While it is understandable why managers and bosses don’t always listen to everything their employees report or suggest, it is still strongly recommended to consider it on a professional level, especially if this is an employee who’s always done a good job and knows what they’re doing.
Cause if they don’t, bad things might happen to good people, and that can mean anything from causing serious damage to making a fool of oneself. This is the story of the latter, though.
A Redditor has recently shared a story of how his boss didn’t listen to them about the deep discounts he wanted to give to one very rich client and how detrimental it could be to the business, and then had to learn that the hard way through malicious compliance.
More Info: Reddit
Bosses not listening to their employees make for some very juicy malicious compliance
Image source: Phase2 (not the actual photo)
So, a Redditor by the nickname of u/Mittendeathfinger recently went to the r/MaliciousCompliance subreddit to share a story of how they warned their boss about the massive discounts he was about to give a well-off client, without really considering that it might leave the company in the red.
You see, OP is a manager of a team working for a commissions company and one of their responsibilities is bidding on work. Last fall they evaluated the overall situation, its effects on the company, the costs of supplies, shortages, and the like to determine a new price list with increased prices that would maintain an 8 to 10 percent profit margin for the company.
And this story is no different as a boss made an unprofitable deal with a client despite an employee warning him about it with their calculated price changes
Image source: Mittendeathfinger
Well, there is this one very well-off client that has done business with the company and wanted to do some more business—quite a big project, in fact—but was not happy with the new prices. And the boss did not care that no other client had really batted an eye at the price increase, just this one.
In turn, the boss deduced that OP had made the prices too high. Despite the back and forth the two had about the whys and hows of the price increase and how it’s all calculated based on multiple factors, the boss put his foot down and demanded the prices be “the same as the "competition.’”
OK, cue malicious compliance.
Image source: Mittendeathfinger
So, it came time to place an order on the supplies and to put the plans in motion, and lo and behold, the materials and the works ended up costing 90% of the price that the boss had agreed with the customer. So, the remaining 10% was supposed to technically cover OP’s labor costs and the remainder should be profit.
Well, Mr. Boss Man was upset and started asking questions. Naturally, all of the responses included reminders of the warnings OP gave, and now the boss realized that the company had done exactly what he asked for—performed the works practically at cost price, and perhaps even more if you factor in OP’s labor.
And folks online ate up this story fast, praising the OP for their malicious compliance and sharing their own stories along the way
Image source: Dushan Hanuska (not the actual photo)
And, also naturally, this led to the boss asking for a proper price list, which, surprise-surprise, OP already had—had had since the previous fall, when they initially created the proper prices based on the proper calculations, which the boss insisted on not using for this one big client.
Anyway, folks online enjoyed the story—so much, in fact, that it got a bit over 18,000 upvotes with a handful of Reddit awards.
Apart from the overall praise for maliciously complying with the boss’ questionable orders, folks shared their own boss stories where the bosses also didn’t end up winning or coming out in the green.
But what are your thoughts on this? Do you think OP could have made their malicious compliance even more malicious? If so, let us know how in the comment section below!