Redditor u/cranne went viral over on Reddit last week for the story of how she was fired from her job — “the worst place” she’s ever worked for. The position put her in charge of speaker coordination and she cites a few problems out of the gate, but nothing insurmountable. So she chugs along — until she’s fired for taking “too long” to reply to emails.
The story’s a pretty great one, so I’ll let her take it from here:
From the get-go, she explains, there was no onboarding or training. She was the only person who did her job. It was not a great set up.
Gather round as I tell you the story of the time I got fired at the worst place I have ever worked.
From day one, it was a nightmare. There was 0 onboarding or training. I was simply given the log-in info for a couple of different websites and told to get to work. This company planned large conferences and I was in charge of speaker coordination. I was the only person in this role. The information solely resided with me.
But she decides to make the best of it…
Not a big deal, I say to myself. I’m good at thinking on my feet. I’ll just ask questions when I need clarification on something.
But the manager was very difficult to communicate with due to language barriers.
That turned out to be impossible. My manager’s first language wasn’t English. I’m all for learning new languages. I think it’s a great skill to have and it takes a lot of work and being able to speak multiple languages is impressive. The problem was that her English was so poor that it was often very hard to understand what she was trying to say.
I once asked if she had time to hop on a call and explain something to me and she responded with “No cranne. Self skills is a must. I am bird without head”. It took me a few days to figure out that she was trying to say that things were hectic, she was running around like a chicken with it’s head cut off, and she needed me to be self sufficent.
Regardless, I did my best in the position. Small mistakes happened here and there but overall all the speakers were very happy and felt well supported. I struggled on the communication with my manager, but I thought the company was happy with my work.
So the OP presses on until four months in she’s pulled into an office and told she’s out! Fired! For what? Taking too long to reply to emails.
Until 4 months in when I was randomly pulled into a meeting with my manager, HR, and legal.
Effective immediately I was fired. I asked why I was being fired and why this was the first I had heard of any problems. Why wasn’t there a write-up or a verbal warning?
My manager said it was because the ten minutes (I ran the analytics) it takes me to respond to an email was too slow.
During her exit interview, HR asked for all documents and a run down of her progress working on a project.
That was a bullshit reason and we all knew it. If you don’t like me personally, fine but don’t try and make this seem like I was a bad employee. To be honest, I was furious.
We do the exit interview with HR and then she asks me to send over any documents I had (we worked on personal computers remotely) and describe where I was at in regards to our next event and our speakers. NDA’s are really common in this field, I’ve signed one at every job I’ve ever worked. But this employer’s NDA had a clause in it that worked to my advantage.
So OP does some SERIOUS malicious compliance here and refuses to discuss or share any documents pertaining to the job.
I said:
“As per my NDA, I am not to discuss intimate details or share documents relating to this position with any employer- past or future. Since this firing was effective immediately, you are now a former employer and I am bound by my NDA”
HR was flummoxed so they asked the legal department for help—legal said that the OP was technically right.
HR hemmed and hawed a little bit telling me that of course I could speak to them about it, this was about their event.
I pulled out my copy of the NDA (always save contracts) and pointed out the exact clause and said that it clearly stated that if I violated this NDA I would be sued, so no, I couldn’t talk to them about the position.
HR turned to Legal and Legal pointed out that I was technically correct. They were a former employer and I was bound by my NDA
And because she was technically right, the company was screwed: the event was a disaster, speakers pulled out, and maybe don’t fire someone less than a month from a major event?
They fired me 17 days before the event. They didn’t have time to start over from scratch. I still keep in contact with some of my coworkers and apparently the event was a shit show and manager nearly lost her job because of it. Over half the speakers pulled out once communication broke down.
All because I ~tAKe ToO lONg tO ResPoND tO EMaILS~
Reddit got a big laugh from the whole thing.
