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  • Was hired at a company as a designer. Went to the production meeting and sat down beside another designer (introduced myself and we started chatting). In comes everyone else and sits down. We all start chatting and do introductions.

    Five minutes into the meeting the company owner comes in, chatting with a salesman. He glances around the room, then his face freezes on me - he then looks at the guy beside me and keeps looking back and forth. He finally motions for me to come outside the conference room. I walk out and he asks me what I was doing there. I tell him ‘remember, you hired me and my start day was today??’

    He turned pale and just said ‘oh yeah I forgot’. He let me go back in the room but then I heard him call the guy beside me out.

    The guy never came back. Apparently he had intended on firing him and forgot.

    Needless to say I didn’t stay long before I found another job. The place was complete chaos.

    • Omg he had hired the replacement already and forgot to fire the guy... what a mess, and what an idiot

      • Yeah, I was young and it was my first job out of college (technically I worked thru college but this was my first after graduation) so I was very inexperienced still and also didn’t know what to look for when it came to red flags.

        The owner’s wife worked there in a ‘higher up’ position and was the major cause of a lot of conflict at the company. Basically he would give people orders then she would come along and contradict them.

        If anyone disagreed with her then she would go to hubby and complain about said person(s) making it impossible to please either because you couldn’t prove her wrong. That designer in particular was just the latest of ‘trophy wife’s wrath’. The place had an insane turnover rate I quickly found out.

        At least it was a good learning experience and taught me to ask questions and meet people during the interview process.

  • A couple times now at my current job they've hired someone, only to have them just not show up on their agreed first day with no communication. I'm guessing they just got a different job they like more or something, but still, I'd imagine one usually at least tells people not to expect you, under that circumstance?

    • Companies can't be arsed to let you know you didn't get hired, I can see how someone would just ghost if they got a better job. Not commenting on whether it's right it wrong, just making an observation.

    • It's so weird. I've seen a lot of people do that over the years.

      One guy even responded to bring called, claiming he had spoken to the another manager about the start day, making it seem like a miscommunication. Next day rolls by and he's still not showing up. Didn't bother calling him at that point.

  • I worked at a tiny hospital in a rural area as the sole IT admin. They hired a new Director of Nursing, a very long process because we were so rural it was very difficult to convince people to move out there to work. They had helped her find and buy a house, helped her husband get a job in the area, enrolled their kids in the local school system. They had me buy a new computer specifically for her and asked me to come in early and be available to help with any computer problems on her first day.

    She didn't show up at all that day. People were pretty panicked about it. Next day she did show up, although about an hour late (not that anyone complained about it) and they rolled out the red carpet and everything. I spent most of the morning helping her get access to things and then she was off to more important things.

    Next day she didn't show up at all again.

    That one orientation meeting was the only time I ever saw her, a few days later they asked me to terminate her accounts, preserve emails and pull security camera footage. I still don't know what was going on. Drugs? If she had another job opportunity it seems pretty crazy to buy a house and move your whole family. She almost certainly would have been the highest paid employee, probably within the top 5 for the whole town.

    But yeah, I guess if you don't show up and don't have a good excuse things end pretty quickly.

  • On his first day, he came on to one of the women I worked with very aggressively and shortly after told another to "bring me a cup of tea, quickly" while on the way to a meeting.

    He was escorted off the premises by several other members of staff a few hours into the day once all of his system access had been revoked.

    I'm sad to say this, because I know what a bad rap this field gets already and I know so many lovely people who are part of it.... But, they worked in InfoSec.

  • I got fired before my first day. Well kind of.

    So I was in college at this time and I had applied for and got hired at McDonald's. I had previous experience working at McDonald's in a different town. Not sure exactly what position it was anymore but something something lead I think. Anywho at the end of the 'your hired' talk the manager that did the hiring told me that the Christmas party was like that weekend and I should really show up to meet everybody. So despite not working a single day I show up for the Christmas party.

    Well, her boss (the boss of the person who hired me) saw me and determined my hair was too long for a guy and fired me. He basically said that boys were to have essentially a 1950s men's haircuts if they were going to work for him... At McDonald's. I don't remember the specific words but I remember getting the vibe that he was very homophobic and that he thought long hair was somehow gay. So I was given the ultimatum of getting a proper men's haircut or I could be done. And despite not being gay myself I didn't want to work for some dude who just oozed homophobia, so I peaced out and told everyone I could at the manager of that McDonald's was a homophobic piece of shit.

    For those wondering how long was my hair... It just barely touched the collar of my shirt, if it even touched. You know the 'broke college student who can't afford or remember when the last haircut was' look.

  • I once quit on the first day of a job.

    I had previously worked with industrial robots and automation. Fixing them, calibrating them, making hardware and software adjustments as needed.

    I was between jobs and found a small business that seemed like it was looking to do some automation expansion. The interview was a little weird because they were kind of vague with specifics. That’s not entirely abnormal with companies that have proprietary processes or automation, though I felt they were being a little bit overly cagey.

    They wouldn’t take me into the clean room, which again isn’t unheard of, if in my opinion a little overly protective.

    My previous job had been partially titled “Maintenance” (as in I maintained the robots) and the small company asked quite a lot about my versatility in maintaining things. I think that makes sense for a small company to want one person do all things for a robot.

    I get a call that I’m hired. On paper the job looks good. Pay is a little low but this was an in-between job.

    I show up for the first day of work and one of the first things I have to sign is a 15 page front and back Non Disclosure Agreement. That’s an insane length. My previous job with a huge, established tech company was a two page NDA and they actually had a lot of different processes.

    So, I sign their crazy NDA and I’m taken into the airquotes “clean room”. First thing I notice is that I’m not suiting up or even putting on a white room style jacket. I see a cup of coffee on a “clean room” work bench. This is not a clean room.

    I’m walked through and out of the “clean room” and to the outside back of the building and shown some air conditioner units. Told I need to work on those to fix them, and then later in the week I’ll be cutting the grass.

    Lol.

    No.

    I left at lunch.

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