What's the worst job you have taken up?

[Deleted member 8118]

I know my job isn't as bad as what I'm probably going to hear about, but I work at a grocery store.

It's considered a high-end chain, and I'm sure many will be able to guess the type and name, but it's probably the worst job I've taken up so far.

Upon getting there, there was no one to train me and I had to jump through hoops to get training, and go through other people. Management seem frustrated to even have to bother with me.

The department I work in is filled with rather young men and women who like to call out of work a lot and come in late. One woman I work with said to me "I don't know how I haven't been fired yet." with a smile on her face after coming in late and hungover.

One guy spoofs the temperatures of the foods because he sometimes doesn't feel like doing it.

I haven't even been given a name tag in two months of employment, and they haven't properly assigned me space in the common area to store property.

Also, it's either you work 6:30-3:00 or 2:00-11:00, no in-between hours. I'd be fine with this if the hours weren't before public transit starts, so I'm up right now trying to catch a bus at 4:40am.

I can't even see what hours I work outside of work despite the company having Kronos - they seriously print out schedules still.. For a company that is considered hip and 'with the times', that just seems backwards...

Putting my two weeks in since I have a better job lined up.

Note: I'm pretty glad I did this. I fucking hate this job. Its made me want to finish my degree even faster so that I can at least find something I remotely enjoy.

 

[Deleted member 2809]

Tobacco plantation for a month. My hands were fucked for 2 months. Seriously.

 

[Maximo]

Dish Pig, makes you realize how fucking disgusting and wasteful people are.

 

[Evo Shandor]

Was a deep cleaner for trauma wards and surgery spaces.

 

[stone616]

Retail at Target working in their electronics department. If you've never worked retail and aren't hard up for a job I'd advise avoiding it. The pay is poor, the customers aren't respectful to you or each other and being a grunt you're disposable and are treated as such.

 

[Bacon]

Whole foods was god awful. Management structure encouraged cutthroat behavior and it infected the entire store. Everyone was always on the verge of popping off at one another. And thats without even talking about how entitiled the customers were. Thank God I'm out of retail.

 

[Raigan-etc]

Housekeeper at a hotel, was horrible, found used tampons in the toilets on numerous occasions

 

[SliceSabre]

Cashier for Walmart. Didn't make it two days before I ran outta there and quit. Human being are awful creatures when shopping.

 

[impingu1984]

Head of daycare at the Whitehouse ... We currently have only one baby to look after but he is a complete nightmare.

 

[Croc Man]

I spent a day whole day stuffing envelopes and another hole punching and binding diaries.
When I'm bored at work these days at least I can remember that and think it could be worse.

 

[Shadybiz]

Good that you have a better job lined up. However, grocery/retail type jobs like that will pretty much always have people on the crew that will call out and come in late. Not that other jobs don't have that, but those are the types of jobs where when 1 person does it, they make it a pain in the ass for everyone else, because then they have to try to call in another person, or spread the work over fewer people, etc. It sucks, I know; I've had a few of those.

Anyway, my worst job was 1 day. It was a "marketing" company. Interview went well, and they called me in. On the first day, I learned that it was one of those jobs where you pack up your car with a bunch of crap, drive to various strip malls, walk around to the stores IN said strip malls, and try to sell the crap that's in your car. I learned this a bit too late. My "trainer" drove us from NJ to DE, where we hit our first strip mall.

If I had drove my own car, I would have seriously left immediately upon finding out what the job really involved. But, since I didn't, I walked around all day, selling nothing, and didn't come back the next day.

 

[Saganator]

Grocery store bakery. Crazy hours. One day I'd work early morning, 3am to 1130am. Next day I'd close, 1pm to 1030pm, then off but I would have to work 3am the next day so it was barely a real off day. I was a half awake wreck most of the time. Hated that job. Kroger treats their employees like dirt.

 

[Philia]

Head of daycare at the Whitehouse ... We currently have only one baby to look after but he is a complete nightmare.

Click to shrink...

Took me a few seconds before I laughed. Good one!

I've worked at shit jobs but I can take it pretty easy. The hard part? Working 9 days in a row every two weeks. THAT was a brutal. :\

 

[Deleted member 8118]

Tobacco plantation for a month. My hands were fucked for 2 months. Seriously.

Click to shrink...

Damn.

I haven't even thought about a job particular to this in a bit while. I watched a show which touched on the subject of these sorts of jobs in the 21st century - didn't go in depth, but hearing even this small detail is horrible

Whole foods was god awful. Management structure encouraged cutthroat behavior and it infected the entire store. Everyone was always on the verge of popping off at one another. And thats without even talking about how entitiled the customers were. Thank God I'm out of retail.

Click to shrink...

Ding ding.

This place is a zoo.

Grocery store bakery.. Kroger treats their employees like dirt.

Click to shrink...

And to think I was looking for a job as a baker.

My hours aren't as bad, but I feel like a bag of shit when I'm off work.

 

[Bacon]

Damn.

I haven't even thought about a job particular to this in a bit while. I watched a show which touched on the subject of these sorts of jobs in the 21st century - didn't go in depth, but hearing even this small detail is horrible

Ding ding.

This place is a zoo.

Click to shrink...

Good thing you're getting out now. I drank the koolaid at first and stayed for far longer than I should have.

 

[johancruijff]

concert rigger or whatever is called, not because it was annoying or disgusting but because how fucking dangerous it was

 

[Chrno]

Softlines (clothing) at Target.

So many people pee in the fitting rooms.

Crazy to think how far I've come from retail...

 

[ToddBonzalez]

Not as bad as some, but I was a "parking lot attendant" aka cart pusher for Wal-Mart when I was younger. Being outside, exposed to the elements all day, doing the same insanely tedious task for hours on end...blah. The fact that we got paid 25 cents less an hour than the cashiers was salt in the wound.

 

[Raptomex]

So far it was my first job working at Target. I met some cool people but my hours always sucked, the pay wasn't great (as expected), and the store manager didn't like me for some reason.

 

[Mupod]

Right out of high school I was desperate for any kind of job, I had quit my paper route to help my brother with his business in Toronto but that fell through. Anyways, someone from the paper offered me a job putting flyers in papers on an assembly line and it paid ok. What they didn't tell me is the reason I was offered the job is that a strike had just started and I had to cross the picket line to get in there. And then it was a grueling night in the driest, smelliest, hottest place I've ever been. My eyes were stinging 5 minutes in and it only got worse. Probably the longest night of my life. Thankfully my parents understood when I didn't want to go back there due to the picket line issue, but it was mainly just because the job was torture.

I mean, I'm not some picky whiner afraid of physical work, the job I got after that was a night janitor at a college and that was totally fine. Did it for a couple years and it paid a big chunk of my tuition.

Helping my brother with his auto detailing business, mentioned above, is a close second for shittiest job. 13 hours a day, 6 days a week, and I kept being asked to stay late even though my feet were so fucked up I could barely stand. Being on your feet that long with water everywhere basically turned my feet into a cracked, soggy mess and I legitimately think if it had gone on for more than 2 weeks something real bad was gonna happen. The worst part was that everyone else took smoke breaks every hour but if I tried to sit down with them I'd get bitched at for taking a break.

My previous job, while fairly easy IT work, ended up with the owner trying to pay me with fake cheques. So that might be in the running too. Setting up a phone system in an office with the knowledge that the business probably won't last 2 more months and those people were wasting their money was unpleasant.

 

[djplaeskool]

Telemarketing for MBNA back in the day.
Had summer semester off in college and wanted some extra cash.
I learned that I don't have the killer instinct necessary to force people get Credit Cards they probably don't need.
On top of that, I took a fucking ton of verbal abuse on the phone. Pay was decent, but it wasn't worth it, personally.
Only made it a couple of weeks. I've never held a job in any kind of sales since.

 

[Deleted member 9241]

I sold meat door to door off the back of a pickup truck. I had the job for about a week. It's as bad as it sounds. A few months after I quite, the company was closed and prosecuted for a slew of illegal bullshit by the state.

A close second is working through a temp agency where I had to clean the steps of the fire escape in a skyscraper. The first day there were 4 of us. 2 days later, I was the only one who showed up. Just me, a bucket of soapy water, and a hand brush. It took me about 2 weeks to do it alone.

 

[52club]

Pizza Hut, my first job, it has made everything else seem pretty good.

 

[SwampBastard]

I got a job managing the regional office of a traffic control company. I was in charge of about 40 folks in eastern Kentucky, southwest Virginia, and some in WV and TN. Most of them disliked me right away because I was a "Yankee" and because I was a "college boy." For those who don't know, traffic control is where we'd send a couple people out in a truck to do lane closures and the like with utility crews. We had to send people out wherever the phone or power company needed help, at all hours of the day or night, and we pretty much didn't know where that would be until the day before. On a good day, I would have all of the following day's work orders in by 5 PM. It was not at all uncommon, however, for me to get phone calls up to midnight, or even later. When that happened, I would have to rearrange the schedule, then start calling my employees to let them know about the changes. Someone calls in sick? Same thing. And the area I was responsible for was so rural and spread out that I might have to make someone drive two hours each way to get to a job site. Basically I was on call 24 hrs a day, seven days a week. It was awful, and walking away from that place on my last day was honestly a top three happiest moment of my life.

 

[Cybersai]

Working in the airport in the bitter cold and heat was killer. But other than it wasn't that bad.

 

[Torpedo Vegas]

3rd shift at Target back in 2001. I got stuck with their furniture section so it was a lot of lifting heavy stuff and avoiding their mouse infestation. The worst was the manager we had moved to days and was replaced by Jaime Kennedy from Malibu's Most Wanted.

 

[Alwayscrazybacon]

Prinyers bindary, night work 10pm to 6am filling machines with paper, so loud you cant even chat with your coworkers. Good pay was the only benefit. I lasted about 2 weeks.

 

[acheron_xl]

Telemarketer for shitty psuedocharities. It just sucks the life out of you. And there's little to no correlation between effort and success.

 

[shaneo632]

Working in a mail sorting office. Utterly soul destroying labour with forced standing and the walls were all painted oppressively grey just to make it more depressing.

 

[Cybersai]

It's times like this I'm glad I never worked retail. The horror stories I've heard.

 

[honest_ry]

Ive had over 30 jobs in my 36 years. Funnily enough the one that lasted the longest is my least favourite, Inbound Banking Call Centre.

Best, outside in the summer cutting grass all day.

 

[Roubjon]

Softlines (clothing) at Target.

So many people pee in the fitting rooms.

Crazy to think how far I've come from retail...

Click to shrink...

I mainly worked as a cashier at Target, but for a short bit I was the dude who went around in a cart and collected the items for people's Online Pickup Orders. I felt bad for everyone in the Softlines section because of how much of a mess it was at all times. Random ass clothing thrown everywhere.., and there was always a missing shoe.

 

[Deleted member 8118]

I mainly worked as a cashier at Target, but for a short bit I was the dude who went around in a cart and collected the items for people's Online Pickup Orders. I felt bad for everyone in the Softlines section because of how much of a mess it was at all times. Random ass clothing thrown everywhere.., and there was always a missing shoe.

Click to shrink...

I worked retail at an outerwear company and when sales came around, my coworkers would freak out. It stressed me out for a second, but I stopped giving a shit. If it's going to be a mess, it's going to be a mess. Most clothing stores are understaffed, so it's best to say fuck it and move at a real pace instead of stressing yourself out over some inevitable mess.

My managers would try and get on my case because I couldn't put clothes away fast enough.... It was nearly impossible to put clothes away faster than the rate of customers taking them off the rack..

I truly feel bad for the people who are stuck managing these places. I'm pretty sure they've been at their places so long that they feel stuck..

 

[Gunkankun]

I'm sure I'm not alone in this, but working in a callcenter was the most mindnumbing experience ever. Not only were you restricted to the bare minimum in terms of walking around and socializing, the products and offers were also really scammy. Lasted a very short while there.

 

[Atisha]

Tobacco plantation for a month. My hands were fucked for 2 months. Seriously.

Click to shrink...

Gosh why? What goes on at a tobacco plantation?

 

[Deleted member 2809]

Gosh why? What goes on at a tobacco plantation?

Click to shrink...

You pick tobacco. It's icky as fuck and attacks your skin. My hands were shedding for a while after.
Gloves don't help either.

 

[LosDaddie]

Professionally: My first job out of FSU. Engineering Designer but my boss wanted me to learn what the guys out in the field go through. So for almost 5mo, I was out in the field digging ditches, bending conduit, installing panelboards....all the fun stuff. It was brutal, hot and dirty.

I hated it at the time, but it was valuable experience.

 

[MatchaMouse]

Did housekeeping at a hotel for one day and quit. Never thought I'd peace out on a job after only one shift and can't imagine I'll ever do it again, but those 8 hours were grueling. Super tedious and hotel rooms can be really gross.

 

[PrimeBeef]

McDonald's. Worked two days before quitting. Was only 15 at the time, but saw too many patties dropped on the floor just to be picked up and placed on buns and served. We had the numbers system so we knew when they burgers were made and when they needed to be tossed out. Too often they were just changed and old burgers were served. Witnessed a cook, clean bathrooms then return to the line without washing hands. No one wore gloves while preparing food. !st day was in office training second day was on the job training. Never came back. Sent a letter to corporate about what I saw. I found out all of this owners franchises and have never visited one of his since.

Had some shitty jobs but that was the worst experience.

 

[King Alamat]

I wasted about half a year at GE building these red, fiberglass components (I'm long past the point of caring about what they're actually called) for transformers. Forty hours a week surrounded by proto-MAGAts spent greasing up these finicky sonsabitches for minimum wage. When they suddenly decided I was no longer allowed to listen to my iPod for safety reasons despite every other person wearing ear protection and the fact that I stayed at my workstation all shift, I trudged through the remainder of my contract and made a promise to never work in a plant again.

 

[joylevel11]

i've never had a job that was so bad. probably my least favourite was working at a local supermarket. i just hated how they constantly rushed you and kept track of your performance. can't be arsed with that shite.

 

[Rosenkrantz]

Loader at the chocolate factory. Industrial part of town, no way to return home after 6pm, shitty wage, no place to sit your ass when you're tired and draconian penalties for being late for 5 minutes (I had to take two buses to go where). Oh, and if that's not enough, job wasn't official.

 

[smurfx]

My first job was as a dishwasher at a Marie calendars. The dishes never stopped coming and I also had to bake the pie crust and prepare them and then clean the entire back area. They also tried to cheat me since the manager told me everything had to be done by the end of the night but I had to clock out so they didn't have to pay overtime. I only lasted 2 weeks.

 

[Verano]

Worst job was being a video editor for a small ethnic tv studio. I interned there when it was picking up steam. Modern tv studio however the staff from top to most bottom staff were incompetent and inexperienced what they were doing. I felt like me and few others with experience ranging from production to post production were the ones who knew our job well enough. Anyways management/owners were cheap..they can afford to host expensive events, buy rolexs, etc to shoot and edit content but they couldn't afford to buy a decent professional camera nor a lav mic or a boom mic, or hire actual professional staff for examole one of the staff found it hard to believe that sound and voice needed to be re recorded in ADR and he was tryna debate me on how camera mic was just perfect and audio didnt need add. Also the owners bought cheap prosumer cameras, dollar store walkie talkies that almost never worked, unreliable equipment and had staff work in another country to get sponsors for the studio which I later found out they never did shit and kept whatever money was given to them. Editing programs was atrocious. Camera guy gave me no lead or tail room...just straight zooms, pans, etc which made it difficult for me to edit. The media files were disorganized too which made it a hassle to edit the sequence without me nervously trying to find footage. Most of the time i forced myself find images and video clips online cuz camera guy was too F
fucking lazy to record b roll. I honestly thought things were shaping up for the studio considering the fact that me and few other gave management/owners stuff for them to fix and improve to make production and post production smoother. The staff were doing good job for once but I left 8 months in due to car problems. Anyways it turns out management asked the staff to work for free or accept furloughs because they couldn't pay their wages anymore due to their shitty selfish ways in buying shit that had nothing to do with production. They got sponsor money and spent most of it on themselves. but none of them wanted to work for free or take a hit in pay and left.
I was awkwardly happy that it went out of business...sad for some of the staff..I didn't care for the owners..this loss is on them.

 

[Dead Guy]

I've worked a ton of shit jobs over the years from dishwasher to retail floor sales. Absolute worst though, and I hope to God it will never be topped, was my summer working as a manual labor worker for the town I grew up in.

Job itself was the last thing I wanted to do but the job I thought I had that summer ended up not hiring me so I had to find another really quick. Should have raised a ton of red flags that the town position had been advertised for like 2 months and I got the job almost immediately after I applied.

My main duty was garbage man; we didn't have a truck that picked up the bins by itself at the time so I had to toss the bags all in manually. Also there were days where just because they had nothing else for me to do I had to shovel mulch into the same truck to be dumped. Sometimes this was in 30 or 40 degree heat.

Actual tasks weren't the worst part though it was my co workers. Most of them had never even finished high school and were some of the most bitter racist fucks you ever did see. Unfortunately the guy I worked with most of the time because he drove the garbage truck was literally the worst person I've ever met in my life. Was constantly verbally abusive calling me a cunt and piece of shit on the daily and he even got physical abusive some times pushing me around and throwing me out of the way when he felt I'd screwed up.

Was hell on earth for 4 months and to this day I don't know how I survived.

 

[Deleted member 9241]

McDonald's. Worked two days before quitting. Was only 15 at the time, but saw too many patties dropped on the floor just to be picked up and placed on buns and served. We had the numbers system so we knew when they burgers were made and when they needed to be tossed out. Too often they were just changed and old burgers were served. Witnessed a cook, clean bathrooms then return to the line without washing hands. No one wore gloves while preparing food. !st day was in office training second day was on the job training. Never came back. Sent a letter to corporate about what I saw. I found out all of this owners franchises and have never visited one of his since.

Had some shitty jobs but that was the worst experience.

Click to shrink...

I worked at McDonalds from '92-'93 as my first real job. My location was run amazingly well. You could eat off the floors there. Cleaning seemed like 1/2 the job. No one ever messed with the food like you described. It comes down to management. Our manager, whom everybody loved to hate, won a Ray Kroc award years later (given to the top 1% of store managers every year).

 

[Horror]

Inventory counter.

Basically we had to hit up retail stores after-hours (usually after 12) and do an item count. We had these big ass counting machines strapped to our sides to record each piece of merchandise. If my totals didn't match with the numbers provided by the store manager, I had to start all over. Didn't last a week.

 

[Deleted member 31199]

Toys R Us and Hess (which is now Speedway on the East Coast) working in their convenience store.

TRU was just boring and had repetitive music but not terrible...

Hess had an horrible manager but he would later get fired himself. He was just very grumpy and impatient all the time.

 

[Hollywood Duo]

Toy store at Christmas

 

[Daitokuji]

Software QA. Boring, dead end job, low pay.