Some jobs are so unnecessarily bad that it almost seems like the managers are competing in some secret contest to determine who is the truly worst boss. After all, employee turnover isn’t that uncommon and even a competent manager’s style might not work with every employee. But to have the entire team quit at once really takes some work.
Recently, a person asked the internet to share their stories of job experiences so bad, all the staff walked out at once. So scroll down and upvote what you think are the wildest ones, and comment your own stories. And if you want to explore other horrible job experiences, Bored Panda has you covered, so check out some more here.
#1
Oh fun one. Our salon lost our manager to having a new baby and becoming a SAHM. It was sad to see her go. So our DM comes in and says he's hiring from within the salon. He's been looking at our sales , client retention and what not to pick.
Meanwhile for a month or so we had no manager. So Becky took the role on and did great. ( We still had paperwork and orders that needed done) She set up a cleaning schedule. She fixed a lot of simple issues that our old manager just didn't see issues with. Our schedule was written out for the entire month . Basically she stepped up and put in a lot of work she didn't get paid to do. Becky also had a really bad back. Was 45 and did hair for 27 years. If anyone needed to manager it was her. Her client list had gone down a bit, but she was still very busy.
Tara had worked their six months at this point. And Tara was not a team player. She would put your sales commission on her account accidentally. She would say things like she's paid to do hair not clean. Not to mention, she weight shamed everyone. Skinny fat in between. She found hurtful things to say about everyone. But she would be loud and laugh and be goofy. So we kinda just rolled out eyes and moved on . She was 23 and had a decent client list and remained " busy" . But here's the thing. She wasn't busy. Her friends would come in, hang out and whatever. Sure, she would do a wash and blowdry. But that's $20. No cutting no coloring. When her actual clients came in, she would do their hair and after they left, her and her friends would laugh about them. Our old manager had to tell her if her friends aren't there to get their hair done they don't need to hangout.
So DM comes in and sees all these clients / friends waiting on Tara. His dumba*s thinks that Becky overstepped her role and Tara should be managing.
The best part. We all looked at each other and started packing our bags. 6 people walked out. Tara crying that this isn't fair she earned this and we are just jealous bit**es. We went as a group and rented spots at a different salon. The old one shut down a month later. Because we take our clients with us. And washing your friends' hair doesn't keep the salon a float.
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333points
#2
Boss man told workers hell fire them for discussing wages, someone left a copy of the federal law protecting our rights to discuss wages on his desk, he gathered everyone into his office where he pinned the papers to a wall and shot them with his shotgun and then says anyone who discusses wages will be next. Wel all left and someone called the anonymous police line about a shooting at the place.
250points
#3
CEO announced to the company, amid concerns of being overworked, that other people have it worse and ‘if you don’t like it you can leave’. So everyone left.
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210points
While these may seem extreme, many companies are actually facing mass voluntary turnover, as workers choose to find other opportunities. Many have learned to not take themselves for granted and will leave bad jobs quickly. In 2021 alone, 45% of resignations were from people who had worked at a position for less than a year. The sunk cost fallacy still affects us, however, so this number drops to 8% after at least three years in a position.
Now, maybe that’s too harsh, if you are fine with your workplace, you’ll probably stay more than a year, if you can. Certain industries do suffer more turnover than others. Annual turnover in the US is around 18%, but it goes up to 30% for retail and commerce. These positions, particularly in service roles, have the misfortune of having to deal with potentially terrible managers and the general public. On the other hand, the energy industry experiences only around 15% turnover, as power infrastructure might kill you, but won’t yell at you for doing your job.
#4
Record profits are made. The ceo an managers get raises " lunch brakes will now only be 10 min and there will no longer be free food. We did good but not good enough so no raises for yall this time " 10+ people walk out to never return
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205points
#5
Our boss.
Multiple issues: trying to make us work while on vacation, underpaying us for car mileages, refusing to help with training, lying about being at the office when she was at home, ect
What made us all leave was when she denied leave for our coworker who’s dad had died unexpectedly. She asked for even just one day for the funeral and my boss refused.
We covered for our coworker for the week but then all put in our notice.
The higher ups finally figured out something was wrong for us ALL to resign and they fired her.
They begged us to come back, but if they’re that blind to what’s happening, it’s not worth it.
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184points
#6
Landscaping company. We were already stretched to the breaking point because the owner would never hire enough help. Then he decided it was a perfect time to take a new project...over two hours away from where anyone lived. Multiple people quit after this announcement. I stayed for another few days and then quit.
A few weeks later, he was calling everyone and begging us to come back because the property owners were furious with him over the work not even being started. I told him I'd already gotten a new job. He swore at me and hung up lol
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168points
Despite the general chaos in the world economy since COVID, there is a growing sense of confidence among workers. Many of the stories here may have appeared risky, as quitting on the spot can be terrifying. You don’t know how long it will take to find a new job, how quickly you will have income again, and other concerns. But 36% of workers stated that they were ready to quit without having another job lined up for them. 22% were confident that they could find employment fairly quickly. So managers beware, more than half your workforce is ready to walk at almost a moment's notice.
#7
They called in a consultant. This guy's "brilliant" idea was to totally switch business models and go from selling one type of product (which we had tons of clients willing to buy and were making great money) to selling a completely different product and turning all of our production staff into salespeople. After the announcement:
Day 1: three people left
Day 2: four more left
Day 3: it was down to me and the two owners, I lasted another week and then left.
Company went under in about 3 months.
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162points
#8
Boss relied on the old “you’ll never be able to get a job somewhere else, and certainly not a better one” gaslighting tactic to keep us. One of us did find another, better job somewhere else. Everyone else was gone within 6 months.
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157points
#9
I had a boss that colluded with some new hires and family members to vote out the union. We lost our pension, benefits, and guaranteed rates overnight. They only needed 40% to pass. Everyone who voted to keep the union quit within a month.
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153points
Either directly or indirectly, managers are responsible for over half (60%) of the voluntary and, obviously, involuntary turnover at a company. Of the 60% of US workers who chose to leave their jobs, managers were cited as a common factor for quitting, alongside a “less-than-ideal work environment,” which is a wonderfully vague way to describe a horrible workplace. Since managers can and do have so much control over the day to day of operations, it is safe enough to blame them for a workplace is, well, “less-than-ideal.”
#11
They hired a manager who was vicious. Then did not stop her behavior. And long term employees just quit one by one. I held on longer than most. At my exit interview, they asked why I was leaving and I just said her name. Finally two years later they let her go but by that time they had an entire turnover of staff.
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127points
#12
Private company (1924-1988) single owner dies of old age. Family sells Connecticut based company to French corporation.
French company says we are moving you guys 500 miles north to New Hampshire. You can move yourself at your own expense, and have equivalent pay for 1 year after which it may be readjusted.
They were expecting about 125 people to relocate with them; they got 3.
They got desperate, but in the end all they could get was people promising to stay until the Connecticut site closed, for an additional 6-month bonus at the end. (I took this, I was the last one, signing papers with HR on the loading dock and driving away with a few nice checks.)
EDIT 1: for those interested I met and spoke with old Bern himself in '87 while he was touring our test lab. His comment was (more or less) these guys need new equipment, which was spot on.
EDIT 2: No part of Connecticut is 500 miles from New Hampshire. More like 250 miles, if that.
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122points
In the US, for not entirely clear reasons, the West Coast appears to have the worst managers. In an America-wide survey of workers, people in California, Washington State, and Oregon complained the most about bad bosses and were the most likely in the US to quit over terrible managers. The bottom line, at least for US employers, is that statistics show that three out of four resignations could have been prevented.
#13
Teenage Coworker asked for two days off because she’d found herself pregnant. Manager said that she was just reading her body wrong and wasn’t pregnant. Called her into work the day after her abortion.
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122points
#14
I led an IT team that supported a new version of a proprietary application. The team was a mix of corporate employees and contractors.
Most of the customers who used out app were located in the Western hemisphere, so while we provided 24x7 support, the vast majority of customer issues were during the typical North American work day.
We had a couple of contractors who liked working overnights, so they covered the evenings, and did a handoff every AM.
This worked very well. So well, in fact, that our corporate overlords decided that the app should be expanded globally. We noted that the current team couldn't handle the additional support load without more team members.
Instead of doing that, management decided that we should just move a bunch of people from the day shift to the night shift. Since no one liked this idea, management implemented a mandatory "rolling" schedule, in which you might work 9-5 one week, and 3-11 the next. There was no predictability, and personal preferences/needs were not taken into account at all.
I pointed out to management that this would make our well-seasoned support team unhappy, and would technically violate the contract that the contractors were working under (which specified work hours).
Nobody in management thought that this was a problem.
I immediately wrote letters of recommendation for everyone on my team, and started applying for other jobs. In about two weeks, I had a better job lined out, and gave my notice.
Within about a month, all of the contractors had been moved to other contracts (with different companies) when they reported the contract breach to their handlers, and about a half dozen of the long-serving corporate folks had found other jobs, like I did.
Support for the app got moved to India, and my understanding is that the dealers (the people who used the app) staged something of a revolt, and the app had to be shut down and reverted to a previous version that cost the company a lot more money to maintain.
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119points
#15
Not all at once, but in very quick succession.
A coworker, whose brother owned the business and no one liked, got promoted to supervisor. Took him about 20 minutes before he started abusing his power, ordering people to do extra hours to cover his shifts and s**t like that.
About 6 weeks later, basically the entire staff had found new jobs and quit.
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116points
#16
Management who came in at noonish, checked some shots then left at 3-4pm announced that all artists would be required to work 12 hour days for the next few weeks because they took on too many contracts at once. A few people said "f**k it" and quit, that cascaded into more and more people quitting since they realized they'd be expected to finish their shots too.
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112points
#17
we had a really really toxic manager (F 36) who wasn’t fit to be manager, would talk trash on her employees & got banned from working at VS. one time, the store flooded & we were waiting to hear back from her as to when the store was repaired. she had terrible (hardly any) communication, so she didn’t tell half the staff. one full time employee (F 41) stopped by 3 days after reopening & asked why she wasn’t notified. the manager told her “you’re a big girl, you should’ve figured it out yourself”. we all quite like beads falling off a broken necklace after that.
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108points
#18
Boss said that we wouldn't have paid Christmas vacation (after doing it for 5 years), the issue is that he announced it two weeks before Christmas when a lot of people already had travel plans - That and removing Christmas bonuses.
A bunch of people quit over that, some I know are job hunting and ready to leave.
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107points
#19
Management laid me off. The manager. In 6 years I had 1 turnover. After they laid me off all 6 of the guys reporting to me had their two weeks notice in. It’s a long story but basically the new management had no clue what they were doing and it showed when they “eliminated my position”
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102points
#20
Boss binge watched us on the security cameras and came back to us with the findings.
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96points