11 Stories From Millennials Who Used To Work In Toxic Workplaces

It isn’t delightful in these places. The people don’t seem to give a damn about you and expect people to work like robots. Just because it’s hard to find a job doesn’t mean you can treat them as if they are dispensable. People aren’t objects – treat them like one if you wish to be treated the same, right?

Well, these millennials had to share just how horrible the workplace is. Especially right now because employers are finding all kinds of excuses to cut down losses. The economic crisis is bringing the worse out of people, but don’t forget – you don’t deserve to be treated like that.

Clock-out on time, report harassments, and leave the toxic place if nothing is done.

Lindsay inviting millennials to share their toxic workplace stories. Hers: my co-worker was afraid to be seen taking a lunch break.

“Winter break. Gave my PTO a month and a half in advance. It was cool, nothing was ever said. After New Year’s, I was an opener, so I got to the tanning salon, logged onto the computer… another employee came in and basically told me I was terminated while I was in Ohio.

“They never informed me and I still had the keys, the alarm codes, safe key – she just never formally sat me down to collect all of that. So, Helen, if you’re watching this, screw you. I’m glad I actually moved on to have a career.”

While working for healthcare and watching over two toddlers with croup and husband on 107 degree fever from flu, they called out and told her to ‘do what she needed to’ for the family as they ‘do what they need to do’ in regards to continuing to employ her.

“I called to inform my boss that I was unable to come in due to my 4-month-old daughter being kidnapped, and they threatened to fire me because it ‘sounded a bit dramatic.'”

“I went to leave on time, and I was asked if I was working a half-day. My manager argued that if I could leave on time, I clearly didn’t have enough work, and I should be working late every single night.”

“When I was trying on a menstrual cup for the first time, and I bled through my pants. I was two hours away from home, so that no one could bring me pants. I wasn’t allowed to leave, so I had to work a 12-hour shift in bloody pants. It was disgusting.”

Japan has one of the world’s most extreme work culture. Overwork to death or ‘koroshi’ is a very common term to hear and an actual concerning cause of death. The Japanese actually feel guilty when they take time off, which is why only a little over half of the people take their deserved paid leave in 2018.

The reason boils down because they don’t see their boss taking time off, and they are worried about ruining the ‘group harmony.’

“My boss thought it was a ‘joke’ to call me by my birth name every single day, rather than my chosen name.”

“I went to go tell my boss that I had finally planned my wedding and my honeymoon. She told me, ‘No, that’s not gonna work for us,’ even though I had told her more than six months in advance because it’s on a certain date that our magazine gets published. I was a salesperson, so my job was done by the time the magazine gets published.”

“I was pregnant and working at Subway and my coworker had a heatstroke because they wouldn’t fix the air conditioning. I had to work around him passed out on the floor with EMTs trying to wake him up because the owner wouldn’t close the store. Instead of fixing the air for me to be safe with my unborn child, all the owner did was say, ‘Hey, good job getting through that.'”

“We were at a company festival, and my then-boss had taken a bunch of drugs the night before, pretty sure he was still high in the morning. We were all chilling by the pool… and he shared with me that he was dying of cancer. I had a sister who had passed two years earlier, so being the sympathetic person I am, I started to give him advice. He then turned around and said, ‘I’m just [playing] with you.’ I quit a month later.”

In fact, people will speak ill of you when you take breaks. “They would react negatively. They will not say anything directly to that person, but they will speak ill of that person behind their back,” says one of the interviewed workers who wishes to be unnamed.

Their work extends way beyond their actual work time. People would spend overnights at offices at times. It’s normal to get off at 8 pm and then spend time with work colleagues, which is important networking until midnight.

“The GM at my old job pressured me to take a management job. I ended up getting so much better than him that he would continuously stalk me on the cameras and once he got the opportunity, fired me during COVID.”

“When I was giving birth, I got a call from my boss asking if I was gonna have my report turned in and if I was coming back the following day.”

Doing things to the extreme is not healthy, but Japan is slowly changing. The younger generations are starting to sound their wish to be allowed to take their paid days as they’re supposed to.