‘What’s the dumbest thing you’ve done at work without getting fired?’ – 17 blunders that somehow didn’t get the boot
Working environments can be stressful places, where the slightest error could see you polishing your LinkedIn profile if you’re not careful.
Then again, that isn’t always the case. There are always strange instances where even the most catastrophic of screw ups are somehow brushed off. To give you a taste of the weird ways of the workplace, Dull_Noise_8952 put this question to the good people of r/AskReddit:
‘What was the dumbest thing you ever did on your job and still did not get fired?’
Here are the top replies that narrowly avoided a P45…
1.
‘I’ve heard a tech tell our service manager:
‘I’m going to take the rest of the day off for my mental health and for your physical health.’
‘He is still employed and I’ve stored that nugget in my back pocket.’
-In3briatedPanda
2.
‘There have been tons of times in multiple jobs where I’ve just wasted time or been on social media at work. Then suddenly something wasn’t done, and my boss would ask why, and I’d say “oh man sorry I was so overwhelmed” and they’d always buy it.’
-Narrow-Palpitation22
3.
‘Went to club on a Tuesday, ended up staying til the end at 4am -Got home at like 5am -Remembered I had to open the bank tomorrow at 7am, with a manager -Didn’t sleep, got dressed and went straight there -Stank up the whole vault with tequila -10 minutes after the bank opened, I went to the washroom upstairs to puke, then proceed to pass out -Manager knocks on door, wakes me up and sends me home
‘Didn’t get fired’
-tyrwlive
4.
‘During my first week on the job my boss was introducing me to people in the different departments, we went to the main server room. As he was introducing me to the IT staff, someone came through the door and I jumped backwards to avoid being hit. My back hit the emergency shutoff button to be used in case of fires and the like and shutdown everything cold. Took nearly three days to get the servers back up and all the data restored.
‘I didn’t get in any trouble for it because it was clearly an accident. In fact soon after they put a plastic box over the button that had to be lifted before the button could be pressed. To the day I left the company 10 years later, they called that box “The Ryan Cage” after me.’
-Dervrak
5.
‘My boss walked in with the ugliest hat ever. Being the genius I am, I said “ah that’s how you know you’re the boss, you’ve been here for an hour and not one person has made fun of that ridiculous hat”. I really don’t know how I didn’t get fired.’
-LeadingGuide693
6.
‘Deleted an entire national inventory database. Luckily I had an unauthorised backup on a drive on my desk so I replaced the whole thing in 20 minutes.’
-BanisienVidra
7.
‘Had an enterprise router down
‘Accidentally Reflashed the wrong Router….. took another 1500 customers down.
‘Realized it and let my boss know that I was a moron.
‘Boss laughed and said “thanks for taking responsibility for it, are they both back up?”
“Yep”
“OK good work but be more careful next time lol”’
-Old_Sweaty_Hands
8.
‘Big time corporate company.
‘Flirted pretty seriously with the recruiter / HR lady at the job fair and got an interview and eventually hired. We continued to awkwardly flirt over the next year or two (she became my HR rep), so intensely we made a few other co-workers uncomfortable.
‘Jokes on them though – we’ll be married 15 years in November and I still flirt with her all the time.’
-Ballmaster9002
9.
‘In the early 80’s one of my first jobs was working at a gas station that offered full service. Long story short. I filled a lady’s diesel Mercedes Benz with gasoline. I felt like a moron, but fortunately I caught my error before she tried to start her car. She insisted that I suffer no consequence and paid for her own towing and repair. Turns out that this very nice lady was also a cougar lol.’
-PickleNutsauce