What was your best revenge???

[msmarieh]

What was the best work revenge you have ever had - something where someone got their comeuppance??? (NOTE: I am NOT looking for you setting the office on fire or anything like that.)



Mine goes like this:



Early in my career (second job) I worked for one of the best managers I have ever had - then or since. He was beloved throughout the office and named District Manager of the Year two years in a row. He ended up being promoted and transferred. The new DM came in (a man with a serious Napoleon complex) and immediately started instituting changes without even bothering to find out how the office was currently functioning. HQ realized this would be a difficult transition no matter who came in, so they sent out an arbitrator to help introduce the employees to the new manager. This manager walked into that meeting, looked at his watch and said (IN FRONT OF THE ARBITRATOR) would this take long, because he had important things to do... The writing was on the wall that this was NOT someone we wanted to work with.



Another inside sales rep and I gave our notices together, just on principle. I was planning to leave anyway in two months as I was getting married and moving out of state, but he didn't know this. My customers were some of the larger ones (Softsoap, Dow Brands, Flintstones Vitamins, etc.) and several of them called HQ and told the VP of Sales to convince me to stay.



That nasty little DM had to call me into his office and (against his will I am sure) ask me to stay on because so many of my customers had called the VP to complain about me leaving. How sweet it was to say so sorry but no way in hell will I stay and YOU are the reason why. It was one of the highlights of my career and I was only 24 at the time!



Fortunately I have had more great bosses since then, but what a fabulous life-affirming, self-esteem boosting moment... How about the rest of you???



Marie



 

[elleny]

Sometimes revenge comes in surprise packages.  Before I worked as an admin, I worked as a Assistant Manager for Brugger's Bagels.  Our particular franchise was going to crap, and the investors ordered our DMs to make a profit and fast.  



Well the first thing they did was go into each and every store and "clean house".  To save his skin my GM said that I was the reason the store was running so horribly.  I was demoted to shift manager, and when I found out I was so mad I started crying (and anyone who knows me knows that when I cry I'm close to doing some physical damage to something).



The DM told the GM that he would be AM while they brought in my old manager (who ran the best store in the territory) in to clean things up.  Well she was the one who trained me, and knew that I was not the one messing up.  I mean, I did all of the GM duties including inventory, payroll, cashouts, bank runs and scheduling.  I even managed to reduce the number of employees on each shift by 25% w/o compromising the store.  



Well, when she got here, she took me off all of those duties, and gave me the shift lead job.  My old GM/new AM was given all of the tasks I was doing for one week, and we lost $2000 in sales.  Needless to say, he was fired, I was promoted, and my new GM was just as good to me as when she first trained me.  It just goes to show that sometimes other people do care.



Ellen (sniff, sniff) in TX

[fireproof]

Way back in the late 1970's I was in high school and found a summer job in an accounting department.  There was one vice president whose idea of saying "HI" was to sneak up behind you, pick you up and swing you around (and then comment on how hard or easy it was to do so).  About the third time he did this to me, I "lost my balance," and landed on his foot (with high heels, of course).  Not only did he never come near me again, but the other ladies in the office immediately became "clumsy," and soon he left everyone alone.



Naturally, such behavior on his part would not be tolerated today.

[winkiebear]

The best one was that the worst boss I've ever had was asked to leave the company because of an integrity issue.



I work for a global company, and it's in the top 5 of the Fortune 500.  Integrity is a HUGE concern for this company.



So, nanny-nanny-boo-boo.  You got canned and I got promoted!!!!



 winkie - who loves revenge regardless if it's cold or hot!

[lioness70]

I wasn't around to see the boss from hell get his, but at least it happened.



This guy was a textbook example of bad managing, straight out of Joan Lloyd's "Your life isn't more impotrant than mine" column this week.  He was the KING of sarcastic comments and condescending comments, and he knew how to time these things.  He was great at embarrassing staff members in front of other people from other departments.  He would never tell you how your performance was-then he'd drop the bomb in your performance review.  He was a master at twisting things around to make him look good and everyone else look like sh*t-especially in front of big bosses.  And since he had no life (he was never married and middle aged), he tried to make sure everyone else had no life.  He would make people call in regularly on their vacations.  He wanted to have control over doctor's appointments, picking kids up from school, and other such life necessities.



In truth, he was a very insecure man who was afraid he couldn't do the job which he was hired for (administration manager-all that is is overseeing everyone else's jobs, while everyone else does the work).  Hell, his job was easier than mine!  But instead of being nice about it, he turned into a bully.  He was a classic bully type, an insecure person reveling in power.



He did not like me at all from the day he got there (I was hired before he was), and he launched an all-out campaign to get rid of me, using the divide-and-conquer methods I described above.  Without going into details, things got so bad that I almost went out on doctor-ordered stress leave.  I'd already complained to HR about this destructive behavior, but they told me he was free to run things as he saw fit, and if I didn't like it, I could leave.  Well, I did just that a couple of days after that meeting.



A little over a year later, my husband (who became UPS account exec for that company after I left it) told me how half the company was fired in a wholesale company cleanout.  The big boss didn't like the way things were being run.  Imagine how pleased I was when I found out they got rid of boss form hell.  Like I said, I wasn't around to see it, but it only proves that BULLYING DOESN'T PAY.  No one is going to go out of their way for you if you don't show them any respect.  No one was there for him to put in a good word for him when the ax fell.  Why would they?

[yankeestarbuck]

Well, like others, this wasn't MY direct revenge, but it was so wonderful.  I used to work for a family-owned and run company, for 5 years.  Things were OK, except for the vice president, who was the president's son. But they hated each other.



Well, this VP just acted any old way he pleased, said the rudest things to me whenever he felt like it and abused just about everyone.  But I liked the job and the other coworkers, and the money, so I shut my mouth, looked the other way and sublimated my anger into ice hockey.  This man was bad.  He loved sending his expense reports in overnight to the finance dept. and expected an emergency check overnighted to him for the next day.  When the VP of finance emailed him that his AmEx card being frozen until the funds were repaid did not constitute an emergency, he emailed back that when he was running the company in a few short years, he would decide what was an emergency and what wasn't.  Don't get me wrong, the guy was a good business man, and most of the AmEx bill was wining and dining clients.  The reason I know about these emails is they got stuck in his printer and I had to have the repairman pull them out, so I kept them, for personal reasons.



6 months before I left, the company was sold, right out from under him.  The president said nothing to anyone, including his partner, the senior VP.  I quietly chuckled to myself, knowing his days were numbered.  Sadly, so were mine, since I didn't like the way things were being changed and I didn't adapt well to that.  I ended up being fired, wich led me to the great job I have now!  So, I guess it felt kinda good!

[superninjaadmin]

Not sure I can call this "revenge" but this withcy-poo had it a long time coming to her!  Here's the story:



From 1983 to 1986, I worked at a TV station in the traffic department.  At the time, there were four of us working in the department (this was back before computers, so we typed the traffic logs on the IBM Selectrics and used a lot of white out).  After two years went by, the traffic manager, Debbie (who hired me), moved to a different department and the next person in line for a promotion (Teri) took over as manager.  They didn't replace Debbie, so the three of us took up the extra work.  It was a busy place, but we ran a smooth operation.  



As soon as Teri took over as department manager, her head swelled up like a balloon.  She was Miss Queen Bee.  Although she was only one year older than me, she developed a huge chip on her shoulder.  She would do her darndest to search and try to find mistakes that me and Ursula had made on the logs, and then we were chastized and belittled repeatedly - EVERY DAY!  Teri had Ursula in tears every day.  But, if Teri made an error, oh...she'd just laugh it off and act like it was nothing.  Ursula and I developed a real animosity toward Teri.  And, to top it off, she was a total witch to her husband!  She'd call him on the phone at work and rag on him.  I couldn't believe how she treated him.  The next day, she'd get a dozen red roses delivered from him.  I don't know why her husband put up with her crap.  While she was the manager, they were having a house built.  Needless to say, Teri was on the phone practically 80% of the day talking with the builders, smoking cigarettes and --- not doing her job!  Ursula and I picked up the slack.  



Well, then Teri got pregnant.  When she went out on maternity leave, I took over Teri's responsibility.  We got a temporary person to come in and help with the department, so there was me, Ursula and the new girl.  During the three months that Teri was home with her baby, it was a LOVELY time in the department.  The atmosphere was fun, positive, and we all were a happy team.  When Teri came back from maternity leave, and she saw how well I did running the department, she turned up the heat and made my life miserable.  I put up with her crap for two months and then I resigned.  During those two months, upper management knew what was going on, but they didn't do anything about it.  Her manager told me in confidence that they didn't want to fire Teri because she just built a house and had a baby.  Well, I couldn't take it any more, so I quit.  That was the best thing I ever did because during my unemployment in 1986, I took some computer classes and got a new job that doubled my salary.  I found out that the TV station fired Teri about a month after I quit.  Good riddance!  I don't know what happened to her, but she's probably still a miserable person.  Who knows, who cares.  This happened almost 20 years ago, and still to this day, this woman stands out as the biggest (you know what) I've ever worked with.  



The moral to the story is, you get what's coming to you in the end and good things come to those who wait.  



I have lots of patience - I can wait a long time.  And, only good things have come to me from this turning point 20 years ago.  

[deedeeb]

When I left my old department last September, I was feeling pretty unappreciated, to put it mildly.  My job was posted internally and only 2 applicants were considered - I tried to interest other people, but the truth about the psycho managers and director got around anyway.  One of the applicants was a real "queen bee" type, a clerk who acted like she ran the world when in fact, she spent a huge amount of time occupying herself with busywork (she used to scrub her entire workstation down like she planned to do brain surgery instead of data entry!) instead of getting important things done.  When things had piled up sufficiently, she would ask for overtime to finish (overtime was strictly rationed at that time, due to a merger), or worse, have the manager divide up the work to the other clerks on the staff.  I thought it was unfair to burden others with work that was her responsibility and said so.  I was accused of being jealous!  When the opportunity came for me to transfer out, I was asked what I thought of "M" and told them honestly (I was very businesslike and gave appropriate examples) that I thought she was not ready to take over my work right away.  She had never filled in for me, not even for a day, and I knew she'd get overwhelmed.  I figured it would take her a few months to melt down; instead, it took about 3 weeks.  She has apparently demanded her old job back which is not an option at this point.  She has been calling our HR group to try to file a grievance about this, and blames me for not preparing her!  I hate to say this, but I DID tell her so!  She was so smug about getting the job, I do get some satisfaction about the phone calls I get weekly, begging me to come back!  Neener, neener, neener.....(I know - so mature!)



I did do a horribly immature thing to an overbearing, snotty, demanding manager who left around the time I transferred in here.  (I knew she was leaving, otherwise I would never have come over.)  She wanted her boxes of files and stuff shipped to her new location (we had a 3 floor building with no elevator!) and demanded that I do it.  I have an artificial hip and am waiting knee replacement surgery so I wasn't about to pick up anything heavier than my big old self from a chair!  I couldn't get the company drivers to move the stuff, either - they would only take it from the loading dock.  My DH (a real prize but that's another post) carried all her heavy cartons downstairs and stacked them for pickup, but--oops!  Two of them got "lost" on the way (I shoved them in the dumpster I am sorry to say).  OK so that was a petty and childish reaction, but sometimes................

[hupawoman]

I had to respond to this one because it brought back a memory, and to say it's so true Super Ninja!  What goes around comes around.



I had been working at a private Christian school for about 7 years so that my son could attend with discounted tuition and for the free daycare.  He was due to graduate and it knew it was time to go out to the secular world and get a better paying job.  I was close to accepting a position at an insurance firm and was talking to some parents about it at my son's baseball game.  A mom who never said a word to any of the other parents asked me for my resume, as there was an admin position open in her dept.  The next day I faxed it to her and got a call back immediately to schedule an interview.  I met all 5 of the managers I would be support in an engineering dept.  The job was more interesting, a better commute and about the same salary.  So when they offered I accepted.  And so began my descent into corporate hell.  I would be supporting the managers, VP and a dept of about 50 engineers, but my reviews would be written by this woman.  I was in my early 30's and she in her late 40's.  I was fresh and eager to learn, she was hard and callous.  She also had a thing for younger men.  On my first day she was showing me around and started gushing over this young guy in the IT dept.  I though him to be a bit too skinny and kind of gruff.  He or his co-worker would have to come over almost every morning to get me logged on.  I found out later they did it on purpose cause they wanted to ask me out.  



After a couple of months this woman was really out to get me.  She would make me go outside with her while she took her smoke breaks, tell me my bosses were complaining (they weren't), and basically did her best to make me feel inferior.  And I took it and would go home and cry.  I thought I would get fired and for a single mom that was very scary.  She eventually accused me of cheating on my time, stealing pens and all sorts of bizarre things.  One day another senior level admin stopped me asked how it was going.  I broke down and cried.  She walked me over to HR and said I needed to report it.  It seems that I wasn't the first one this had happened to.   HR transferred me to the manufacturing dept and boy, what a difference!  This woman, as a final act of wickedness, wrote a six-month review that was unbelievably horrible.  My first revenge was six months later when my new manager wrote the most glowing exceptional review and the HR VP told me the first one had been pulled from my records and thrown away.



I eventually was laid off from this company after two years and then rehired three weeks later for $10K more than when I left.  I also became friends with the young guy this woman fancied.  We eventually got engaged and this woman badmouthed me to him and everyone else about my reputation.   No one believed her and we married.  A few months later her boss left the company and no other exec wanted her.  She was let go and I was promoted to management.  We never heard from her again.