Categories
Antiwork

My last boss used the threat of demoting/firing me to try to get me to work harder, while I’m expecting a kid

What's unfortunate is that I did like this job at one point and gave 110%. However I learned over time that in this bullshit “relentless positivity” startup culture, the actual work you do matters a lot less than how you market yourself and kiss ass. After I expressed to my boss that I felt like some recent promotions/demotions weren't really fair, I became a target. My performance evaluations centered entirely around my “attitude” and not my actual work, despite zero cited instances of how my attitude was poor. The boss just somehow “knew” it was. He gave me an insulting raise at performance eval time, which I again said I wasn't thrilled about, and at that point he started micromanaging me in a way he didn't for other employees (including the one he started sleeping with lol). Then when I quit for a better, high-paying job, he asked if I…


What's unfortunate is that I did like this job at one point and gave 110%. However I learned over time that in this bullshit “relentless positivity” startup culture, the actual work you do matters a lot less than how you market yourself and kiss ass. After I expressed to my boss that I felt like some recent promotions/demotions weren't really fair, I became a target. My performance evaluations centered entirely around my “attitude” and not my actual work, despite zero cited instances of how my attitude was poor. The boss just somehow “knew” it was. He gave me an insulting raise at performance eval time, which I again said I wasn't thrilled about, and at that point he started micromanaging me in a way he didn't for other employees (including the one he started sleeping with lol).

Then when I quit for a better, high-paying job, he asked if I would be giving the two weeks I “agreed to.” I told him that wasn't a thing and he said “well most people do it out of respect.”

Nah, fuck him. He somewhat has a point that my performance did go down (read: not working after hours and learning programming languages on my own) after not receiving substantial raises or recognition for everything I did for the company for 5+ years, but the fact he thought demoting me/not giving a real raise/not doing any actual managerial work would somehow motivate me to do anything besides look for other work just shows how delusional and self-absorbed they are.

Don't let any job try to gaslight you into thinking you can't do better, or into thinking that they “care about you” when they only care about profits and in some cases massaging their own ego. Don't feel bad about quitting a job and leaving them to fend for themselves, especially if you already have something lined up. They'd do the same to you without even thinking about it.

My only regret about how I quit is that I wasn't even more unprofessional about it. Couldn't be happier where I currently work because you don't have to act a certain way. Just show up and work and get paid somewhat fairly.

Leave a Reply

Your email address will not be published.