Karen Cancels Employee's Vacation, Gets To Kiss Her Promotion Goodbye

Imagine a supervisor who continually refuses to give your vacation time in favor of their workplace cliques. So you end up having zero time off in two years. While ‘I can’t even’ just by typing this, for one Redditor who worked in a disability shared accommodation agency this was a reality.

As if his job wasn’t hard enough already, “one of the Clique members 'Karen' was appointed acting supervisor and it went to hell,” the former employee wrote in a post on r/ProRevenge. Turns out, Karen wasted no time in giving her friends the best shifts and making their requests a priority. So every time the author would apply for leave, Karen would reject it “on the grounds that others had already submitted leave.”

Understandably, the author’s frustration grew: “This annoyed me as I have a family that I wanted to take on holiday.” But this all came to an end when the CEO himself intervened, asking his employee to take some time off. Read on for how this whole situation evolved and let me tell you, there’s some sweet revenge in the end.

“A workplace clique is when a group of coworkers become tightly knit, to the extent they exclude or otherwise negatively impact on coworkers who are not in the clique,” Christine Mitterbauer, licensed and ICF approved career coach and serial entrepreneur told Bored Panda in an interview. “If you’re experiencing this as a coworker not in the clique, it can be very stressful and damaging to your experience at work, not to mention your confidence and your career progression.”

As soon as you feel that coworkers are becoming too close and cliquey, Christine recommends preparing yourself for a bit of a counter attack. “Every situation is different, but one thing to look out for is starting to gather proof that you’re not being treated fairly. Whenever you have conversations with the people involved, try to do them in writing so there’s a visual record of what they said. Taking pictures of certain situations, especially if the picture can demonstrate what time something occurred/did not occur, this can also strengthen your case.”

Christine continued: “Also, get other people in the company on your side, including other coworkers who are not in the clique, as well as superiors, bosses or other allies you can think of. Be fair and honest when you involve them in conversations. This isn’t about you forming your own clique and playing the same dirty game as the clique is playing with you, but it’s about gathering proof and allies that you can eventually use to get the people in the clique to be reprimanded and ultimately stopped.”

The career coach concluded that in case you’re in a similar situation, it’s best to “always act quickly when you suspect people are acting fishy, as it can really ruin your confidence and experience at work if this kind of behavior goes on for too long.”