sadly, the area manager was sub-monkey.

So, we "sales associates" got harrassed and threatened to try to sell cell phones and credit cards and extended warranties to people who, by and large, just wanted to get their batteries and get out so they wouldn't miss their damn bus.

Our _store_ manager, in contrast to the area manager, was a decent and hard working fellow who was clearly working towards a nasty ulcer, if not a heart attack. The poor guy actually sent me for a week to work at the upscale-mall store to improve my sales numbers (everything and everyone was tracked, creating a nasty in-store competition among sales reps, along with everything else) for fear that the uber-manager might just come down from on high and dismiss me (who he felt, I hope, was one of his more reliable people.)

The defining moment, I think, was when the ubermanager started sending us threatening faxes about our store's sales numbers, again comparing us to the upscale mall branch. Our store had two phone lines, one of which was for calls, the other one of which was for faxes and credit card transactions. So while the sub-monkey's faxes were rattling away, paying customers had to stand and wait, unable to use their credit cards because of ubermanager's need to berate us.

I felt truly sorry for my store's manager when I left. But I've never been so glad to leave a job in my life. I told him my wife's family needed some help (which was true, though an excuse), wrote a letter making it clear that no one's actions or behavior were responsible for my chosing to quit, and shot out like a bullet.

Posts: 3826 | Registered: May 2005  |  IP: Logged | Report this post to a Moderator
Dan_raven
Member
Member # 3383

 - posted      Profile for Dan_raven   Email Dan_raven         Edit/Delete Post 
Sterling, I quit that company about 15 years ago. They made a big announcement that a new pay plan was going to emerge that would make everyone much happier.

When it came out it showed how you could make more money, if you sell more stuff. However, if you don't sell a lot more stuff, or just stay the same, you would make less money on the job.

Every person working in our region, who had half a brain--and that job attracks math geeks--did the math and showed it to their managers, the area managers, and the regional managers. We had a regional VP come into our store and apologize.

Yes, the new pay plan would pay us less money. That wasn't going to change. He just wanted to apologize for telling us it wouldn't.

Posts: 11895 | Registered: Apr 2002  |  IP: Logged | Report this post to a Moderator
Artemisia Tridentata
Member
Member # 8746

 - posted      Profile for Artemisia Tridentata   Email Artemisia Tridentata         Edit/Delete Post 
Yes. You probably meant "Employment at Will". A "Right to Work" state is one that does not allow "union shop" contracts that require that all employees join a union or pay union dues.
Posts: 1167 | Registered: Oct 2005  |  IP: Logged | Report this post to a Moderator
mackillian
Member
Member # 586

 - posted      Profile for mackillian   Email mackillian         Edit/Delete Post 
katarain, because 1) I got a better job in my own state and 2) the group home director had learned too much from the area director [Frown]
Posts: 14745 | Registered: Dec 1999  |  IP: Logged | Report this post to a Moderator
   

   Close Topic   Feature Topic   Move Topic   Delete Topic next oldest topic   next newest topic
 - Printer-friendly view of this topic
Hop To:


Contact Us | Hatrack River Home Page

Copyright © 2008 Hatrack River Enterprises Inc. All rights reserved.
Reproduction in whole or in part without permission is prohibited.


Powered by Infopop Corporation
UBB.classic™ 6.7.2