Today was the birthday of a colleague. This specific colleague has been through the ringer lately. She has been absolutely miserable. A little while back she faked a positive covid test to call in sick because she simply needed a mental break. The past two weeks she's had another three breakdowns.
This morning when I arrived was one of them. Once she'd calmed down a little I asked what happened and apparently manager had chewed her out basically as soon as she entered. It was shitty. Unfortunately not out of the ordinary.
What was out of the ordinary, since it was her birthday, I got her a little present, which some of my teammates saw me gift to her. Realizing it was her birthday, they went to the shop during the lunch to get her a gift as well. It was great. Despite it being small things, it seemed to cheer her up!
At the end of the afternoon manager called us in and chewed us out for giving her a gift! What the actual [redacted]? He claimed it was because it “Sets expectations”. Which I find highly ridiculous, especially for him to worry about it, since it was veeeeery clear already he didn't participate so the expectation isn't on him because of the face he made when he saw us giving the gifts.
At the end of the day, she left 'early'. I quote early because she actually did make her hours, it's just that all of us are crazy enough to stay longer as standard (without pay because he will make a big deal out of you writing the hours even though he witnessed you being there extra) just to avoid him making a fuzz. But well, she had a dinner for her birthday, so she left 'early'. On her way out he gave her shit that “Did you make your 8 hours today? You seemed very distracted by the whole team.” So she called her family and told them she'd be a bit later.
So to summarize: manager made her cry basically as soon as she entered, then gave us all shit for getting a small gift for a colleague (genuinely small, don't think anyone paid more than 5 euro for it), then made her work overtime for absolutely no urgent reason, if there was a reason at all.
Managers (can) f*cking suck. Seriously.