The holidays are a time many look forward to for a myriad of reasons. It's an opportunity to rest, you can spend time with friends and family, and it's honestly just nice to have a day off from work.
However, some places of work remain open during the holidays, so those in need of a break have to save their time off and schedule it in advance to ensure they'll have a moment to breathe — and that's exactly what Reddit user u/bearandthebunny did.
In a now-viral exchange, u/bearandthebunny (who we'll call BAB for short) shared messages she received from her manager, who asked that she work during her approved time off.
With one person out, her manager asked that she come in anyway and called the schedule he attempted to impose "non-negotiable." Which went very wrong:
After issuing an ultimatum of BAB either coming in to work or being fired, she responded with "I quit."
A bold move, tbh.
BAB's post about the situation quickly went viral, and the most common comment among 7,000 centered around the entitlement of bosses who feel as though they can move their employees' lives around like chess pieces:
"What is it with the entitled bosses?" user u/OMA_ posed. "Why are they everywhere and not learning that intimidation doesn’t work? Just do better with the schedules and treat your workers right. Being a dick is the best way to lose a business."
Another user, u/Duskuke, agreed and could relate to the manager's stress when it comes to making schedules when low staffed. However, they pointed out that communication and fair treatment is key:
"I don't get it dude. My roommate works for a job with a great boss and they're very short staffed at the moment. So between him, his boss, and his two other co-workers, they actively communicate days off and who's gonna cover who weeks in advanced, and his boss is very understanding if someone needs to take off on short notice and they make it work. It shouldn't be this hard," u/Duskuke said.
On top of everything, many couldn't understand why the business would insist on remaining open on the holiday if so many of their employees were requesting time off to be with family:
"Oh you can't schedule enough people to work on Thanksgiving? CLOSE THE STORE!" user u/SeraphymCrashing said.
People agreed that closing would have been a much better solution than threatening BAB and ultimately losing another employee while already spread thin:
"'We're short staffed!'
'I'm not coming in.'
'Come in or you're fired.'
'I guess you're even shorter staffed now, bye!'" user u/Possible-Whole45 jokingly summarized.
In the end, BAB shared that she did not call her manager as requested, and she ignored any incoming calls from him. And while she's steadfast in her feelings toward management, she can't help but feel a little guilty when it comes to her coworkers:
"I kind of feel bad for the rest of the staff if I do really quit. I'm not the only one that was told they didn't have to work on Thanksgiving," she said.