Pretty much the title.
I'm a copywriter for a… start-up company. Let's call it that. Even though it has been around for 7 years.
A few weeks ago, my boss and I got into an ugly spat over working overtime with no pay. It was not the first within our department. I admit I'm not completely in the right here; but in my defense, when I finished the amount of work I needed to do AT WORK, I didn't think I had to work overtime anymore. Especially since the others have to work overtime to catch up with me.
Big mistake. The day after, we were called into the office, where I was torn to shreds for “not working overtime when everybody was.”
I stood down. Not because I didn't want to fire back; but because I had been warned that I couldn't talk back to the manager in “that way.” The meeting is closed with me branded as “not working as hard as everyone else.” “The Excel file shows whether you work or not”, she said.
Now, I DID NOT write anything extra, but I did look over the part she wanted me to fix. At midnight. And it showed on the file. But she didn't mention that at all.
But that was not the end. Today we were called into the office again. My boss was having a b-tchfiss. She yelled at everyone for everything that was “not aligned with the company's core values.” This ranges from not wanting to work overtime to not wanting to eat lunch with everyone else. (Yes, she was serious; this was one of the company's core values: togetherness.)
The worst part?
When it was my turn, the story became: I didn't work overtime AT ALL, I didn't answer the call to work overtime outside of work hours when I could still send an emoji on the company's group chat. In general, a terrible person who didn't give two ficks about others.
Mind you, my productivity was double everyone else's the next day. But not a word on that.
She topped it off with a threat to fire me and anyone who doesn't want to be “A part of the collective” – I swear this is what she said word by word!!!
I should have called her out on her bs the first time. That's my only regret. Now her narrative of this story becomes, “I'm the slacker who didn't work.” Periodt.
Well, I hope she is happy with whoever she got left. Our department lost 2/3 of our workers during the last 3 months. And the meeting today kills whatever morale I have left for the work.
P.s: Making dirty laundry public means I no longer have any desire to fix my relationship with my manager. Or to work at this company. I will miss the zero-distance commute though.