In many workplaces, the people in power make decisions that mostly exist to satisfy their ego, to the detriment of everyone else. Generally, there is very little anyone can do but grit their teeth and just survive through it. But sometimes an employee might see a perfect opportunity to comply with the new rule in a hilariously hostile way.

A worker shared a hilarious (and expensive) bit of malicious compliance when they were instructed to not take their company phone anywhere. We got in touch with the worker in the story to learn more.

Some workplace rules don’t actually make any sense

Image credits: Kamaji Ogino / pexels (not the actual photo)

One employee made their company spend thousands just by doing exactly as an IT manager told them

Image credits: [deleted] / reddit.com (not the actual photo)

Image credits: Prostock-studio / envato (not the actual photo)

The worker had some responses to initial comments

Image credits: Ok-Pea3414

Normally, getting a call from your boss out of hours means something has gone very wrong

Bored Panda got in touch with the employee in the story and they were kind enough to answer some questions. We wanted to hear their opinion on why the manager made such a strange decision. “I really don’t know. Company policy was to be reachable as much as possible, which includes carrying the phone with you, even on PTO, like 24×7.”

“As for the IT manager – maybe she wasn’t having a good day and she snapped? On Reddit or on the Internet – many users do not understand, in certain industries, at a certain level of seniority – you have to be able to be contacted by work anytime. And yes, you are paid handsomely for the sacrifice. Now, if you are a cook at a fast food place, this type of attitude doesn’t make sense. When you get paid in mid-to-high six figures, you have to understand that a portion of the pay is to compensate for sometimes the horrible work-life balance. As many posts claim in TrueUnpopularOpinions, and I tend to agree – many users who think it wasn’t a win, haven’t been a part of an industry or haven’t been high up enough in their positions where they are expected to be able to be contacted, AND are paid handsomely. Most would have experience with horrible managers in positions that pay $20 or below, expect to keep week free for unannounced shift changes, may or may not have a full 40 hours scheduled to save company on employee benefits and all the scummy things employers do. And I’m in no way denigrating them, I worked fast food for a year during college and it was horrible,” they shared with Bored Panda.

“Maybe the IT manager went on a power trip? I really do not know. Before this incident, I didn’t even have any contact with her. Maybe she decided to show who’s the boss? I’m out of clues here, but I’m going to give her benefit of doubt and say she was having a bad day – BUT that doesn’t mean just trying to put me down in front of everyone, and throwing a few racial slurs along the way. And she wasn’t allowed to make the decision about where the phone goes – it is on leadership far above her – but she was two or three levels above me in hierarchy or seniority, so simply decided to follow what she said, after sending her an email and getting a response. Do I feel bad for her? Somewhat, but let’s hope this was a lesson for her to start improving herself and understand that it’s not okay to throw someone else fire for reasons beyond that someone.”

While this IT manager didn’t exactly have the best plan, many readers were a bit surprised to find a person “bragging” about now being more available for work calls while on vacation. They managed to effectively leverage this opportunity, but let’s face it, most of us would prefer to not spend a single minute of our time off wondering about “work stuff.”

Indeed, many countries have even passed laws against this, although it is possible that in certain “critical” jobs, this law is overlooked. After all, this person did say that they need to be on call for government agencies regularly, so it could very well be a life or death issue. However, it can still be mentally uncomfortable to know that at any hour of the day, any day of the week, you might get a work call.

Image credits: Marjan Grabowski (not the actual photo)

Many places now have rules against after-work emails and calls

This is often the main (and often sole) complaint with work from home, as the feeling of being “off the clock” never truly shows up. If you can hear email notifications while cooking dinner, it might be hard to truly internalize that the workday is over. Calls are even worse, as they tend to mean something has gone very wrong. In general, most jobs are not actually worth the sort of stress they often end up causing.

A message or email can be ignored, or, at the very least, you can read its contents and then think a bit to formulate your answer. Calls are intrusive and stressful, particularly if it’s something that your boss feels like they need to do out of hours. This is why many countries actually have a “right to disconnect,” meaning that a worker can’t be penalized for refusing to answer calls or emails outside of working hours. This is necessary, as some companies might try to claim that it’s a normal part of their policy and not an exploitative practice.

It’s important to note that this doesn’t mean that they can’t do it. If you feel like doing that work or simply don’t mind “out of hours” messages, feel free to answer them. But a right to disconnect gives people the opportunity to not do that. A healthy work-life balance is always important. Currently, the European Union is looking into making this a law, as they already define the right to disconnect as “a worker’s right to be able to disengage from work and refrain from engaging in work-related electronic communications, such as emails or other messages, during non-work hours.”

France, often a pioneer in worker’s rights, already passed laws against this in 2016 and required larger companies (defined as having fifty or more employees) to put working hours into writing. Of course, in this story, the employee seemed relatively ok with getting these calls, perhaps because it’s just part of the field they work in.

Instead, this is another classic story of a manager making a sweeping call based on personal preference that is neither well informed nor actually useful. After all, the entire point of a special phone like the one in this story is that the employee could be reached almost anywhere. This does mean that sometimes the phone will end up damaged, no matter how this IT manager feels about it. While this might be a tad expensive, these company phones don’t exist to be kept in a pristine state, they exist so that critical workers can be reached very quickly if needed.

Image credits: Katerina Holmes (not the actual photo)

People thought this bit of malicious compliance was hilarious and chatted with the employee

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