While this is pretty common, that didn’t stop this new-hire fast food worker from being put into a tight spot when their manager told them to stay in one spot so that they were out of the way and could intercept any incoming customer orders. The strictness of this direction, and the repeated reiteration of it, left them squirming when customers expectantly looked at them like they should be getting their orders for them, and a shift lead even came to put them in their place for not doing their part to help out.
When you’re that fresh-faced new hire, even if it doesn’t make a lot of sense to you in the moment to be doing the thing you’ve been told to do, there’s no quicker way to send a manager over the edge than to not listen to what they’ve asked you to do or add your own interpretation to that thing. Realistically, they were told to stay at the counter so that they could handle someone who might walk through the door.
I’ll tell you one thing: having a manager who is willing to admit that they got caught up in the heat of the moment is a dime a dozen, and having one who will actually go out of their way to apologize to you is even more uncommon.
All in all, this is a pretty harmless tale of malicious compliance where everyone is actually behaving quite well and handling things in a pretty understandable and mature way. The real problem here is the lack of communication between the shift lead and the manager as to who is doing what and why.
Author: Kayitsi.com
