Dump This Boss With The Bins And Boxes

(It’s the day before an inspection of our workplace, and there’s a lot of tidying to do, especially of things that have been dumped in bins and boxes and left on the showroom floor. Our boss has no sense of priority and, instead of dealing with the dumped items — many of which he dumped there himself — he decides to rearrange the office. He’s been told over the last six or more months to do it, and he’s now in a panic. I figure he’s planning on having us do all the dumped items, but no, I get in at 8:00 am and I’m told to completely rearrange a section of our showroom — completely unnecessary at this time. I soon realise I don’t have enough fixtures to complete the job.)

Me: “I’m running out of [item] and can’t fix the shelves properly.”

Boss: “I’ve been collecting them, so I know there’s enough to do it.” *walks off*

(I keep on working and having to lay the shelf dividers loosely; after about two hours the boss brings me a bag of the items I need. I keep going but soon realise that we are still going to fall way short.)

Me: “There’s not going to be enough.”

Boss: “Of course there will be enough; I saved enough for this job.”

Me: “I need twelve [items] for each shelf.”

Boss: “There should be enough there.”

Me: “I still have a dozen shelves to do.”

Boss: “You can do it.”

(I continue on just fixing the shelves on each end with two each of the items, leaving the rest of the shelf dividers loose but being held in place by stock. The boss decides to “help” me by moving some of the stock, which really creates more work for me to do. It’s now 8:00 pm; I’ve been working on this all day.)

Me: “Can you imagine how long this would take if I had to fix every shelf divider in place?”

Boss: “Well, the way I do it is to lay and complete all the shelves first, and then put the stock there.”

(I turn and give him a look of daggers, as he knows I had to lay every line of stock individually to find the best fit.)

Boss: “Well, maybe not this time.”  

(When I finally finish, I have just six of the “we have enough” items left, which means we are only 90 short. After I replace all the items the boss “helped” me with, it is close to 9:30 pm. I actually have to ask him to leave things alone that I am not ready for. I clean up the area and start looking forward to leaving. The move has left one section empty, which I tried to talk the boss out of emptying completely, but he insisted that it should be done.)

Boss: “Do you think you could just move [another section] so that section is filled?”

(That would be at least another hour’s work, because then he would make me fill the new empty section with something, as well.)

Me: “No, I don’t think so.”

Boss: “Yeah, it’s probably time to go, or I’m going to fall asleep on the drive home.”

(He lives a whole ten minutes away; I have a forty-minute drive. We headed to pick up our personal items and I noticed that not one of those dumped bins and boxes had been touched.)