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The original was posted on /r/maliciouscompliance by /u/ongogavlogian on 2024-10-08 10:57:56+00:00.
A while back, I used to report directly to the CEO of a small startup. As it often happens in startups, things were hectic, and the CEO frequently used my slides and reports for her presentations, which I didn’t mind—until we got a new manager.
This manager really didn’t like the fact that my work was getting used by the CEO without their input. They became hypercritical of everything I did. Fine, I thought—if they want better slides, I’ll keep improving them. And I did, all while working on three major projects for clients.
Fast forward to a few weeks before my impending doom (aka layoff), and suddenly I’m getting feedback that they hated my work. All three projects that I had been working on for three whole weeks were no longer aligned with the company's direction. They were pivoting, they said. I was a bit annoyed, but okay—I moved on and cleared my backlog, including deleting all the slides I had made for those projects since they were "irrelevant" now.
Then came layoff day. Surprise, surprise—during the handover, they came to me asking for those slides. They were pale-faced and desperate. Apparently, someone higher up had no idea I was told to scrap them, and they suddenly needed them for the clients.
I calmly explained that I deleted them after the meeting where the CEO and my manager explicitly said we were going in a "different direction." Their panic set in. They begged me to help, even asked if I could stay on an extra two weeks to rebuild the slides.
My response? "F*** off. You have all the raw data and reports. Make your own slides."
The cherry on top? I later heard that all three clients bailed on their commitments because of how poorly the projects were handled.