Your first day at anew jobcan be extremely nerve-racking. It’s your only opportunity to make a good first impression oncolleagues, and your brain will be moving a million miles an hour trying to take in tons of new information. But something that’s important to remember is that youremployershould be trying to make a great impression onyoutoo. Otherwise, you might just be inspired to say “sayonara” before your first payday!Redditors have recently beensharing storiesof employees who quit their jobs before evenworkinga week, so we’ve gathered the juiciest ones down below. Enjoy reading through these tales that might inspire you toquityour own job, and keep reading to find a conversation with Ben Stocken, Founder and CEO ofWest Peak!This post may includeaffiliate links.
Your first day at anew jobcan be extremely nerve-racking. It’s your only opportunity to make a good first impression oncolleagues, and your brain will be moving a million miles an hour trying to take in tons of new information. But something that’s important to remember is that youremployershould be trying to make a great impression onyoutoo. Otherwise, you might just be inspired to say “sayonara” before your first payday!
Redditors have recently beensharing storiesof employees who quit their jobs before evenworkinga week, so we’ve gathered the juiciest ones down below. Enjoy reading through these tales that might inspire you toquityour own job, and keep reading to find a conversation with Ben Stocken, Founder and CEO ofWest Peak!
This post may includeaffiliate links.
The owners daughter showed up to open 1.5 hours late. Said she thought her mom had given me keys. Proceeded to tell me to unload her car before I could come in and clock in. I locked her keys in her car and left.
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The oh ‘By the way we never mentioned it at the interview but you will get 50 percent pay for 6 months till your trial period is over’. I was half way into my first shift when they sprang that on me. I turned around and walked out. No discussion. Didn’t say a word. Just left.
Desk job. All male staff. Male boss made a joke that I can feel free to use the kitchen to make food for everyone because “finally we have a woman on the team”. Walked out.
To learn more about what pushes people to quit their jobs early on, we reached out to Ben Stocken, Founder and CEO ofWest Peak, who was kind enough to have a chat withBored Panda.“When people quit jobs right after starting them, it’s often one of two main things: Either the job has been mis-sold to them in terms of scope, opportunity and often culture, which destroys that initial trust in their leader who hired them and the organization,” Ben shared.“The second reason is that they have a terrible or non-existent onboarding experience. Onboarding is the first real opportunity you have as a business and a leader to set the working relationship off on the right foot, and getting this wrong leads to scope for miscommunication and conflict from the get-go,” the expert explained.
To learn more about what pushes people to quit their jobs early on, we reached out to Ben Stocken, Founder and CEO ofWest Peak, who was kind enough to have a chat withBored Panda.
“When people quit jobs right after starting them, it’s often one of two main things: Either the job has been mis-sold to them in terms of scope, opportunity and often culture, which destroys that initial trust in their leader who hired them and the organization,” Ben shared.
“The second reason is that they have a terrible or non-existent onboarding experience. Onboarding is the first real opportunity you have as a business and a leader to set the working relationship off on the right foot, and getting this wrong leads to scope for miscommunication and conflict from the get-go,” the expert explained.
When I found out their timeclock system didn’t track hours worked, but the minutes spent typing or moving your mouse. And it’d take random screenshots too (if you’re in a video meeting, I guess they get to take pictures of you too?). All that and they wanted this installed on my personal computer. That and a few other reasons made me back out after one day.
I was between jobs and got a temp job helping with payroll and they told me I would have to hold paychecks for people who did not return their uniform and when I pointed out this was illegal (and showed them the law) they said to do it anyway so I quit and went back on unemployment until I found a real job 3 weeks later. Quitting a job because they want you to break the law gets you unemployment in most States.
When i saw that the microwave was coin operated.
We also asked Ben how employees know whether their new job will just take a while to get used to or if they should run as soon as they spot red flags.“Early red flags are often a rushed interview process and repeated clashes of values. Our values underpin how we perceive the world and therefore how we interact with it,” he noted. “Fundamentally, if you find yourself in the first few weeks of a new role and business, and what you observe from behaviors and actions doesn’t align to your values, it’s never going to lead to an environment where you can do your best work.”
We also asked Ben how employees know whether their new job will just take a while to get used to or if they should run as soon as they spot red flags.
“Early red flags are often a rushed interview process and repeated clashes of values. Our values underpin how we perceive the world and therefore how we interact with it,” he noted. “Fundamentally, if you find yourself in the first few weeks of a new role and business, and what you observe from behaviors and actions doesn’t align to your values, it’s never going to lead to an environment where you can do your best work.”
It was a telemarketing company selling timeshares around the US. My first call was an old lady who told me the story of how her husband fell down the stairs two weeks ago and died right in front of her. My manager was over my shoulder listening in and said something like “OK, now pitch the package.” I left immediately.
Line job in a factory that assembled magazines. Because of all the paper sliding along the tracks, little bits would gum up the gears and they wanted us to reach inside and pull out all the wads of paper scrap about once an hour while someone MANUALLY held down a button that paused the machine from moving. Refused, clocked out for lunch and left.
Finally, we asked the expert how companies can ensure that their new employees have a smooth onboarding process.
I got a summer job as an HR/Office Assistant while in college.They told me on my first day that they had to fire some people later in the week and they needed me to do it because they didn’t want to.I didn’t come back the next day. Not only did I of course not want to do it, but I was shocked at the callous disrespect they had for the employees that they wanted to fire. If you want to destroy someone’s lively hood, have the balls to f*****g do it yourself.
I was a GM car salesman half a day. Family of 5 come in and settle on a Pontiac Catalina. Sales manager told me to squeeze another $275.00 from them. I went to family, cut $500 from the contract, turned it in and sent them home in a new ride. Told sales mgr I was done and left..
The boss hid the bathroom key and had everyone ask him for permission to use it.I have IBS and I got the runs the first day (of course).When I asked for the key the second time after 30min of using it the first time, he asked me: “again???“The third time he started chewing me out.I literally turned around on my heel and got to the locker room to take my stuff and go.He then tried to block my way out when I sat on my motorcycle to drive away.
Work in IT and got a new job as a SysAdmin and on the first day found support tickets where the guy before me was required to track every second of his time through it. Several tickets that read something like “Cleaned office - 15 minutes”.No thanks. I’m not a child that needs supervision.Luckily my old job let me come back like I never left.
Started a sales job just after graduating which I was happy to do because I’d done what I thought was a similar job while studying. Morning was as expected, induction stuff, a few odd characters, manager seemed ok. After lunch, they said ok now we need to get in a car and go do some door to door sales…. this was supposed to be an office based on the phone type of job so I was already thinking, nope.After about 45 minutes of chatter and slight panic because the person who usually took people around had gone off somewhere, someone asked if a car with a specific reg plate belonged to anyone. It was my car. Manager asked me to drive the team to an area of town for the door to door. They said they’d give me a separate payment for fuel. I said my insurance wouldn’t cover them so I can’t take the risk. They said to call my insurance and confirm. I said I’d go outside to do that while having a cigarette.I did not smoke. I got in my car and went home.
I got a job in town X. One the first day they told me tomorrow I needed to show up to a different office in San Francisco (which is a 90 minute commute there and a 2-3 hour commute home). Not what I signed up for, they legit could not understand why I was leaving.
I came in to be one of 4 retail managers for a museum with 4 stores. While training me I overheard multiple associates (who I would be managing) swearing and yelling at customers. Then one of the other managers training me to log the safe yelled and screamed at me that I didn’t know how to count cause the safe was $1 short (we later found the dollar on the floor behind the desk she had been counting at) then the district manager above me spent the entire day sitting at the cameras listing reasons to write up associates which included: seeing the outline of a girls phone through her back pocket even tho she never took it out, an associate going to the bathroom twice during his shift (they were only permitted one break apparently), and an associate not asking literal children to donate to the museum.Great first day. Even better last day.
Got hired as a farmhand for a potato farmer as a summer job from college; minimum wage through the local job office where I was told, “this guy has gone through a lot of workers”First thing he told me to do was change the oil in the tractor and pointed to where things were. Now I had changed the oil in my car, but that hardly compared… I managedNext, I was given a “s***ide jack” and told to walk out to the field where a 40” tire on one of those huge sprinkler systems had slipped off the railroad tie going over the ditch and use the jack to get it lifted out of the ditch and somehow use my 130 lb frame to move it back onto the railroad tie…I managedLunch time came and I had trudged back from the field with the jack. The farmer sees me and says, “I’m going to the house for lunch, please eat in your car.” Luckily I had brought my own lunch, but it was 90 degrees out and I was a sweaty filthy mess from what I had done so far and had no way to clean up… I managedFor the afternoon, the farmer had me perch on the back of the potato planter while he drove it down the field and I had to hop back and forth between the planter bins and manually make sure the potatoes were dropping into the feeder tubes… I managedGot a call shortly after getting home asking if I’d like an assembly line job in an air conditioned factory, never went back to the potato farm.
I was a Cold caller trying to solicit donations for an organization. Called a guy. His widow answered the phone saying he had recently passed. Supervisor said I should try and get the widow to make a donation. I was done.
I was in high school, working 3 part time jobs. I had gotten hired as a cashier at a supermarket. I really just wanted to be a stock boy, but oh well.I show up to work and the manager isn’t there. So I just start asking people like, hey I’m new how do I clock in? What do I do?Eventually someone clocks me in like an hour late. They put me on a register, show me the produce code sheet like once, then left me alone. No clue how to do a sale, no idea how to do coupons, etc. The manager shows up halfway through and yells at me, in front of a customer, for not knowing produce codes. Even the customer was like, “hey, it’s his first day. Calm down.“Time for my lunch break. Nobody has shown me where the staff room is, so I just buy lunch from the store and eat it in the cafe area. Manager storms in, takes my tray, throws the rest of my food away, and goes off that I CANNOT eat where customers are, that I’m stupid, etc. I just got up, threw the apron at her, and walked out. Absolutely ridiculous. I did, however, go back and demand my check for hours worked. Because f**k that.
I was assigned to a middle school grade 6 as a student teacher. I was supposed to be under the guidance of the classroom teacher. She was all too willing to let me be in complete charge and told me I could just do “whatever.” I called my faculty advisor and requested to be reassigned. The next day I was at a different school with a teacher who knew what she was doing.
Not me but a friend. This friend is a very good looking woman. It was to be her first job out of college working as a research tech in the lab of a Nobel Prize winner. She thought it was weird that at her interview he told her she needed to wear a skirt to work since he wanted people to look professional - but in a lab? Since he was older from a more formal time she thought “Oh well okay.“At the first lab meeting he sits next to her at the table while one of the students/post-docs is making a presentation. As soon as the lights went down she feels a hand on her thigh and it’s the Nobel laureate and he is working his hand up her thigh. She squirms but doesn’t do anything and quit that day. I asked her why she didn’t go to HR and she said she didn’t think it would matter since he was Mr. Big Shot. Later turns out she’s heard stories about him from multiple female employees. He died before he could get Me-Too’ed.
Not quite the first day (I have a mortgage), but:Been through the entire interview process: small payrise plus quite a generous company pension. All confirmed in writing.“Cool!” thinks I. Leave my existing job and start at the new place.A week or two in, HR does their induction. And the “generous” company pension doesn’t exist. It’s statutory minimum.Obviously I raise this, because that’s not what I signed up for. The answer comes back: “Tough, that’s the pension”. Er… excuse me, but we agreed in writing that it wasn’t. “Don’t care; that’s the pension”.They were astonished when I put in my resignation about a month later.
After 3 interviews, negotiations and tests, they agreed on my salary and we started on Monday. I come in, do all the paperwork and get assigned a pc, desk etc. Before coming in, I saw the red flag that they had a high turnover but they agreed on a really good salary for me. All of a sudden I get an email from CEO that he wants to “test me” again and gave me 3 complex tasks from his side business totally unrelated to my skills and position in the company, like asking a doctor to write a code. He told me just do it cause you’re working for me from now on. I stood up and went through the door. Half an hour later the HR calls me and asks to come back, I told her to have a good day and never contact me again.At my new job, I have a colleague who worked there for one year. She started telling me crazy stories about the boss and the company. I didn’t dodge a bullet, but rather a rocket strike.
Only time I’ve EVER just walked off a job site. I was homeless and answered a Craigslist ad for a roofing job (I’d never done roofing before). I was working for a pair of tweakers from NYC. After spending most of the day doing standard labor (bringing materials up a ladder, putting down roofing material and stomping down on it after they hit it with a blowtorch, etc) they wanted me to stand on a 2-inch-wide beam that was rotten and slick from rain- VISIBLY unstable- WITH NO RESTRAINTS OR SAFETY EQUIPMENT WHATSOEVER- and they wanted me to stand on it and use a sledgehammer to smash out as much decaying roof as I could, until I hit a point where the roof was solid again.I told the guy I wasn’t cut out for that type of work. He told me to quit being an upstate vgina. I told him to find a downstate pnis because someone is going to die under their tutelage and I’m not going to let it be me.He refused to pay me for the 6 hours of intense physical labor I’d already worked and I had to panhandle to get bus fare back… but I didn’t die…
When the manager said, ‘We’re like a family here.’ Bro, my family doesn’t make me clean a bathroom for $12 an hour.
Basic restaurant server job, I was in college. The drive was kinda long, and as a college student that matters a lot. I was mostly getting a job due to feeling like I was inadequate if I didn’t have one.So I go buy the black clothes required and show up. But the clothes weren’t black enough, due to having a gray lining around the button-up shirt’s collar and cuffs on the inside of the shirt. It barely peeked through under certain angles. They told me to leave and come back when the clothes fit their requirements.So I drove back to campus, called them up, and quit on the phone. It was just way too much BS to deal with and did not bode well.
It was supposed to be a B2B sales job. First day I get paired with a “highly successful, veteran salesman,” and we go downtown. Next thing I know, we’re walking into a Jiffy Lube waiting area, and the guy I’m with busts out a box of makeup samples and starts trying to sell makeup to the people waiting for their oil to get changed. We leave and I’m like yo WTF, I thought this was B2B sales? He’s like “well, I do go from business to business doing sales.” I’m like mother f****r that’s door to door, not business to business lol. I asked to be brought back to my car and never called those fools back.
Wasn’t told I’d be on the operations floor on my first day, didn’t bring my PPE. Got handed company issue steel toe boots (cheap and nasty) which promptly began to tear my feet to shreds. I show my supervisor my bleeding feet and tell him I can be back in an hour with my own boots and could then finish my shift. He told me if I leave to get them don’t bother coming back.Easiest walk out ever.
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It was a hotel. Not a crappy one but not a fancy one either.I was hired as housekeeping, I love cleaning and it paid decent so I was excited.First room had a pile of toe nails on the beside table, gross but whatever, I’ve got gloves.Second room someone pssed on THE PHONE! I asked where the replacements were and my trainer told me to just wipe it. It was a landline, there was p**s inside of it! WTFThird room had cm in the window sill. Another WTF. I noticed the window faced a playground across the street. I quit right there.
Worked in an amazon warehouse. I had just finished grad school and was applying for jobs. This was May 2020. The place was unbelievably hot, especially while wearing a mask. The guy training us kept screaming at us “COME ON! LETS GET THIS MONEY! LETS GO! YEAH!”. S**t like that. It was a 12 hour shift of back-breaking wok. By the end I thought I was gonna die. I left that day, went home, went to sleep, got up at 5am and redoubled my efforts to find a job. Got a job 1 month later working from home.
Got hired to be a machinist, which I had years of experience, show up first day and did usual paperwork stuff, then expected to be sent to shop and run Hass machines, instead they said well we’re fully staffed in machine shop and we’re transferring you to fiberglass dept which I had no experience. Walked into shop and it was a total nightmare with no ppe devices or a torret booth and told you’ll be fine. Stood around till lunch then just left.. idiots called me everyday for a week wondering where I was. That job has now been posted on indeed for 3 straight years lol.
I started the day at 7am at a little technical workshop where we repaired electronics.At 8am, I had learned that all 3 co-workers where there for 1 month max, and the teamlead resigned yesterday and I was to follow her up.At around 9am the wife of the big boss waltzes in, verbally assaults the co-worker next to me and tell him if she ever sees him with headphones in again she fires him on the spot.She doesn’t even greet me. I let it sink in.11am I decide to explore the facility on my own, since no one is showing me around. I learn there is no breakroom, only a shoddy toilet outside. You are supposed to eat your lunch in your car/outside.And to my absolute horror.. that there is no coffee machine on premise and people who brought one saw them destroyed.At 12am I walk into the boss’s office, I say I have never seen such a s****y workplace and he just has to pay me from 7am tot 11am and I’m out.Fought for a month with him and had to send a lawyer to get what I was owed because he wouldn’t pay me unless I finished my workday. Which I wouldn’t have been able to in those conditions.Funny story is, since that day my first question in any job interview was: do u guys have a coffee machine. It’s my, do they care about their people kind of thing. If the answer is no, I walk. I did it twice to flabbergasted recruiters.
(Technically second day) Started working at a car dealership as a lot porter. Me and other brand new coworker were asked (ordered) to straighten a line of cars during what was the worst thunderstorm that year. Turned out multiple tornadoes and tons of lightning. Boss said if we didn’t do it right then to not worry about coming back so we both quit on the spot. (Still waited out the storm though.).
Had a job as one of those people holding a sign on a street for a closeout sale. I sat down to tie my shoe, and got yelled at because I’m not supposed to be just sitting there. I mean she literally yelled at me. So I left the sign there and went home.
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“15% of our female employees have reported harassment in the workplace” - shipping company*this guy was right it was actually 25% working at shmed ex.
A bartending job - the person training me found a giant shard of glass in the ice. And then poured more ice over it. Bye.
My sister had two companies in play for her first job out of college. She really wanted Chicago, but it fell through, so she took the job in Detroit. (This was before the revival; back in the decay pØrn days)It all moved fast, so she took a guest room in a friend’s place. Her first day driving into the city, she just felt dread, like “ugh, this is where I’m going to build my life?”She did a u-turn, picked her stuff up from her friend’s place, called the HR lady to say she wasn’t coming (lol) and went back to mom and dad’s. It took her a few more months to land a dream job in Chicago. Sometimes you just have to hold out for what you want.
I applied to a local newspaper for advertising sales, thinking I would be making a lot of cold calls, instead I was being trained on ways to sneak past things like front desk reception so that I could knock directly on a business owners office doors. This was in a small town where I knew a lot of the local business owners already and the thought of behaving that way around people I had known my whole life was just distasteful, that and learning there was no wage, just commission.I did that first day of training and then at the end of the day gave them back all the training materials and apologized for wasting their time, but that I couldn’t see myself doing very well at that job.
Got a job tarring roofs in the summer in Maryland. Sweating my a*s off but I could barely keep up. One big dude was teaching me the proper way to spread the tar evenly with a giant mop. He kept prompting me as I was going then suddenly stopped talking. I look over and his eyes have rolled back and is starting to fall over into the hot tar we just spread. I grabbed him and started screaming for the other guys as he was too big and we were both heading for the tar. They grabbed both of us and got us off the roof. Paramedics for him and the water hose for me. When lunch time rolled around I told the boss “I’m outta here”. He asked if I was coming back tomorrow and I said “hell no” and left. I lasted about 4 hours.
I went through 3 interviews to get the job. I arrived 10 minutes early on my first day. The manager of the location I was told to report to had no idea that I had been hired. They called the person that instructed me where and when to report. That person said they needed to check their notes and call back. I didn’t wait, I just excused myself and thanked the manager for his time. Later in the afternoon, the person who hired me called and was angry that I was a no show at the very place I showed up for.
I started a job in an office, normal, cubicles , offices and reception. I went to the wash room and it was locked, I asked someone if there was another washroom. They said ask reception for the key. Really? I went to reception and felt really humiliated, but, I asked for the key. She handed it to me, and asked if I needed toilet paper?I said it’s alright, false alarm, got my stuff and left.
I got an offer with one of the largest UK banks.Heard nothing for 3 months. Then they text me on the starting day expecting me in the office at 8am. I’d chased them multiple times over the 3 months.Technically quit on the starting day but never really started.
When I was 21 I got hired on the spot at a Village Inn. I didn’t know enough at that time to know that’s a huge red flag. When I showed up for my first shift I was shocked and appalled at how disgusting the kitchen was. When I watched a server drop somebody’s pancakes on the kitchen floor, pick them up and put them back on the plate, then walk out and serve them to someone, I was done.
The job was misrepresented, I showed up on my first day and they said- we’re decided that you should do this job instead of what we hired you for… I said no, and walked out.. (an interesting outcome) a few weeks later I received a days paycheck from them… considering I’d only been there less than a hour.
Interviewed for a position and they outlined everything I would be doing. Got there the first day and discovered that I would be doing none of it. Fortune 50 company no less.
I worked for a publishing startup in 1992. Our job was to put folded magazines in screen doors across west Omaha.I had a drivers license, so I got to drive the van for the “runners” and drop off bins at intersections for the runners to restock.The vehicle was a van in the academic sense in that it had four wheels and an engine, but brakes and tires were clearly an afterthought.I decided not-dying was important so I lost those people’s phone number and worked at Wendy’s for a while.
It started with the guy saying “I told him he should have just hired you when you dropped off your resume” (first red flag)Then at coffee break and lunch all everyone did was b***h and complain.I finished the day but it was such an angry place with high turnover it didn’t seem worth it to continue.
Oh you’re on call so whenever we need you, no matter where you are if we call you you have to come in.
They wanted me to work in the dark.“Nope.”.
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Gabija Saveiskyte
Indrė Lukošiūtė
Justinas Keturka
Work & Money
