My Job at the Cult – Managing Mojo
Previously, I told y’all about the huddle and the DISC profiles from the craziest job I’ve ever had. Those had some cringeworthy moments for me and I’m sure for y’all as well… but the behind the scenes shittiness that went out beat anything I’ve ever experienced. Let me tell you more!
At the cult, people tended to get promoted quickly. Promotions may or may not have title changes, but they always had an increase in responsibility and virtually never a pay increase. Within a month of being there, I found myself with my first employee to manage. Being new to management, I was nervous and excited at the challenge. Excitement quickly turned to anxiety as my boss told me about my new employee.
“Yeah, Bob is on thin ice around here. It wouldn’t hurt my feelings if you had to let him go.”
“Let him go?”
“He was involved in a gossiping scandal that led to several employees being fired, and he’s not really over it. We have recorded IM conversations between him and other employees bragging about being hungover coming into work.”
“Gossip scandal?”
“Yup, anytime you think he’s not going to work out you just let me know and we’ll pull the plug.”
Talk about setting someone up for success. You’ll be shocked to hear my employee quit about two weeks after I started managing him, but he gave me a heads up that he found a much better job. I wished him well.
I should not that during the six months I worked at this company, approximately 35 people quit or were fired. That might not seem so shocking if I didn’t add that the cult never had more than 75 employees at a single given time.
Another time someone in our office had what I can best describe as a manic episode. Jokes aside, I’ve known several people with bipolar disorder (I’m not saying this person had that) and it’s not anything to laugh at… at all. The day after this display, which was certainly unusual but not what I would call alarming or super disruptive, my boss decided said employee needed to go. He pulled me and their direct manager into his office.
“How’s Crazy doing today?”
We were silent.
“Do whatever you need to do to their work evaluation to make it look legitimate. [Person] doesn’t need to be working here anymore.”
It was at that moment where I shifted from, this place is weird but perhaps tolerable to this is the most toxic illegal work environment I will ever experience. I started job hunting immediately, but there was more fun to be had at the cult before I made my eventual departure. Looking back, I wished I had quit on the spot the minute my boss called this employee “Crazy”, but fear and stress can keep you in a bad situation far longer than you should be.
16 thoughts on “My Job at the Cult – Managing Mojo”
I swear, this new “blog series” of yours is like… my new obsession.
You’re like me – the second there is name calling or bullying I’m out! I can’t stand gossip, etc either. Good for you for moving on – someone close to me works in a toxic environment and is scared to leave since he’s convinced no one else would hire him. I hate seeing how it’s affected his self confidence. It’s my mission to try to make him see he deserves so much more 🙂
if this place is in our shared geographic location, you might have to disclose its name at some point, off the record!
I could get past name calling and gossip – those happen everywhere, even in the incredibly progressive and forward thinking environment that I work in. That being said, that turnover rate is extremely high and purposely going out of the way to find something wrong to fire someone? That is not cool.
Wow, this place gets better and better. Holy cow. This could be made into a movie
Wow…in insurance we brag about being hungover WITH the boss ahhaha
I feel like I’m watching an addictive TV show right now… “The Cult.” Keep writing more, this stuff is fascinating in a horrible way.
I too have regrets about what I put up with at my first job out of college. But as long as we learn from it for all future jobs, then its okay. If a boss ever again calls another employee “crazy”…you’ll know what to do and you’ll have the confidence to do it.
This is inspiring me to write about my crazy job that I had when I first moved to TX… but I am slightly scared that my ex-boss might somehow find it, hunt me down, and bury me in her backyard. She was THAT nutty!
I have similar fears about these people.
woooow .. i feel like these stories can’t be real, but they are! lol
Talk about car crash tv but in written form I can’t look away.
Sorry you had to work in such a vile place, super glad you got out but feel awful for those still there and/or victimised while there.
Train wreck! Love it!
Hindsight is always 20/20, and for me, I didn’t quite realize just how bad things were until I left!
Craziness!
That really sounds like a horrible position to be in, I’m glad you don’t have to deal with it anymore. It sounds like a lawsuit just waiting to happen with someone like that in charge,