Organizational development consultant Louise Carnachan says that the r/NotMyJob subreddit is full of woefully executed work we've all probably seen in daily life. She says the "I'll show you" type behavior the subreddit is famous for can be the consequence of being micromanaged. However, while it's one way to claim power, it's not a particularly healthy way, Carnachan says.

"Obviously, some of the images [are] of acts committed by the inattentive, disinterested, or vindictive. But it's unlikely that all were saying 'Screw you, boss' or were a consequence of incompetence. Some workers may have been assigned jobs for which they had no training [and] were given poor or no instruction and/or inadequate materials."

"Some of the goofs are clearly process problems, such as not having sweepers move debris away before the road striping truck came through. In other instances, I suspect the worker was never clued into the big picture, so their part was out of context and executed inadequately. Or, they just didn't apply common sense and think about what they were there to accomplish and why," Carnachan adds.

"Mistakes involving language are ubiquitous in our global economy," Carnachan notes. These types of mistakes, she says, are often done by accident. "Mistranslations abound, spelling errors aren't caught, sometimes word orientation is upside down or sideways. (You'd hope signs could be hung up accurately, though.)"

"No doubt we've all been the recipient of form emails sent without the personalized information inserted, reminiscent of the speaker who begins their talk with, 'Greet the audience and say your name.'"

Other times, mistakes, whether they're intentional or not, can have a pretty funny result. "Typos are the best," Carnachan says. "As demonstrated on a sandwich label stating it contains 'Criminalized onion relish.'"

Mishaps can happen in any and all work settings, of course. "No one job classification has the corner on poor performance, but some jobs certainly have more public visibility," Carnachan tells us. "And some workers are self-motivated to be high performers, while others are not."

When scrolling through the r/NotMyJob subreddit, some people may label these types of workers as lazy. Yet, the reality is much more nuanced. "Effort is hard to evaluate because we only see results. We can't measure an individual's exertion," Carnachan explains. 

"One worker may put in a lot of effort yet achieve mediocre results, while another puts in less effort but obtains good results. Skill, ability, training, and personality traits impact this. There are people who are just in the wrong jobs," she also adds.

However, even the most dedicated and hard-working employees might not produce the best results sometimes. "There are many factors out of the worker's control," Carnachan notes. "Examples are the quality of the training and materials provided and how compensation or rewards are calculated (i.e., tied to production quotas or quality measures?). If I get paid by the piece and there aren't any real quality standards, I'll put out a lot of pieces."

Workers should get this information from their supervisors, Carnachan says. "Managers and crew leads are responsible for communicating the 'why' of the work and how it ties into an entire project. When people have no idea of what follows their labor, they work in a vacuum, and then, it's easy for them to make assumptions and bad decisions."

In an office environment, corporate culture also comes into play. Carnachan lists some questions that might impact an employee's performance. "Is teamwork expected? Are folks responsible for noting and correcting mistakes regardless of who made them? Are service and customer satisfaction important, or is the mentality to just mark it [as] done?"

Seeing others do the bare minimum at work might be entertaining. That is until it happens at your own workplace. Indeed, sometimes, people might adopt the "Not my job" mentality to the extreme, and that might even be dangerous to others.

"The willful desire to create a safety hazard for others is beyond 'Sticking it to the man,'" Carnachan tells Bored Panda. "If it's a training issue and can be remediated, that's okay -- if not, this is the wrong person for the job, regardless of their motivation."

"When people are treated poorly, they tend to want to act out by sticking it to the boss," Carnachan explains the possible cause of the "Not my job" mentality. "But pushing back by refusing to do unpopular chores, like [taking] out trash, wash[ing] up, or restock[ing], becomes childish. 'We'll just see how bad it gets before somebody does something' should turn, instead, to a discussion about what needs to be done, who is doing it, and when."

"Every job has elements that are less interesting, even downright unappealing," Carnachan points out. "But if there's a fair distribution and rotation and everyone knows what the rules are, it goes better. If the boss won't step up to [initiate] this conversation, then a staff member can."

"Job descriptions don't get into details like restocking the printer," she adds. "It's up to the manager to set the stage for teamwork in their department and the expectations for communication, dealing with disagreements, being attentive to safety, owning the work of the entire team instead of just their own contribution, and [contributing] to the little tasks that are required for a smooth operation."

Carnachan says that a team should adopt the view that each member "owns the work of the team." Employees, thus, should have a less individualistic approach to their work. "When people feel responsible solely for their own work, coworkers may start evaluating each other to monitor who they think is not pulling their weight."

"If a colleague's inattentive or their inaccurate work compromises safety or the team's outcomes, speaking to the manager about your concerns makes sense. But withholding help or engaging in stupid power plays to punish the colleagues or the boss isn't okay."