rSlash - r/Prorevenge My Boss Fired Me, So I Fired Him!

Episode Date: July 18, 2022

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Welcome to R-slash Pro Revenge, where OP manages to shut down an entire company. Our next reddit post is from Warrior. In January of 2021, I began working for a very big American company in Europe that's in the energy sector. At the factory plant where I worked, we would repair gas turbine parts so they could be used again. If you were to purchase these parts for new, they would cost several thousand dollars and they would last for about a decade or so. If you repaired these parts, it would only cost about 25% of a new piece and they would last for another eight to 10 years.

Our customers would pay us like 50% of the cost of a new part and since each part was like two to $8,000 and a gas turbine contains thousands of pieces, we could potentially save our customers several million dollars for each gas turbine contains thousands of pieces, we could potentially save our customers several million dollars for each gas turbine. Customers would save a good chunk of money, and of course, the company was sitting on a golden goose. Over the decades, that meant that staff at this factory started making a lot of money. Over time, that led to problems among management, because management cared less and less about skill and honesty.

As long as the workers kept doing what they had been doing for the past several decades, money would keep flowing into the company. So you can see where this might be going. So I was hired on as part of quality control. Specifically, my job was to operate a 3D computer-managed measuring machine. As you can imagine, gas turbines get pretty hot and spin fast. A decade of heat combined with dynamic stress has the nasty habit of deforming items. As a result, we have to measure the items really precisely so their production knows which

part of the item needs to be repaired, or if a piece is too broken to be used again at all. Operating this machine isn't too complicated. You put the piece into a bracket, clamp it down, load the correct model, and start the program. The machine then spits out a report. It wasn't hard to learn, I learned it in like a week. This machine was immensely important to the factory, running in 2-3 shifts per day, like 6 days a week.

Something like 80% of all pieces that went through our factory had to be measured at least twice. As nearly anyone with a technical background can guess, operating a machine and understanding what it's actually doing are two very different things. When I started, there were only 3 guys who actually understood how that machine worked, as well as one technician, Vladimir, who could actually fix its code. Vladimir, however, was the technician for the entire factory, so he was a really busy

guy. And whenever he had to come over, our department would have to pay for his time, which is something the bosses did not encourage. Of the 3 other guys who understood the machine, Antonio is the one important to this story. He had been working there for a few decades at least, and he knew every nook and cranny of this machine. He was a simple worker, but if something went wrong, he was the guy that you turn to. He had a bit of a short temper and used very hmm, blunt language, but he was honest, open, and fair.

So despite some heated arguments, Antonio and me got along swimmingly. What no one except for Antonio and I knew was that over the past several decades, Antonio had collected so much time off that he could retire two years early, and he was 63 years old. He had decided to groom me as his successor and began teaching me every little detail about the measuring machine, how to fix stuff, how to do proper maintenance, why it did certain stuff, and so on. Antonio was a perfectionist but so am I, so I really appreciated him. During my first week of that company, I noticed it's biggest problem.

This factory had a massive problem with clicks, clans, and little circles. If you were part of the correct click, you could do whatever you want and be untouchable. If you aren't in the right circle, well, then other people steal your credit and you make a fine scapegoat. I didn't care much about that to be honest. For me, this was a well-paying job with a terrible commute, so I just wanted to stay there for as long as I could, earn my money, and then just take the next job. There was this fourth guy who operated the machine, Igor. Igor was part of the same click

as my boss, Manuel. My boss's boss, Freddie. And of course, his own boss, Manuel, my boss's boss, Freddie, and of course his own boss, Boris, who was Igor's brother. Igor was working the measuring machine simply because it was the most comfortable job that he could perform. He usually did the night shift because the night shift paid extra. Igor was, well, to compare him to a light bulb, he was like a wet match in a dark basement somewhere in a black hole. Maybe I'm being a bit too harsh with him now, but all I ever saw from him was how stupid

he was. Igor was also pretty lazy, rude, and arrogant. After all, he had an untouchable status due to his brother's best friend being the boss of the entire assessment department. Six months after I started working there, I had the first incident with the measuring machine. We received a bunch of rotary blades on pallets. And as one of our firm rules, we had to sort them in numeric order. Each rotary blade had its own serial numbers, so things went way faster and easier if everything was sorted in order. Since we had to pick up the blades one by one to

measure them anyway, it wasn't that big of a deal, just a bit annoying. Egor never finished measuring a set of rotary blades if he could help it, leaving just one or two blades left for measuring. And even when he had to finish a set and start a new one, he would never compile the reports into one excel sheet. I'm pretty sure he didn't even know how that worked. One morning I came to work after Egor's shift, and like usual, there were three unmeasured blades left over.

I just shrugged and went to go measure them. The problem was that the palates were a complete mess, and all the rotary blades were completely out of order. Igor had worked the late shift the day before, and would also work the late shift that day, so I would actually get to see him for a few minutes when I handed my shift over. Of course, this meant that I would have to sort all the blades while also operating the machine to make sure there wasn't a delay. Usually, this is a chill job. The blades are never heavier than like 50 pounds, and you had like 6 to 14 minutes to measure out each blade. Sorting the last order took me two hours of quite sweaty work while also operating

the machine, so I was somewhat annoyed. When Igor came back that afternoon, I asked him politely why he hadn't sorted out the blades. He rudely replied that he wouldn't do that. I was a bit baffled, and I asked him if he knew that sorting the blades was mandatory. Again, in a pretty rude tone, he said that he wouldn't talk to me about that. Outright, refusing to speak to me about a problem? What the hell?

I told him that if he didn't want to talk to me about it, then I would have to talk to my boss about it. He just gave me a smug smile and told me to go ahead and do that. Well, I did just that. I asked my boss about it, saying, hey, I thought that we were supposed to sort the rotary blades, or did we change that? This led to a four-way conversation between me, my boss, Igor, and his brother-slash boss. Boris wasn't happy at all, and my boss was rather embarrassed because it was clear that I was correct, but neither

them wanted to admit that their friend had done anything wrong. I did my best to remain polite and professional. The end result was rather inconclusive, with them issuing a kind request that we should please sort the pal to they came in disorganized. Igor just shrugged, and it was clear that he didn't care. Three more times the rotary blades came in unsorted, and each time Igor refused to sort the blades. Strike one. Six weeks later there was a second incident. Every morning before I started, I would maintain the machine just like Antonio had showed

me to do. One morning I came in and switched the machine to manual mode like I do every morning. A second later I heard a grinding noise and instantly stopped the machine. Obviously, in a machine this sensitive, a grinding sound is really bad. I quickly inspected the machine and found a deep crater in the stone surface, maybe an inch deep. I also noticed scratches along the entire length of the treads, so it was pretty clear this machine was running with the crater for a good bit. I immediately shut down the machine and told Vladimir and my boss that

something seriously wrong was going on here. I took pictures of the damage with timestamps, just part of my usual paranoia. The machine was taken out of commission. The entire stone tread had to be reworked and the machine needed to be recalibrated. The machine was out of commission for a month due to that crater. That crater, by the way, looked exactly like the bottom corner of one of the blades, as if someone had dropped it onto the stone tread. And the previous shift before me was drum roll, Igor, of course. Igor denied that he had done anything wrong, and also he couldn't recall seeing any scratches

or hearing any grinding noises during his shift. He tried to blame it on me, but I had reported this five minutes into my shift, and the last play that Igor had measured was still in the machine. Again, it was clear to everyone that Igor had screwed up, but not even a harsh word was spoken to him. While the machine was getting fixed, we were clear to everyone that Igor had screwed up, but not even a harsh word was spoken to him. While the machine was getting fixed, we were put to different work. I got placed into the pre-assessment team where the pieces get their first evaluation. I made some good friends there, which would serve me later on.

Strike number 2 After the machine got fixed a month later, we had a crude, massive backlog. To the point that the other departments literally had run out of work because they were waiting on us to get up to speed first. The machine was supposed to work in three shifts, but Antonio had taken his two-year vacation, and the other two colleagues who knew how to run the machine had left for better jobs. So at that point, the only people left who knew how to work the machine were me and Igor. One morning, I noticed something pretty weird.

The order that I had just started the previous afternoon was still not finished. Again, with just two blades remaining, every measurement report has a time stamp. Typically, measuring these blades takes like 4 minutes each, but for some reason, Igor's reports had like 10 to 15 minute gaps between them. Some of them were even half an hour long. I knew that Igor was a bit of a slacker, but these gaps were huge, so I thought that maybe he had trouble with the machine. I asked him if he was having trouble with the machine, and he snapped at me that everything

was fine. He asked me why I asked that. I told him there were some huge time gaps in the report and I couldn't find any error messages. Igor looked at the time stamps for a moment, back at me, and then just shrugged and went home. On my next shift, I came in expecting Igor to have completed four orders, but instead there were none. I was pretty confused because the measuring machine had been running over the weekend with no shutdown or restarts. But then why were there no measurement reports

at all? I called Vladimir because missing four entire orders worth of reports is a big deal. According to the rules, I also told my boss that the machine was in standstill due to technical issues. Both Vladimir and my boss came to the measuring machine and together the three of us looked for the problem. It took us a while to figure out that someone had turned off the reporting feature of the measuring machine. Maybe to avoid the timestamps. This caused quite a bit of ruckus because all four orders had to be measured again this time with reports. Again, it was super obvious that Igor had screwed up, but management needed a scapegoat, and I guess I looked like a scapegoat. And now, finally, the revenge.

That same afternoon, my boss's boss, Freddie, came up to me in his nice expensive suit and went straight into my face. I had been sitting in my chair compiling the results of the first order when he stood in front of me giving me no room to get up. He looked down at me and snapped at me that he was sick and tired of me bullying my co-workers. He handed me a termination letter and told me that I had two options. I could either promise to do better, apologize to my coworker Igor, and admit that I was at fault, or I would be fired immediately.

Well, one of the good things about being bullied for most of your childhood is that you learn to keep your head cool under stress. So, I calmly took the boss's letter and read through it a few times. Freddie told me that he expected my written apology before 2pm. Well, when he turned around and marched out with a smug grin, he left me with the termination letter, with his signature on it. Fun fact, when both parties agreed to it, a contract can be canceled immediately without any further responsibilities. I had two hours left until the deadline, so I spent a cleaning up my workplace, and then, according to the rules, cleaning out my hard drive completely.

I placed the backup into the assigned server with all the data correctly named and compiled. But of course, I labeled this data as unsearchable. You know, to avoid too much clutter. If you actually understand how the measuring machine works, you could find this stuff in like 20 seconds. If not, well then, good luck buddy. So I packed up my stuff, then I went up to the office with my termination envelope in hand. The big boss had a smug smile the moment that he saw me, but his expression turned to confusion when he saw me with my laptop, work phone, and everything else. I handed him the resignation letter, offered a polite nod, and turned to leave.

He shouted at me, where the hell do you think you're going? I said, you terminated my contract. So according to the rules, I'm handing over all my equipment. Here's my safety shoes and safety glasses. Have a good day, Mr. Freddie. I said that with a cold, calculated voice, trying my best to sound like a lawyer. Then I went to my own boss and piled my stuff on his desk. My boss was confused as hell, asking me what was up.

I told him that my contract was terminated. My boss was a smug douchebag, but he wasn't that dumb. His eyes went big when he realized that I was the only employee left who knew how to actually run the measuring machine. He was lost for words and then rushed into Freddie's office to see that termination letter. I went home and my now ex-boss tried to call me on the way home, but I dislike taking phone calls in public transportation, so I simply muted my phone and continued reading my book until I got home.

When I got home at 4pm, I finally answered his phone call. My boss tried to convince me that I had to come back so they could sort everything out. I replied, I'll have a new job within a week, and it'll take you at least a month to train someone on the new machine. Assuming you had someone who could actually train that new person. I tell you what, give me a solid contract with Triple the Pay, an apology from Freddy, and I'll consider it. He told me that I was being completely unreasonable with these demands, so I said, so to get this clear, three times you guys try to heap the blame on me,

and then you guys literally try to humiliate me, and Freddie actually does fire me. And you want me to be reasonable? Well then, I guess it would be reasonable to just ignore you then. So long! I hung up and blocked his number, as well as any other number that he used to try to call me on. The aftermath. As I mentioned before, I still had ears in the company, so I have a pretty good idea of what happened afterwards. The factory soon had a huge backlog. No one maintained or cleaned the measuring machine anymore, and since this was a precision machine, it didn't take that lightly. Vladimir was soon called in multiple times a day to fix a problem, which in return built

up a backlog for him and other places. He tried to explain stuff to Igor, but yeah, that didn't work well. Other departments completely ran out of work to do, and of course, they didn't want to take the blame for missing deadlines, so the issue pretty quickly got escalated up the ladder. And with no one wanting to take the hit, it climbed higher and higher before it eventually got to the desk of the National CEO of the company. What followed was the arrival of the proverbial Kill Squad. You know, the modern equivalent of the executioner.

A bunch of guys in very tight suits, no sense of humor, cold eyes, and strict command to find someone's head to put on a silver plate. From what I heard, there was even a prosecutor from the USA among them. I was called back by the company a month later asking if I could come in for an interview. Not a job interview mind you, but they wanted me to give them a statement about the whole affair. I happily complied and gave them the whole story as accurately as I could and openly admitted what I didn't know or what I was only guessing about.

Igor got fired for careless negligence. His brother, Boris, likewise got the immediate boot to the butt. My boss was fired as well. He and Boris had been fired for mismanagement. Their boss, Freddie, however, not only got fired, but also dragged a court. And I have no idea how, but he was actually dragged to court in the US. But given how ridiculous that country's justice system is, and that he had been designated as escape-good by the company, I wouldn't be surprised if he had to hold very tightly

on to soap for a good while. The entire factory went firmly into the red for the full year due to missing deadlines, which means daily fees of tens of thousands of dollars per contract. Last I heard, the company had to contract the producer of the measuring machine to train new employees how to operate it properly. I had asked for triple pay to do that job, but those guys were more like triple zeros at the end.

Oh, and I did find a new job within one day. I was fired on Monday, had the interview on Tuesday, and started work on Thursday. I do manual measurements now in a quality control department. My boss is a blast, my team is friendly, and my commute is only 18 minutes long. I've worked there for 9 months now, and I'm already the de facto team leader for first sample stuff, and best of all, I'm appreciated for the work that I do. Man, so okay, as a business owner myself, I genuinely don't understand how you could have so much writing on just one team of people. I mean, obviously, the problem here was incompetence, right? And nepotism and cronism. But what if that machine breaks? It's just

the entire factory gets shut down for a year while you get a new machine. Why not have a second machine? Why not have two machines and two teams working on it so that you never have a backlog? I mean, I can tell you why. It's because they don't want to spend the extra money. I don't know, man. It feels so weird to me that corporations that are that big and that profitable and that successful can be so stupid with their bottlenecks. That was our slash per revenge.

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