Having a manager’s position comes with a set of responsibilities as they are the ones who have to ensure that employees are doing their jobs, motivate them, give them advice and handle difficult situations. While their duties are important, sometimes the power they have to control other people goes to their head and makes them unbearable people.
So the stories of such arrogant managers being brought down to Earth are very satisfying and Reddit user DistrictEquivalent79 has such a story to tell. He had to fix a server in a store, but the manager there didn’t really understand how important his job was and demanded to call his manager to complain about how he had disrupted her lunch break. Little did she know the IT guy’s manager was way above her and had the power to fire her.
More info: Reddit
IT guy just wants to do his job when the store manager asks to speak with his boss, so knowing it will end badly, he allows her to speak to them
Image credits: Taiyo FUJII (not the actual image)
The story took place 13 years ago and the Original Poster (OP) worked as a field service engineer, also known as an engineering technician, or, as DistrictEquivalent79 put it himself, “the IT guy who drove around in a company vehicle, servicing the computer networks in the stores.”
The OP was a corporate worker as opposed to a retail employee, which meant he received corporate stock as part of his salary, technically making him a co-owner. His base salary was also quite higher than any of the retail managers’ salaries.
This information is relevant because the OP felt it was quite ironic that when he had to deal with store managers, they would act as if they were the store owners and the OP was some random IT guy who was below a retail worker in the company hierarchy.
Bored Panda reached out to DistrictEquivalent79 and once again confirmed that this was very much the case, "Store managers looked at us, field service types, much like low-level retail employees, even though we reported to the C-level. I even had store managers calling me directly to ‘order’ me to do maintenance at their specific store immediately." He added, "he incident you asked me about was an extreme example of a customer disrespecting the IT guy."
For those who might have misunderstood, the OP explained that he never felt above the store managers because he earned more and owned shares of the company, but he wanted to illustrate how highly the managers thought of themselves though they shouldn't have.
The OP worked for the company as a traveling IT guy who went to the store that needed his help
Image credits: u/DistrictEquivalent79
Now that the context is clear, we can get into the details of the incident. The traveling IT guy was called to replace a server. He came into the store officially dressed and the store manager immediately made it obvious he was not welcome in “her” store.
We asked DistrictEquivalent79 if he ever tried to explain how important his job was when greeted with such attitude and he never initiated such conversations, "If they didn’t understand their own chain of command, it was not my place to educate them. My own supervisor advised me to ignore any retail manager who tried to bark orders at me. Gladly!"
So the IT guy just calmly explained to the store manager where he would be working and that at some point, the cash registers would stop working for 5 minutes. Usually, these kinds of procedures won’t be done during store working hours because customers can get quite impatient, but in the comments, the OP explained that it was an emergency and it had to be done as soon as possible to avoid any other problems that might have come out of it.
A lot of the time, he wasn't really respected by the store managers who thought they were the kings of the store, which was ironic because he had company shares
Image credits: u/DistrictEquivalent79
The OP was finishing with his work when he realized he hadn't take a couple of cables he needed, so he went back to his truck to get them, but when he came back, the store manager was already sitting in front of the table with her food laid out on it.
The server was under that table and the OP needed to finish hooking up the server as at this point, the cash registers were not working. The store manager refused to move and asked the IT guy to come back after an hour when her lunch break finished, which left him speechless, because the store couldn’t sell anything if the registers were offline.
One time he was called to replace a server as soon as possible and the manager was very clearly unhappy about him being there
Image credits: u/DistrictEquivalent79
Image credits: Sergiy Galyonkin (not the actual image)
However, there was no way to convince the manager to move; even the other employees coming in panicked because of the lines at the register didn’t help. She blamed the IT guy for not finishing his work before her lunch break started.
Understanding that this was ridiculous and that he himself could get in big trouble for making the registers not work for an hour, the OP tried to suggest to the store manager to find another place to eat or have her break at another time.
We were curious to know why the manager wouldn't move as it seemed she didn't care her behavior was causing chaos. The OP was convinced that she did care, "Only, her theory was…because I broke it, I would take the heat for the registers not working. She didn’t understand, my taking the registers down was not my idea. I had orders from way up high to yank the server out NOW. So the registers were going to go down (at least briefly) if I followed orders."
While working, the OP realized he needed a few more cables to finish hooking up the service, so he went to his truck to grab them
Image credits: u/DistrictEquivalent79
It seems that asking to move hit a nerve and the store manager demanded to speak with the IT guy’s manager. Knowing that the situation was serious and that his boss was way higher up in the company hierarchy than the store manager preventing him from doing his job, he maliciously complied with the request.
He called his boss, handed the phone to the woman and went to the store front to calm down the customers, explaining what was going on. Even though he wasn’t there when the phone conversation took place, the OP heard some bits of it and was quite sure the manager was trying to convince his boss to fire him.
When he came back, the manager was already having her lunch and wasn't planning on moving, even knowing that the server was under the table she was eating at
Image credits: u/DistrictEquivalent79
After a few minutes, the manager left the office with her food and the OP went in immediately to get the server working. It didn’t take that long, but he stuck around for another 15 minutes to clean up and collect his things.
While he was there, he noticed the retail district manager coming in and when she was going out, she was leaving with the store manager and her things put in a box. It seems that not even half an hour had passed and the manager was already fired.
In the comments, the OP explained that it wasn’t surprising that the district manager showed up so quickly because the district office was 5 minutes away by car. Also, he was guessing that this wasn’t the first time the store manager had done something wrong and it could have been that this incident was just the last nail in the coffin.
While she was refusing to move, the cash register wasn't working and a line was building up, so the OP wanted to get this over with
Image credits: u/DistrictEquivalent79
The Redditor told us that he doesn't know what happened to that store manager next as he never got involved in the retail gossip and there were not many opportunities to do so anyway, "
For the most part, when I was in a retail store, I was there to service an open ticket as fast as possible, and then roll out to the next store on my ticket list. I made a few friends in the retail stores, here and there. But kept to myself on most retail store visits."
Of course, not all store manager are like that. The OP told us about one of them who actually flirted with him and was quite upset when he left for a better job, however, in his experience, most of them just tolerated his presence.
He also opened up that "The lack of respect from customers is depressing. It’s not unusual for folks in IT to burn out from stress." DistrictEquivalent79 also revealed that this particular story "sadly is only one of thousands I could tell you, based on my personal experience alone. You definitely want to stay on the good side of your IT guy. But many people don’t see it that way."
The manager felt disrespected and demanded to speak to OP's boss, so he called them and after a few minutes of conversation, the woman left the table
Image credits: u/DistrictEquivalent79
While the OP was picking up his things, he saw the store manager being accompanied by the retail district manager with her belongings in a box
Image credits: u/DistrictEquivalent79
Image credits: Elvert Barnes (not the actual image)
People in the comments were entertained by the story and were suggesting what could have made the situation even better. Someone suggested that the OP probably saved the regular store employees from the dictator that she was.
What did you think of the story? Do you think the manager got what she deserved? Do you think the OP should have warned her who his boss was? Let us know your thoughts in the comments!
Redditors have found the story entertaining but couldn't understand the manager's stupid behavior
