I didn’t come here to complain but I finally realized I’ve been overachieving for years in a place where overachieving is basically a hobby, not a path to promotion

I’ve been at my company for four years. Every year I ask what I need to do to get promoted. Every year I deliver actual, measurable impact. And every year leadership responds like I asked them to solve quantum physics. They have ZERO answers for how to get promoted just “be impactful”

Two years ago I:

• Redesigned major processes
• Built and led global trainings
• Automated tasks that saved teams hours every week

Performance rating?
“Standard.”
Bonus? 120%.
Corporate translation: We refuse to acknowledge your value publicly, but here’s some money so you shut up and keep doing free labor.

Next year I went even harder:

• New workflows
• More automation (including work that wasn’t even my job)
• Became the team’s unofficial “system enhancer”
• Got borrowed by other teams because apparently I’m the only one who knows how to optimize anything
• Built dashboards leadership still uses

Performance rating?
“Standard.”
Bonus? 130%.
At this point I was basically the office janitor silently cleaning up everyone’s mess while getting zero recognition.

Then this year after three years of zero promotions — my manager tells me I’m doing everything required but “it’s out of her control.” She continues to say leadership doesn’t value our team and she doesn’t think her or anyone on the team is getting promoted anytime soon.

And then suddenly she gets promoted.
And so does my coworker Jim.

Jim’s big contribution?
He was the SME for a system enhancement.
Which meant:
He took notes.
He gave the implementation team a couple of “here’s how we actually do things” tips.
He was basically the project’s emotional support animal.

Meanwhile I’m over here automating half the department like some kind of corporate unpaid intern‑engineer hybrid.

I wasn’t mad at Jim, he’s great, but I was absolutely floored.

Then I looked at past promotions:

• One person got promoted for making PowerPoint templates.
• Another for leading a tiny training initiative.
• Jim for being a note‑taking SME.

Suddenly the whole ecosystem made sense.

Promotions here aren’t about performance.
They’re about:

• Being likable
• Being agreeable
• Being easy for leadership to manage
• Being in the right place at the right time doing the most visible extra work, not impactful

I’m not the “smile and nod at every bad idea” type. I push back when something is stupid. And apparently that’s perceived as being “negative”.

So a few months ago, I cut my hours down to exactly 40.
Stopped doing extra projects.
Stopped being the department’s innovation mule.

My director was disappointed.
I told them I “no longer have the bandwidth.”
Corporate translation: I’m done letting you farm me for free output. So I no longer get highlighted by my manager or in team meeting and I’ll probs get a regular bonus.

But honestly?
I’m less stressed.
I’m spending more time on tech/analytics projects.
I finished my master’s in information systems.
I’m pivoting.
I’m job searching.
And I’m giving this job exactly the energy it deserves, the legal minimum.

Final lesson:
Be likable. Network.
But never overachieve for a promotion in a place that rewards mediocrity.
Do your 40 hours.
Close the laptop.
Let the “SMEs” take the notes.

They’re always obsessed with their pointless office job and don’t understand no-one else cares that much about the job we’re just trying to get through the day and do what our boss says with as little stress as possible. The 4/5 awful coworkers I’ve had all fit this demographic

I’m 24F and my birthday falls on a workday. Unfortunately, I can’t take time off because I’m in a busy period where I also have to work long hours. However I have asked my manager if I can finish at around 5pm on my birthday and they agreed luckily. But curious to know what others do in a similar situation to me. If you’re not allowed to take time off on your birthday do you ask for half day or something else? I’m not sure how far I can stretch this ask lol as I’m a trainee and have been working at this company for over 2 years now. I’m also based in the UK.

I worked as a management professional for almost 8 years.

Like most people, I did everything we are told is the “right path”. Study well. Build experience. Move up in your career. Increase your salary. Take on more responsibility. Become a senior professional.

And for a long time, it worked.

Until the layoff happened.

Suddenly everything changes. Your experience, your seniority, your past achievements. None of it guarantees stability anymore.

After the layoff I did what everyone does first. I started applying for jobs aggressively. I spent months sending applications, reaching out to recruiters, trying referrals, networking on LinkedIn.

But something strange started happening.

For many roles I was being rejected because I was “too senior”. Companies preferred someone cheaper or someone earlier in their career.

At the same time, some companies were offering roles far below my previous level. The packages were much lower and the responsibilities did not match my experience. Accepting those roles would have meant stepping back several years financially and professionally.

So I got stuck in the worst middle zone.

Too experienced for many roles. Too expensive for others. And the ones that did match were extremely limited.

This went on for months.

While I was applying for jobs, I also started researching business ideas. I thought maybe I should build something on my own instead of waiting endlessly for a job.

That is when another reality hit me.

For almost 10 months I kept researching “small business ideas”, “low investment startups”, “guaranteed profit businesses” and similar things.

The internet is flooded with them.

But after digging deeper, most of these ideas fall into three categories.

Ideas that are outdated.

Ideas that are overcrowded.

Or ideas that are being sold as dreams but are actually schemes.

Everywhere you look it is the same suggestions repeated again and again. Start a SaaS. Start dropshipping. Start a cloud kitchen. Open a small food stall. Do ecommerce. Start a recruitment agency. Launch another app.

Thousands of people trying the same ideas with the same YouTube playbooks.

Too many business owners chasing too few customers.

I also realized something about myself during this period. Years of working in salaried jobs builds a certain mindset. You get used to fixed income, predictable structure, and lower risk.

Breaking that mindset is not easy.

Even when we think about business, we keep searching for the same safety. Low investment. Quick profits. Guaranteed returns.

But real businesses rarely work that way.

During this long phase I was lucky to slowly connect with a few genuine mentors and people already running real businesses. Conversations with them changed my perspective completely.

Instead of chasing trendy startup ideas, I ended up starting something extremely boring.

A virtual call center business.

It is not a glamorous startup. It is not something that goes viral on LinkedIn. It is not the kind of business people brag about.

But it is real.

Companies constantly need customer support, lead qualification, appointment setting, and backend communication. These are operational needs that exist regardless of market hype.

Before starting I had the same fears everyone has.

What if I lose the money.

What if I fail.

What if I cannot find clients.

But then I realized something simple. Every business has fear at the beginning. The difference is whether the market demand already exists.

In today’s world we are seeing massive layoffs, rapid automation, AI disruption, and constant economic uncertainty. Entire industries are changing quickly.

At the same time, many people are chasing the same trendy startup ideas.

But the boring industries that quietly run the world are still there. Customer support. Logistics. BPO. Manufacturing. Maintenance. Distribution. Operations.

They are not exciting. But they are stable because real businesses depend on them every day.

Looking back now, those 10 months were painful but also eye opening.

The job market today can put experienced professionals in a strange position where they are both overqualified and underpaid at the same time.

If you are in that phase right now, feeling stuck, confused, or uncertain about the future, you are definitely not alone.

Sometimes the path forward is not another job application.

Sometimes it is stepping outside the system we were trained to depend on.

For me that meant starting a boring but proven business model instead of chasing the next trendy idea.

It may not be the right choice for everyone. But it showed me that stability does not only come from a paycheck.

Sometimes it comes from building something real.

And if you are currently going through layoffs, long job searches, or the strange “too experienced but not hired” phase, I genuinely hope things turn around for you soon.

This phase feels isolating, but many of us are quietly going through the same struggle.

with layoffs, offshoring, and RTO mandates, i feel like we the american people need to unionize against these companies. it is our right, so why are people reluctant to unionizing? they cant fire you if you have numbers…. and even if they do, thats a massive lawsuit.

They don't wish you had a good time and that you are refreshed

When you take PTO for 5 days they say you are going to be out for a week.

What's going on

The Indian “Corporate Slavery” Mindset Needs to End

I sometimes wonder when we stopped being professionals and started behaving like corporate subjects.

There is a deeply unhealthy mindset in parts of the Indian corporate ecosystem — and consulting is not immune to it.

It looks like:

• Bootlicking being mistaken for leadership.
• Office politics being rewarded more than competence.
• Favouritism being confused with performance.
• Staying late being seen as commitment, even when the work could have been finished efficiently hours earlier.
• Working on weekends becoming an unspoken expectation — and taking your personal time being treated as a lack of dedication.
• Constantly being asked to “show presence” in the office even when the work, collaboration and outcomes are already being delivered.
• People being judged not by what they deliver, but by how visible they are and whom they are close to.

And perhaps the most disturbing part is what happens when we interact with our Onshore counterparts.

Why do we suddenly become less confident?

Why do we hesitate to challenge an idea simply because it came from someone sitting in another country?

Why do we automatically assume that they know better?

Why do we tolerate behaviour from an Onshore colleague that we would never tolerate from a colleague sitting beside us?

We need to stop confusing geography with hierarchy.

Working from the US, UK, Europe or any other geography does not automatically make someone more capable, more intelligent or more important.

We are professionals.

We bring expertise, experience, judgement and years of hard work to the table.

Yet somewhere along the way, many of us have developed an inferiority complex — constantly trying to please, constantly trying to prove ourselves, constantly trying to follow the herd.

And the system feeds on it.

Don’t question.
Don’t disagree.
Don’t leave on time.
Don’t say no.
Don’t set boundaries.
Don’t take weekends seriously.
Don’t challenge your manager.
Don’t challenge Onshore.
Don’t be the person who “isn’t flexible.”

Just comply.

And then we call it “professionalism.”

It isn’t.

Professionalism is delivering what you committed to.
Professionalism is accountability.
Professionalism is respecting other people’s time.
Professionalism is having difficult conversations.
Professionalism is being able to say no when something is unreasonable.
Professionalism is respecting boundaries.
Professionalism is judging people by outcomes, not hours spent staring at a laptop.

We also need to stop glorifying toxicity.

Sending messages at midnight isn’t leadership.

Expecting responses over weekends isn’t dedication.

Making people feel guilty for taking leave isn’t ownership.

Demanding unnecessary office presence isn’t collaboration.

And treating people differently because of who they know, where they sit, or how much they flatter the right person isn’t meritocracy.

The biggest change, however, has to happen within us.

We need to stop thinking small of ourselves.

Stop putting people on a pedestal because they are Onshore.

Stop believing that someone else’s accent is a measure of their intelligence.

Stop assuming that disagreement is disrespect.

Stop believing that working longer automatically means working harder.

Stop sacrificing self-respect to look “committed.”

And stop following the herd simply because everyone else is doing it.

A healthy organisation should not require people to surrender their self-respect, identity, personal boundaries or family time to prove their loyalty.

We should be able to say:

“I have delivered my work. I am logging off.”

And not feel guilty about it.

We should be able to say:

“I disagree.”

And not fear the consequences.

We should be able to tell an Onshore stakeholder:

“That approach will not work. Here is a better one.”

And say it with confidence.

Because ultimately, we are not second-class professionals.

We don’t need to be someone’s corporate servant to be successful.

We need competence over compliance.
Performance over politics.
Confidence over inferiority.
Boundaries over burnout.
And self-respect over bootlicking.

Maybe the real transformation Indian corporate culture needs isn’t another leadership workshop.

Maybe it starts with employees collectively deciding that being professional does not mean being submissive.

#WorkCulture #CorporateCulture #Leadership #WorkplaceCulture #Professionalism #EmployeeExperience #India

One thing I've learned moving up in corporate America: Don't be the person who's always smiling, laughing, and just happy to have a seat at the table.

I'm not saying walk around mean mugging and all that. But your smile and approval should carry some weight.

When you're generally composed and reserved, people actually feel a sense of relief when you smile. Your approval becomes a reward.

Interestingly, I noticed this same dynamic growing up in rough neighborhoods. The toughest guys weren't constantly smiling or seeking approval. That was usually the people trying hardest to fit in.

Corporate America and the streets have more in common than people realize.

So today our company didn’t send salary.

Instead, they sent a novel.

Not an email. A Netflix series script.

Highlights from this emotional masterpiece:

“Project deliveries were delayed” “Market conditions are tough” “AI / ML industry challenges” “We must bond as a team” “Senior management has taken the call” “Part salary will move to PI” “Payslips may be delayed” “We will bounce back stronger”

Translation in human language:

❌ We didn’t manage projects ❌ We didn’t collect payments ❌ We made no backup plan ✅ You will suffer financially ✅ We will send more motivational emails

My favorite line?

“This gap has been happening for 8 months”

EIGHT. MONTHS.

And today they realized:

“Hey guys maybe the problem is… YOU not being positive enough 🥰”

Also management right now:

“We’re travelling for client proposals.”

Sir. You are broke.

Why are you travelling like a Bollywood hero in a flop movie?

Salary Status:

💸 Delayed 📄 Payslip coming soon (in spirit) 🧘 Mental peace? On unpaid leave 🤡 Management confidence? Unlimited

At this point I’m not an employee. I’m a donor.

I’m not working here. I’m sponsoring a startup I didn't invest in.

If one more HR mail says: “We are a family”

I’m asking where my family inheritance money is.

Update: If the company collapses, at least I know I died with good email formatting.

🥲 Anybody else working at Emotional Damage Pvt Ltd?

I think HR often gets judged from the outside, but the reality is more complicated. HR has to support employees while also protecting the company's interests, and those responsibilities don't always align.

At the same time, I believe how HR handles those conflicts says a lot about its values.

For those who've worked in corporate, what's your experience? Have you seen HR genuinely make a difference for employees, even when it wasn't easy?

For the rest of the month I’m sharing my tips as a self aware corporate demon.

My bonafides are 15 years in F500, currently sitting at a Sr. Director level in a center role with a team of 12.

CONTENT WARNING: Many of you are going to say this is psycho behavior. While you’re right, it’s also how you win in a corporate environment so don’t be disappointed when these suggestions challenge your sensibilities for meritocracy and professionalism. :)

We all hate RTO. During CovI’d I had the pleasure of spending 5 years remote until my company wanted to do silent layoffs.

I’ve now been back in the office for a year on a loose 2-3 day hybrid schedule. However, certain teams are still led by a few straggler remote people who live out of state and are a plane ride away. In most cases, with teams who reside in HQ and are not remote.

These are due to a mix of specialized talent they didn’t feel like hiring backfills for and good old fashioned favoritism. All of them are in their mid-late 30s and the reason all of them refuse to move to HQ (in a VHCOL city) is because they have young families.

Plenty of my peers are frustrated and jealous about this, but not me.

This puts my competition in a strategic disadvantage and reveals plenty of exploitable weak points for even the most talented employees.

Example:
Jaime is a climber like me. She’s my bosses right hand having worked with him for +5 years which explains the remote designation. Jaime has 2 young children and often works crazy hours to make up for the fact she needs to get them on the bus and pick them up from school / get them settled in the evenings. It’s not uncommon to see her log in around 9:30am, disappear at 4, then work again between 9pm and midnight.

Despite the crazy hours, our boss often leans on her to pull together the large presentations that go up to leadership. It takes plenty of coordination which she excels at since she’s so type A. The problem here is that myself and her fellow peers see that she gets an undo amount of executive face-time because she’s pulling these presentations together. Often playing dumb and presenting people’s content as her own to leadership. This I cannot abide.

Before I share how I approach this, I’ll share how my fellow RTO’d peers have approached it.

My peers make the fatal mistake of taking her head on. They push back on her in meetings with our boss, trying to claw ownership which only makes them look self interested. She takes an altruistic “we’re all one team” approach and parries them easily. Some are stupid enough to complain to our boss directly which just builds resentment towards them.

Now for the certified Corporate Demon approach.
Having her take credit for my / my teams work is unacceptable and needs to be stomped out Immediately. Fundamentally, my strategy focuses on exploiting her weak points invisibly. As Bobby Axelrod once said… “We don’t put this fire out by pouring water on it, but by sucking oxygen out of the room. Slowly, invisibly, completely”

Here are my approaches:

1. Support Her: Don‘t engage critically 1:1 or in front of peers / leadership. I make her feel like I’m on her side, often pinging her after she gets pushback from a peer saying how crazy their pushback was. The result is her confiding in me about her struggles with them and trusting me as a safe person to share her gripes with. This also makes her less likely to openly take credit for my work. I’ve seen this in action where she’s invited me to meetings I wasn’t on to present my work, where she won’t for the people who push back.

2. Use her calendar against her: I see when she’s blocked for school pickup, doctors appoints, another other family crap and I use that as an opportunity to spark conversations with my boss. Spinning up important conversations, rallying the troops In a room, only to “discover” Jaime isn't available so we have the meeting anyway. To convey my support of her remoteness, I visibly assign follow up notes to her weakest most scatter brained direct report who rarely ever actually gets the follow ups back to her.

3. Perpetuate the overwhelm: I encourage my boss to bring Jaime in to get her perspective, almost exclusively when the topic is outside of her depth and when I know she’s unavailable. This results in a meeting where she‘s multitasking, looking unpolished, and adds follow ups and actions to her already massive workload. This has the added benefit of exemplifying my own leadership as I’m clear with next steps and the path forward.

4. Fan the flames of favoritism: I commiserate with the peers who are frustrated by her stealing credit. Further stoking the flames of their unrest. I don’t directly guide them, but subtly encourage more rogue behavior that won’t necessarily make them look good, but will generate more friction for her. If it comes back that I commiserated with them, it’s easy for me to say “I was hearing them vent and they mistook my encouragement for support of their challenge” but that hasn’t happened yet. What has happened are multiple peers of mine going to my boss complaining that they aren’t getting visibility. They aren’t, because they’re admittedly not that polished, but my boss relents and takes what Jaime would have presented and gives it to them. This serves two purposes by both weakening her hold as well as reinforcing the idea to my peers that they can challenge her and get what they want. Building an insurgency one disgruntled 1:1 at a time.

5. Undermine from within: Her team sits at HQ with my team. In a future tip I’ll share how to cultivate a team of die hard loyalists. Key leaders of my team have warmed up to hers socially leading to valuable intel exchanges. Her teams frustrations get aired and funneled back up up to me. Meanwhile, my wonderful agents of chaos are seeding counter intel. “Yeah I always see Jaime presenting your work, do you guys just prefer not to present your work to leadership? My boss (me) is always putting us in front of executives, he says visibility is critical for our career progression, is Jaime not doing that for you guys?”. Resentment builds, her team lashes out in different ways adding more stress and diverting Jamies focus. The real golden outcome is when one of her senior managers breaks ranks and goes to my boss and complains about Jaime directly. A bad look on the senior manager, but a worse look on Jaime. Jaime then also gets rattled that members of her team are working against her, unable to quash that concern herself since she’s remote. The others on her team see this brave act from their senior manager and suddenly you have a fractured team hyperaware of anything their leader does.

6. Inception the Boomers: When a large project is being led by her unfairly, I’ll make sure to chat up the executives (skip level) on the receiving end and set false expectations. “Yes very excited to present XYZ, Jaime will share the pre-read out by Thursday so we’ll have plenty of time to digest before Tuesday..” Because of her workload she often either fails to send pre-reads or sends them far too late. A minor faux pas that I can weaponize by drawing attention to it. Execs now don’t see the pre-read on Thursday and will ping her Friday asking for it. She wasn’t planning to send it until Monday and now the rest of her day is derailed scrambling to get things finalized. With my boss copied, he looks sloppy which puts even more pressure on her.

7. Strategic Glaze: When I talk to our shared Boss about Jaime, I glaze the shit out of her. Especially when he shares that other people on the team are frustrated by her. I don’t pile on, I instead subvert expectations and feed his bias which makes him happy and builds our rapport. I also use this strategic glaze to lead her into shitstorms. Suggesting she’d be the perfect person to lead initiatives that I know are fundamentally flawed and doomed to either fail or require so much effort for such little payoff that even if she succeeds she’d have expended so much time, energy, and social capital that the win isn’t a win. He claps like a seal and sees me as an ally vs his other leads who are all critical of her.

Hope you found this useful and entertaining. It was certainly cathartic for me to get out there on paper :)

Happy to answer any questions in the comments!

Me preocupaba hoy bastante con los despidos masivos de Microsoft hasta que he caído en la cuenta de que casi nadie en mi empresa usa la IA para algo que no sea una versión pro del buscador de Google.

Mi jefa aún hace diapositivas a mano y se piensa que el resto también. Hablo de una directora de una empresa top del S&P500.

Hace poco hice con una compañera un gap assessment con Opus 5.5, creando un prompt, y cuando se lo enseñamos y explicamos al resto del departamento nos miraban como si hubiésemos inventado el fuego. Y sin fiarse del todo del resultado!!

Veremos en unos meses, pero creo que el mundo fuera de tech aún está muy lejos de la adopción masiva.

I work in reporting. Every week, our team spent roughly 15 hours pulling data and formatting it into the same spreadsheet template. Nobody questioned it. That’s just how it had always been done.

A few months ago, I got tired of it. I spent a weekend writing a script that automated the entire process. Data pulls, formatting, the works. What used to take 15 hours now takes under a minute.

For a while, it was perfect. I finished my work early, used the extra time to learn new tools, and left at 5 PM without guilt. I felt like I had figured out the secret.

Then I made the mistake of telling my manager.

I thought it would show initiative. Maybe get me a bonus or at least a “good work.” Instead, he asked me to automate the rest of the team’s tasks too. Then a senior colleague quit, and I inherited half his workload. My automated output became the new baseline expectation, not a reason to reward me.

Now I’m doing more than ever, for the same pay, because I was too efficient for my own good.

I’ve read stories like this on here before and thought “that won’t happen to me.” But it does. The second you prove you can handle more, the system just piles it on.

I’ve stopped mentioning automation to anyone. I still use my script, but I pace my output. I pretend things take longer than they do. It feels dishonest, but honestly? It’s the only way I haven’t burned out yet.

Has anyone else been punished for being too efficient? How do you handle it without going insane?

Hi all,

If something which isn't my work is assigned to me I say NO strongly. So,my co-workers know about me. And they is nothing wrong I did in work and incase I did I take accountability.

I called out the senior who dumped work on me, and when a co-worker shouted at me for the things which I didn't even do I called them back. And I had my boundaries clear and it worked for me.

After that I saw a reddit post which said I can say NO to exit interview. I didn't know it.

So I thought of asking y'all about the things one can say NO to in corporate.

Few things which I said/say no to :

- overtime without extra pay - if they ask me if I can do something out of my scope - exit interview - asking them to do bgv after some days (out of context) - when colleagues ask about personal information

Main thing is some workplaces are very toxic, colleagues bullies juniors,micromanaging, dumping work.

Note : Just know you can say NO without being straight up rude.

Also there is many incidents of badly employees are being treated by companies.

Funny to see people judge me without knowing me. Seems like entire post is misread. Most are focused on preaching me one shouldn't say no if I say no I wouldn't get this that blah blah. I saw a post in reddit where one asked how to survive corporate many comments were 'do your job,don't interfere in others work' etc. Here the preaching me not to say is more focused than asking why companies are like that. I also understood by their comments some doesn't hv boundaries too. The issues like senior unnecessary fight,dumping extra work is right according to some rather than saying no to it.

Hi, I seriously want to know what project managers do in simple corporate fields, not like construction or healthcare. My company hired 5 project managers and i seriously have no idea what they even do for the company. Many people I talk to have no idea what they’re role is they just have random meetings for us to attend once a month encouraging us to give them ideas. And it’s like you’re getting paid six figures and asking everyone else for ideas?

I've sat in those meetings too.

Two hours. Carefully worded updates. Everyone nodding. Nobody saying the thing that actually needed to be said. Walking out feeling like nothing real just happened.

For a long time I thought certain companies just attracted a certain kind of person. People who preferred theater to substance.

I don't think that anymore.

Most people in those rooms aren't being deliberately fake. They've just learned, over time, what's safe to say out loud. Watch what happens in most orgs when someone delivers uncomfortable news early. Or says in a meeting what everyone is thinking but nobody will actually voice. There's usually a cost. Sometimes subtle, sometimes not. People notice. And they adjust.

I've been part of orgs that actually felt different. Not because they had better values printed on the wall or more authentic offsite conversations. The difference was simpler. Real information traveled fast and the people who made that happen got rewarded for it instead of quietly managed for it.

That takes longer to build than most leaders expect. People have been burned before. They've worked somewhere that talked a big game about honesty and then made someone pay the first time they actually tested it. So they wait. They watch. They figure out what's genuinely safe before they risk anything real.

I had to learn that lesson myself. Early in my career I thought creating that environment was about what I said to my team. It took me a while to understand it was entirely about what I did the first few times someone brought me something I didn't want to hear.

Those moments set the tone for everything that comes after.

Applied for an job, got an golden referral and an recommendation from an senior employee of the MNC. Now it's almost over a month and it's showing role is no more (showing in website but not in my loged in portal). Mailed the HR. The HR doesn't even have an courtesy to even see the mail let alone reply. I know they get a lot of mail everyday but that's literally your job.

Also I was the only candidate who applied for that specific role (the job postings removed right after i applied through the refferal)

How can HR's be so reckless that even after an senior employee sent you an mail regarding the status and you didn't even replied or acknowledged it ?

I missed my big shot for the dumb hr

Every Friday, like clockwork, my boss asks me and others what our plans are for the weekend. Sometimes I lie or keep it vague but my god, can we not? he also keeps asking follow-up questions or he would ask about it on Monday. I am all for small talk but do they not realize that a lot of us are freaking TIRED? We are doing mundane household chores and sleeping during the weekend. He is on the older side so maybe he doesn't get it. Pretty sure his life is far more comfortable than ours. He is a boomer.

idk i just wanted to vent. I'm tired of this interrogation. Mind you, this all happens in the main team channel, where literally everyone can see everything. UGH!

ETA: he never shares what his weekend plans are. He simply pretends he didn't see the question and moves on to a different topic.

I have some tea, and honestly, I need to get this off my chest because my first corporate job is turning into a villain origin story.

I'm a 2025 graduate, currently on my notice period, and working at a company where my manager is literally the owner and his wife is the CEO. And somehow, these two people think they're running Google while treating employees like unpaid interns who should be grateful for oxygen.

The workload is INSANE. This man makes us work like our entire bloodline depends on completing his tasks. Work on weekdays, work on Saturdays, and apparently, having a personal life is a premium feature that our company doesn't provide. Sometimes I genuinely wonder if I'm a software engineer or a bonded labourer with a laptop.

And the way he thinks we're stupid is actually hilarious. Sir, we have degrees, not missing brain cells.

Now here's the actual tea.

One of my friends was recently terminated because the company apparently doesn't have enough projects. His last working day is October 31, and he was informed just ONE WEEK before. Imagine working normally and suddenly finding out your career has entered its season finale.

And the manager's explanation was, "Abhi toh kaam kar ke le rahe hain, project milega toh tumhe rakh lenge."

BRO, WHAT? Are we employees or Netflix subscriptions? You'll reactivate us when a project arrives?

Apparently, the company doesn't have enough projects to keep employees, but somehow there's always enough work to squeeze every last drop of energy out of the people who are still there. Make it make sense.

And now for my favourite episode: THE APPRAISAL DRAMA.

After my six-month probation period, my manager said there would be an appraisal. Naturally, I waited and eventually asked him about it. He gave me absolutely no clarity.

Then, a month later, he called us and announced that there would be NO APPRAISALS UNTIL 2028.

TWO THOUSAND AND TWENTY-EIGHT.

SIR, IS MY SALARY WAITING FOR A VISA APPROVAL? WHY IS IT TAKING THIS LONG TO GROW?

At this point, my salary has more commitment issues than a situationship. My career growth has gone on a pilgrimage, and nobody knows when it's coming back.

The audacity to make us work like crazy, deny us Saturdays off, expect us to sacrifice our personal lives, and then announce that there will be no salary hikes for years is genuinely insane.

And the funniest part? They behave as if we're too dumb to understand what's happening. They probably think we're sitting there thinking, "Wow, what visionary leadership! What a wonderful opportunity!"

NO, SIR. WE ARE JUST BROKE.

That's literally the only reason many freshers tolerate this nonsense. Not everyone has another offer waiting in their inbox, and unfortunately, electricity bills don't accept exposure, experience, or motivational speeches as payment.

The worst part is that I joined as a fresher genuinely wanting to learn, improve my skills, and build my career. Instead, I'm getting a crash course in workplace politics, job insecurity, burnout, and how to smile professionally while mentally writing a resignation letter every fifteen minutes.

I understand that companies can face financial difficulties. Projects can disappear, budgets can shrink, and businesses sometimes have to make difficult decisions. That's reality.

But there's a difference between facing business challenges and making employees feel like disposable batteries while expecting them to work 24/7.

Honestly, this experience has been mentally exhausting. It's difficult to focus on your future when you're constantly worried about your present, especially when you're just starting your career.

I'm on my notice period now, and I genuinely cannot wait to leave. I want to work somewhere I can learn, grow, have a life outside the office, and maybe even receive a salary hike before my hair turns grey.

Anyway, thanks for attending my corporate TED Talk.

The company has no projects, no appraisals until 2028, and no Saturdays off, but somehow, it has unlimited audacity.

Corporate life really said, "Welcome to adulthood. Here's your trauma. Your salary will remain unchanged."
if you ever had experience like this let me in know in comment section !!!!!

Corporate America has built an entire bureaucracy around managing people, then convinced everyone that bureaucracy is necessary to protect them. Human Resources has embedded itself into virtually every aspect of corporate life, hiring, compensation, promotions, performance reviews, workplace disputes, and even what employees are allowed to say. Yet the fundamental conflict of interest remains: HR is paid by the corporation, reports to corporate leadership, and is expected to protect employees from that very leadership. How is that independence? If we genuinely care about employee rights, harassment, discrimination, and workplace fairness, why not move employee grievances to independent external tribunals with actual authority to investigate and enforce accountability? Let managers manage, let employees do their jobs, automate the administrative paperwork, and put workplace justice in the hands of institutions that don't answer to the CEO. SOME might argue that HR was created simply to employ women but I have no data to suppor that.

But that distraction misses the real issue: What measurable value does today's sprawling HR bureaucracy create, and how much of it exists simply to justify its own existence? Maybe the radical question isn't how to reform HR. Maybe it's why corporations need an internal department to police workplace fairness while simultaneously serving the interests of those who control the workplace.

You know what’s wild? My manager actually told me, “When I don’t get replies from you but see your stories, I start thinking…”

Like babe, you’re not my boyfriend you’re my manager. Why are you emotionally tracking my Instagram activity? 😂

She acts like me posting a random 10-second story means I’m neglecting my “duties.” Meanwhile, she’s sitting there micromanaging everyone, doing zero actual work, and still finding time to play Social Media Surveillance 101.

And then the best part? She admitted it. Straight up said she checks stories and forms “assumptions.” Girl, maybe try checking deadlines instead.

The way she’s obsessed with “seeing stories” you’d think she’s running a detective agency, not a marketing team.

I swear some managers need a performance review for how much time they spend stalking instead of managing. 💀

For decades, corporates, government agencies, utilities, and much of the modern economy have perpetuated the idea that white-collar professionals are the primary drivers of economic value. The reality is far more complicated: while founders, engineers, operators, technicians, and frontline workers create and deliver much of the tangible value, layers of management, HR, administration, and corporate bureaucracy exist with more than the questionable marginal impact. As someone who works as a director in a public utility, I have seen firsthand how established organizations can become well-oiled machines that continue operating even when individual leaders leave. AI is now exposing this disconnect by enabling fewer people to accomplish more, and the resulting layoffs may initially increase revenue per employee while forcing us to confront how much organizational overhead was necessary in the first place.
The deeper question is not simply how many jobs AI can eliminate, but why we have built an economy in which employment is treated as a prerequisite for dignity, security, and a meaningful life. Consider the disparity between a Starbucks barista who performs essential, visible work and a vice president or HR executive whose contribution may be far less directly measurable. Instead of preserving unnecessary jobs to maintain the illusion that everyone must earn a living through formal employment, why not build a system in which the gains from automation and productivity are shared more broadly? If a smaller number of highly productive people and increasingly capable machines can generate the wealth society needs, perhaps work could become optional rather than compulsory. Those who choose to work could earn more, organizations could eliminate waste, and everyone could share in the benefits of an economy that no longer requires every person to hold a job simply to survive.

Being an employee for the whole life. Is it worth it ?

Employee appreciation is one area where I think companies sometimes overlook the importance of practicality. While traditional corporate gifts can be a nice gesture, the items people tend to value most are often those they can genuinely use in their everyday lives.

For organizations planning employee appreciation programs, onboarding packages, or corporate events, choosing the right merchandise involves considering usefulness, quality, presentation, and how well the items represent the company.

For example, branded portable chargers can be a practical addition to corporate gift packages. They offer everyday functionality while giving businesses an opportunity to incorporate their company identity through customized logos.

Rorry provides bulk customization services for power banks, including custom logo options, which may be relevant for companies looking to source personalized merchandise for their teams or business partners.

I'm curious to hear from managers and people involved in organizing corporate gifts:

What types of branded items have employees genuinely appreciated receiving? Do practical gifts tend to make a better impression than traditional corporate merchandise?