Stories about when your boss got fired

In My Humble Opinion
41

I got hired for a job in Costa Rica, under the system called “ingenieros Telefónica”, where people from Spain go to a Latin American country for 89 days and then come back home for a month, go back…

I’d initially been offered the Team Lead position, but it turned out that the Finance person, who had much more experience than I did, had Required and Requested that job: she would not accept the position unless she was Team Lead. I’d still be getting the same pay if I wasn’t, so I happily accepted (hey, less meetings for me!).

There were a lot of wrong things. She didn’t seem to know her General Ledger from her Cost Centers; she said “yes” to every single request from the customer (Finance? “Yes” as default answer? That’s like… like flying turtles, only rarer); she never fulfilled basic social obligations while complaining that two of us (Paul and me) would not go out get drunk with her; when I let the Maintenance guys into her room to do some preventive work (we were flatmates), I saw that she had a calendar on the wall with the details of her negotiation (:confused:) including a salary which did not correspond to the experience she was supposed to have, with a “YAY, they’ve accepted!!!” beside it. We tried to point out diplomatically that she might need some help; the terms in which we were rebuffed weren’t particularly polite.

We were supposed to have a meeting at the Home Office in Christmas. It got cancelled, too late to cancel our hotel stays and change train tickets, oh well. First day back, Paul and I got in the lift together and he told me “I really don’t know why they’ve made us come, they could have fired us over the phone” “yeah.”

I’m introduced to a guy who’s “going to do Maintenance now”; I was doing Maintenance, so I reckon he’s my replacement.

Nope. He was my junior (the junior from hell, too, but that’s a different story). Someone had remarked on how the boss looked younger than her 35 years, the receptionist had overheard it and said “35 my ass, she’s 25”. “No way, she…” “She’s four days younger than me. I filed her government paperwork, I noticed!” She’d invented her experience, which explains both why she was so lost and why she thought a salary that would be highish for entry level would be OK for someone with 10 years’ experience…

42

  1. Not really a boss but I took an assignment with a temp agency. The agency representative mistakenly told me the pay rate that they charged the client, not the much lower pay rate I would receive. Naturally , when I received my paycheck, I was furious. The previous agency representative had been fired. I ended up compromising on the pay rate but it was a very awkward relationship for the 3 months.

  2. I had a teacher in high school who often mentioned he graded our papers at a local tavern. Apparently he really liked his liquor since he was involved in a couple of alcohol related incidents and was replaced a couple months into the school year.

43

Sorry for the hijack – This reminds me of the best ever maths teacher I ever had in high school. He was the most awesomely fantastic teacher of maths I’ve seen in my life, extremely good at it, and really able to transmit his passion for the subject…

…but he was a tremendous (I would almost say “terminal”) alcoholic. He always scheduled his classes for after 1PM, and to his credit he never showed up to give class obviously drunk. But the rest of the day he spent it absolutely sloshed. It was a real pity.

He basically killed himself with drink; he died one year after I had him as a teacher. A tremendous waste of potential, in my opinion. If he was THAT good being a complete alcoholic, imagine what he would have been capable of sober!!

</hijack>

44

It is actually coming up on the one-year anniversary.

Major meeting with the project lead, upper management, and us worker drones. Subject of the meeting: why are we missing our deadlines.

Project lead was on the spot, and as we went thru the project deliverables, chose to point the finger at me for not doing the work he had requested on deadline for several of the items on the list. Focus of the meeting switched to me. I managed to maintain my calm (not easily) and was able to relate how I had met all the deadlines, and had informed the project lead in e-mails. Upper management asked if I still had the e-mails.

I did.

Upper management ended the meeting, asking me to forward the relevant documentation to him. I did so, immediately - thank God, that I for once had organized my folders so I could put my hands on everything immediately. Upper management responded within 45 minutes, with a meeting request for 7:00am the next morning. I was concerned, although not that concerned, because I figured if they were going to fire me they wouldn’t do it first thing in the morning. I thought we would follow up about the deadlines, and figure out how to recover. I usually am at work by 7:00am, so that was not an issue.

I came into work the next morning, and passed the project lead’s cube. It was dark and empty, and his name plate was gone. The meeting was indeed about the deadlines, but he wasn’t at it. The new project lead was at the meeting. Subject: how can we meet our deadlines, and oh, by the way, we are extending your contract.

Regards,
Shodan

45

Let me get this straight, this guy’s father owned a large enough stake in Home Depot, a Dow Component with a current market cap of about $158 million to influence its hiring decisions, and his son used this connection to secure what would probably be considered a lower middle class position in retail management?

46

Well if this had been 3+ years ago, the market cap was only about $60 billion, and much less further back in time.

But yes, that sort of thing happens all the time. Get your kids/nephews into the company at higher than normal starting levels and allow them to “work their way up” (where ‘adequate’ performance in a single job for 3-6 months = promotion to next level because Nepotism).

47

I’m well aware of that, but I’d expect that someone with those type of connections would set their sights much higher, even for an entry level job.

48

This was more than ten years ago. He was the youngest store manager I encountered in my time with the company. Perhaps nepotism would have placed him much higher if he wasn’t such an idiot.

49

I spent the Bicentennial year in South Korea, while I was in the US Army.

The new commander of our unit, “Col B” arrived on a hot July day. He was late, and as we had been assembled on the motor pool parking lot, people started passing out from the heat. He never apologized.

He’d berate his subordinate officers in front of enlisted people.

Col. B didn’t understand the radio units we operated worked by Zulu time(GMT) He’d say “don’t give it to me in Zulu time, give it to me in real time!”

He once put a 24 hour guard on a statue that had been vandalized, saying it would remain there until someone told him who’d done it. We all hated that statue(long story) and eventually the guard was removed.

Col B liked to put surprise inspections of small, four men units up near the border. He’d call for a helicopter to fly there, not realizing as soon as he left someone radioed ahead he was on his way.

Col B finally made a really stupid move. See, he didn’t like women in the military, didn’t approve of that AT ALL. We had a general arriving, who would be meeting with some of us EW’s, with questions about female military service, and how we viewed our working conditions. Col. B made some kind of excuse not to meet with the general.

Generals always trump colonels And Gen Mary Clark was, shall we say it, not pleased that a colonel had brushed her off. Col. B’s next assignment was to an assisting commander gig at Ft. Hood, Texas, so we heard. He couldn’t be fired, but I doubt he was ever promoted again.

50

With one exception, I’ve always missed The Big Firings at my jobs. I did an overnight at my big box store and the manager was fired by one of the top national managers during my normal shift. Like it was the most exciting thing ever to happen in the store, and we had Lenny Kravitz shop there once. And I missed it (both, actually). I’m still mad years later that I had such horrible timing, watching that asshole boss get escorted out.

There was a seemingly nice family who worked there who all got fired (again, day off) when it turns out they were stealing everything not bolted down. That was depressing and awful. We weren’t allowed to talk about it, which I understand to a certain extent, but management couldn’t be human and recognize that we had known this whole group for years and it was upsetting, even if it was right to fire them.

Another big box store I worked at the managers got fired for taking employees out to the strip clubs. Days off again. I come back in and there are all these new people and it took HOURS to figure out what was going on because we weren’t allowed to talk about it. There’s a huge difference between being discreet (giving people need to know information in a Dragnet-esque Just The Facts manner) and being secretive.

I did participate in one person’s firing. He was new and I was assigned to track his output, which was nowhere near my regular duties. (His tracked output was far, far less than his coworkers.) I figured out immediately what was going on and it was really hard to be like “Hey, how’s it going?” bumping into him. I deserved an Oscar for the day the inevitable firing happened for finding ways to looks busy and not look like I was aware of what was going on. It’s really hard to not look at someone and not have it be clear you’re NOT LOOKING on purpose. Especially because it just would have been more embarrassing for him thinking “Everybody knows” when I just happened to sit closest to the door and my boss trusted me the most to keep my mouth shut.

51

I once of a college professor quite without warning after mid-terms and take all of his files along with him (including the mid-terms). Naturally we were never given any details what happened to him, but I did overhear 2 administrators talking outside after the department chair met with our claims. Whatever he did the dean was furious, and she said he would never work anywhere again.

52

So who messed with the statue?

53

Many moons ago when I was a dept. manager at a retail store one of the ass’t. store managers disappeared. One that I really liked - super nice guy, easy to work with and learn from. He was there when we closed one night and then never showed up again. Turns out he was stacking merchandise near the stock room door and, on his smoke breaks, hiding it behind the store. After closing he would drive around and pick up the stuff. Company security figured it out and arranged for the local police to arrest him while he was loading his car with loot. I never did hear why he was doing it, but it did not work out well for him.

The moral of this story? Never trust a smoker. :smiley:

54

Kevin Dillon, Andrew McCarthy, Malcolm Danare and Stephen Geoffreys.

55

A number of years ago the manager of our office IT team moved to another position and a new manager was hired. Old manager (who has extremely good judgement) had been part of the interview team and recommended against hiring the new person but Upper Management disagreed so “Sharon” was hired. She supposedly had 20+ years of IT management experience.

Sharon was a disaster. She pissed off many of her peers here at the firm, she angered the dozen of us who directly reported to her, evidently had no idea that we have a budget and just handed out equipment left right and center to anyone who asked until one of the junior guys pointed out to her that we were just about out of things like laptops and how were we going to get more? Lousy technical skills, lousy managerial skills, lousy planning, just clueless.

Her first meeting with us (her new team) started with her saying “This is how I do things, if you don’t like it then you should quit”. Multiple people nearly took her up on that over time and this was one of the best teams I’d ever worked with.

I had to talk to HR because she kept calling me “cutie” (I’m a guy, about 15 years younger than she was). 20 years as a manager and you don’t think that maybe that’s inappropriate?

We have an initial 180 day period after which the local office manager solicits feedback on the new employee. I expressed my profound concern about Sharon to the office manager. I found out that virtually everyone else on the team did as well. Some people were so upset with her that they didn’t write it down, they went to the office manager and discussed their concerns directly.

Anyhow, on day 180 a couple of us went out to lunch. When we came back, Sharon’s office was dark and there was an email from the office manager announcing her immediate departure. I recall there was a lot of loud happiness in the aisles.

56

Can’t believe I couldn’t recall this until just now.

When I went back to school in the late 1980s, I got a job at a carryout pizza place. The manager was younger than me (I was the store’s oldest employee at 24) and he was a terrific manager. It was honestly the most fun I’ve ever had at a job.

And then one day, I show up, and I’m told that he’s been fired. :confused: Of course, they didn’t say why, and the store rapidly deteriorated without him, and I quit a few months later. Several months after that, I ran into him at the mall, where he was shopping with his mom, and he told me that he had taken a $10 bill out of the register to the bank to get a roll of quarters, and the district manager happened to be there and didn’t believe his story.

Do I think he’s telling the truth? Actually, I do.

This particular chain still exists, and has mutated into a form completely unrecognizable compared to the relatively new concept at the time.

57

Several years ago, I was working for a Christian non-profit organization. I was in charge of all things IT and also was the main “data wrangler”. I reported to a great guy, whose position was Development Director. (In a fundraising organization, the Development Director is in charge of the the fundraising.) He was also, in effect, the CFO. I shall call him “Bill”.

He was in the process of getting an advanced degree, either a Master’s or a PhD, and had taken two weeks of vacation to go back to his school to sit some various tests. He was in daily contact with our office in case something came up, but we could only leave him voice mails on his cell phone, and he would call us back during breaks or lunch, or after work.

One day while he was still gone, the director of our parent organization (I’ll call him “Larry”) came to our Wednesday staff meeting and told us that he had spoken with Bill and had told him that it just wasn’t working out, and that Bill was relieved of his duties as Development Director/CFO of our fundraising organization. (No reasons were given, but it had everything to do with the rancorous politics that can be pervasive in religious organizations, sad to say.) However, to help ease him out gently, Bill was given a temporary spot at headquarters to help him find something else to do.

At lunchtime, the Operations Director of our organization took me out to lunch and said, “Tell me what you do for us and why we should keep you!” :eek: (One of the hardest interviews I have ever been on, and certainly one with the shortest amount of preparation!)

Anyway, later that night, Bill called me on my cell phone to ask me a computer-related question. After I answered his question, I said to him, “Bill, I want you to know that you have been on my heart all day, and I have prayed for you several times throughout the day.” He said, “Thanks, I appreciate that.” Long pause. “Why were you praying for me?”

I replied, “Well, because you lost your job today and are being transferred to a temporary job at headquarters.”

His response: “Oh. So THAT is what Larry was trying to tell me today!”

Apparently, Larry had sugarcoated the whole thing so much that Bill didn’t know he had been fired!

So, I had the misfortune of informing my boss that he had been fired.

58

I had a horrible boss who was fired for being an Amway salesman. :smiley:

He was the district manager for the outdoor store where I worked. The store policy was that you couldn’t work for a competing retailer at the same time. For example, you couldn’t also work at The Gap. They’re not an outdoor store, but both of us sold casual clothes so they were considered a competitor. This policy was explained upon hiring, and in the rare case where someone made a good faith misjudgement, there was no penalty. The employee would just have to choose which of the two jobs he or she wanted to keep. It’s not like anybody got fired for it.

Until one day, we were informed that the horrible district manager had been fired for violating the non-compete policy! Amway sells a huge range of stuff, and outdoor stores carry quite a few categories of merchandise. I don’t know if the overlap was really significant or if they were looking for an excuse to can him. But…Amway! Ha ha ha ha ha!!

59

My dad saw it happen once around 1970. He worked in a freezing and cold storage plant where unprocessed food was stored in boxes 4ft X 4ft X 4ft. The product is stored at a constant temp so Ice does not form and when processing the product it should poor out of a tipped box like gravel.

The plant manager decided on his own to take on the operating engineers union. He demanded that the engineers take a pay cut. Well there was a strike. It took 3 non union engineers each shift to replace one union engineer. And they could not operate the plant right. Basically the cold storage tunnels were not maintaining temperature. After about 3 month the strike was settled and everyone went back to work. With a lot of OT to clean up the plant and get it back into proper operating condition.

The second day back the Chief Engineer was in the office when his phone rang. He answered to one really pissed off district manager. some of the product was sent from my dad’s plant to Fresno to be processed. When they went to dump the boxes the product came out in one solid block. They were unable to process any of the product. the only thing it was good for was pig food. Tons and tons of pig food.

The district manager was screaming at the Chief wanting to know what happen to the product, and what king of engine room was he running. when the district manager slowed down so the Chief could answer, He just said something on the lines of, I don’t know what has been around here for the last three months. Then the district manager demanded to know why he did not know what was happening in his engine room. the Chiefs answer was well sir this is only my 2nd day back after being locked out of my engine room for 3 months and I am still trying to find out what all is wrong and fix it. The district manager then demanded to know who authorized the lock out. The Chief said well I believe that would be the plant manager. The district manager then told the Chief to get the plant manager on the phone NOW!.

The chief handed the phone to the plant manager and said “this call is for you”. The call was a series of yeses and noes. And when the plant manager hung up he just reached for a cardboard box and began cleaning out his desk.

60

I did not get to see it but

In 2013 I retired from a high rise. When I turned in my notice to the property managers, they took me into there office for a closed door talk. It started with the statement that they knew that I was the one keeping the building running and they did not think the Chief could run the building with out me. Then they tried to talk me into putting off my retirement. At 66 That was not going to happen.

About 6 months after I retired the building sold. The journeyman and the utility engineers passed their job interviews with the new building owner. I understand the chief failed the job interview badly and was not hired by the new owners.