I work for a company so small that pretty much none of the legal protections put in place for employees apply to us. Nearly everything I've seen requires 20+ employees and we do not have that.
I'm sparing details for some anonymity but we have a big meeting soon and I've just been asked by our CEO to attend the meeting in person (on a day I normally wouldn't come in) and then use my breaks and lunch to check phones. (My everyday job- which I can do perfectly fine from home but still have to come into the office 2/5 days a week.) I told them that I can stay home and handle the phones and zoom into the meeting, or I can come into the meeting, but it's virtually impossible for me to do both. I work from a desktop, don't have a laptop, and honestly don't even have a way to get there figured out because I typically carpool with my partner who starts work over 3 hours before the meeting on that day. I contribute in almost no meaningful way to the actual planning within the company- I do some research projects and report on what I find in conference calls, but other than that I pretty much just do customer service and office admin stuff. I'm also paid minimum wage.
When I hit my one year mark I had a review where they, as well as my direct manager, talked about how glad they are to have me here and what good work I was doing. CEO then proceeded to tell me that I wasn't getting a raise though because they “already gave me one” when they were legally obligated to because our state raised the minimum wage. They will be doing this slow increase until 2024 so I'm pretty much guaranteed no actual raise for the next two years if I stay on even if I'm doing exceptional work. (So I've stopped doing exceptional work.)
Today though, is feeling like the straw that's going to break my back. My manager spoke to them about how it's not okay to make people work on their lunches and breaks, and if we all need to be there, then we need to just call it an employee training day and not mess with the phones. When the CEO then came into the office, they proceeded to lecture me about how “Junior members are expected to do a lot of things senior members don't have to.” And then told me “when I was first starting out working (I've been in the work force for more than 6 years, but okay…..) I was regularly asked to work during my lunch and we didn't even have breaks!” To which my response was a baffled look and saying “okay, well that's illegal now soo……”
They have still yet to give me a single reason I should go in in person, besides repeatedly telling me they “want me to” and “we really want you there…” (We being the Royal We, apparently, cause literally no one else gives a shit including my manager- Who would rather me stay home so there's someone to answer phones!!!)
I am trying so hard to get out ASAP, but I'm having so much guilt about leaving my manager with all this bullshit because they are someone who has consistently stuck up for and advocated for me and they deserve SO MUCH BETTER than what they currently get. They have to make significantly more than I do, but whatever they make- it's not enough. They already more or less do the work of 3 people, so if I leave, it's really more like 4 or 5 since we pretty much single handedly keep the office running. This isn't a good reason not to leave, and I know that, and I'm still applying to jobs constantly, but god, I have SO MUCH resentment towards the CEO at this point and it feels like they somehow can't figure out that they're not paying me to be their friend, and if they were, they would have to be paying me a LOT more. I wish I could just steal my manager away when I'm finally able to leave, but I know that it's up to them and they're choosing to continue on with the company fully aware of what it's like. I'm just REAL tired of it.
(P.s. I will not be naming the company as I still currently work there and need a job to survive. It's too small to not know who shared what info, unfortunately.)