(It’s my first day and the manager is on my tail about being too slow.)

Manager: “Faster! Faster! Faster! Faster!”

Me: “I can’t do it any more faster, or I’ll fall!”

Manager: *bellowing* “Faster! Faster! Faster! Faster!”

(Consequently, I trip and my plates go flying. They crash on the ground.)

Me: “Now look what you made me do! I told you!”

Manager: “You did not say that! It’s not my fault you’re clumsy, butterfingers! That’s coming out of your paycheck!”

(I was fired a week later. I wasn’t upset.)

(I’ve accidentally overdrawn my bank account. The nearest credit union location is currently 60 miles away so I open my mobile banking app to do a picture based deposit of a check I received to cover my overdraft. The mobile deposit feature is missing.)

Credit Union: “Hi, how can we help you?”

Me: “Hi. I am trying to make a deposit but the mobile deposit feature on my phone app seems to be missing.”

Credit Union: “Yes, looking at your account it seems your account is overdrawn by $xx.xx so we disabled certain features in your mobile app.”

Me: “Let me see if I understand this correctly. I owe you money so you disable my ability to give you the money I owe you?”

Credit Union: “It is our standard policy to disable certain features of the mobile app for accounts that are overdrawn.”

Me: “Does this even seem logical to you?”

Credit Union: “It is our standard policy to disable certain features of the mobile app for accounts that are overdrawn.”

Me: *slowly like I’m dealing with a child* “Okaaay. Since I can’t drive the 60 miles to get to the nearest credit union right now can you recommend an alternative way to make a deposit?”

Credit Union: “Sure, I can help with that. Let me have your zip code so I can look up the nearest credit union.”

Me: *face-palming, knowing the answer coming up next* “Sure it’s [zip code].”

Credit Union: “Okay, it looks like the nearest credit union for [Different Brand Chain] is 60 miles away, or the nearest branch of our chain is 360 miles away.”

Me: “Yes, I know. As I said already I can’t drive that distance right now. Do you have another suggestion for making a deposit? Perhaps I could mail it to you?”

Credit Union: “Yes, you can mail a deposit to us at [Address].”

Me: “I would just like to recap this conversation… So, I owe you money and you disable my ability to give you money right away, and instead I’m forced to mail the check to you via the post office so that it takes many more days to get the money I owe you. And this is your preferred method of business?”

Credit Union: “It is our standard policy to disable certain features of the mobile app for accounts that are overdrawn.”

Me: *click*

(This happens on my second trip to the pharmacy in the same day. Note, I have plenty of experience as a cashier and actually own a small shop, but I generally pretend to be ignorant as a customer so as not to offend cashiers who do not know what they are doing.)

Pharmacy Tech: *referring to the Point of Sale machine* “It’s going to tell you to sign before you swipe your card.”

Machine: *displays words* “Please swipe card.”

Me: *swipes card without waiting for the screen I am supposed to sign*

Machine: *flashes rapidly between the screen I was supposed to sign and the total, then says* “Processing, please wait.”

Me: “Oops! I was supposed to sign first.”

Pharmacy Tech: “On my end, it says it is waiting for you.”

Me: *turning POS around so he can read it* “On my end, it says, “Processing, please wait.””

Pharmacy Tech: “Well, these are new. I have no idea what to do about that! Try hitting cancel.”

Me: *hits cancel*

(The pharmacy tech hits cancel about twenty times, which any cashier who has used a POS before should know causes the system to freeze. He calls to another employee behind him.)

Pharmacy Tech: “She swiped her card before signing. It’s frozen. What am I supposed to do now?”

Pharmacy Tech #2: “I don’t know. Just shut it down and move to another register.”

(I left wondering how long it would take before they froze all three of their registers.)

(I am fairly new to the company. I am assigned to help the chief engineer update some safety documentation for existing and new equipment.)

Engineer: “[My Name], why have you changed all the details in the early part of this document you’ve sent me? That’s still relevant!”

Me: “That’s the document for [new equipment], not [old equipment].”

Engineer: “How was I supposed to know that?”

Me: “It’s in the filename of the document.”

Engineer: “Oh, you can’t expect me to read that.”

Me: “…and the title page of the document.”

Engineer: “…hmm.”

Me: “…and the e-mail you opened the file from.”

Engineer: *incoherent muttering*

(For a couple years, I have worked full time at a radio station as a graphic designer, with a web developer, and a manager (Boss #1) who oversees all of our projects. It is a really good arrangement: we each have our own offices next to each other in the same hallway. All of our projects exceed expectations, we always finish them all ahead of schedule, and we all work so well together that we consider each other friends more than co-workers. One day, one of our higher-ups (Boss #2) calls Boss #1 into his office. He tells us about the conversation afterwards:)

Boss #2: “So, we just got the manager reviews back from everyone, and it turns out you got the highest score in the entire building!”

Boss #1: “Yeah, we all work really well together as a team. We’re really lucky to have found a way to collaborate that works well for everyone.”

Boss #2: “It’s so good, actually, that we’re a little worried.”

Boss #1: “Really? Why?”

Boss #2: “We think you’re being overprotective of your employees – they don’t really mingle with any other departments and we want everyone to have relationships with each other.”

Boss #1: “Okay, I can see where you’re coming from. I’ll try to see what I can do to make our department a little more open to others in the building.”

(Our boss tells us about the situation and we all agree to try and start socializing with our other co-workers a little more. We do a great job for a couple of weeks until one day Boss #2 calls us all into Boss #1’s office.)

Boss #2: “So, I have an idea I want to throw past you guys. What if we moved all of you out of your offices and put you into one large shared space, like they have at Google?”

Me: “That sounds like it could be a cool environment, but we already work really well just by having our own offices.”

Boss #1: “Not to mention, didn’t you just pay a lot of money for those personality evaluations? Each one of ours said that we work better if we have our own space to retreat to.”

Coworker: “Can we have some time to think about it?”

Boss #2: “…ctually, I was talking about it to [Owner of the Company], and he wants to make it happen. Construction starts in two weeks.”

(All of us were shocked. True to his word, a construction crew came in to start renovating for our new office… a week earlier than we were told. I came back from vacation to find my office completely empty: my personal items, desk, and even the photos on the wall had all been taken down and moved without my knowledge. In a few days they had moved all of us to opposite corners of the building, isolating us from each other, without any prior notification or really caring about our feedback. It turned out that Boss #2 didn’t like how tight-knit we all were. Within two weeks our morale nosedived, the construction took twice as long as was promised, my coworker quit and found a better job, and eventually Boss #1 was replaced by someone who didn’t know the first thing about what we were supposed to be doing. Our department fell apart. To this day Boss #2 still scratches his head and wonders “what went wrong.”)