Worst job you have ever had?
Discussion
Rewired a massive old timber single story building in summer working 50-60hrs a week in the loft which was fully insulated with glassfibre Rockwool. We were wearing paper boiler suits and just underpants, and those s
t paper filter masks. This was before ppe proper.
Crawling through gaps in joists and generally getting blacker as the day went on.
Hot sweaty and covered in glassfibre for a month almost. Young and daft lol
t paper filter masks. This was before ppe proper.Crawling through gaps in joists and generally getting blacker as the day went on.
Hot sweaty and covered in glassfibre for a month almost. Young and daft lol
Worked in an egg packing factory during the the Summer holidays between leaving school and starting college. Lasted 2 weeks and couldn't take it anymore. Long days of taking boxes of eggs off the line and putting them on a pallet, working with some of the strangest people I've ever met. Didn't eat eggs for years after that.
Second worse was as a Kirby vacuum cleaner salesman - life completely consumed by work, having to sing the company song at meetings (yes, really), and being given excuses not to be paid my commission - binned that job off pretty quickly!
Second worse was as a Kirby vacuum cleaner salesman - life completely consumed by work, having to sing the company song at meetings (yes, really), and being given excuses not to be paid my commission - binned that job off pretty quickly!
GT03ROB said:
227bhp said:
GT03ROB said:
Pulling down lathe & plaster ceilings on a hot day. Sweat made the dust & dirt stick to you like it had been plastered on you!
You certainly knew all about it when you got hit by a lathe falling from the ceiling.No PPE in them days!
227bhp said:
GT03ROB said:
227bhp said:
GT03ROB said:
Pulling down lathe & plaster ceilings on a hot day. Sweat made the dust & dirt stick to you like it had been plastered on you!
You certainly knew all about it when you got hit by a lathe falling from the ceiling.No PPE in them days!
98elise said:
227bhp said:
GT03ROB said:
227bhp said:
GT03ROB said:
Pulling down lathe & plaster ceilings on a hot day. Sweat made the dust & dirt stick to you like it had been plastered on you!
You certainly knew all about it when you got hit by a lathe falling from the ceiling.No PPE in them days!
I did a few temping jobs in my late teens and my first temping job right after college was phoning people to talk to them about their shares. Being quite shy I was terrible at it. It wasn't telesales or anything dodgy, but as you can imagine, people don't like strangers phoning them about stuff like that. Half the time it I needed to speak to Mr Bloggs, but Mrs Bloggs answered the phone and I wasn't allowed to tell her anything, which resulted in some irate housewives 
My first one.
Loading and unloading a industrial dishwasher and washing up pots and pans and cleaning deep fat fryers in a filthy greasy spoon seaside cafe for 25p a hour. I smelt so revolting after each shift my mum used to insist on me getting (nearly) undressed in the garden and made me put the clothes I'd been wearing straight in the washing machine.
All sports shop assistant.
Didn't sell any sports equipment, just overpriced stty sports fashion clothing. I remember the management demanding why we were not selling any products and were not amused when I pointed out that they were trying to sell England rugby jerseys for £70 when they were
1) out of date
2) selling for £10 at the shop next door
Following that they sent in 'industry experts' to teach us to sell. No wonder the company closed down
Hateful job. Company was run by morons and the customer base was benefits-for-life chavs
Didn't sell any sports equipment, just overpriced s
tty sports fashion clothing. I remember the management demanding why we were not selling any products and were not amused when I pointed out that they were trying to sell England rugby jerseys for £70 when they were 1) out of date
2) selling for £10 at the shop next door
Following that they sent in 'industry experts' to teach us to sell. No wonder the company closed down
Hateful job. Company was run by morons and the customer base was benefits-for-life chavs
gmasterfunk said:
98elise said:
227bhp said:
GT03ROB said:
227bhp said:
GT03ROB said:
Pulling down lathe & plaster ceilings on a hot day. Sweat made the dust & dirt stick to you like it had been plastered on you!
You certainly knew all about it when you got hit by a lathe falling from the ceiling.No PPE in them days!
Labouring on building sites for a couple years. Utterly exhausting day in day out. I didn't exist after work for the whole time I don't think, just was a zombie. And all for minimum wage (obviously).
Fell asleep eating lunch one day in a back store room one afternoon due to simply be too exhausted to function any longer. Woke up an hour later laying on the bare concrete floor with my sandwich next to me.
Fell asleep eating lunch one day in a back store room one afternoon due to simply be too exhausted to function any longer. Woke up an hour later laying on the bare concrete floor with my sandwich next to me.
I've had plenty of st jobs but I think the worst was being a "parts advisor" for a local ford spares company. Not new parts, essentially a breakers yard with an office selling on eBay and those find a part type websites Google always throws up.
Far from being a parts advisor, my job for the first two days was to sit in front of a pc, hitting refresh every 30 second or so incase an quote request had come through from a find a part website. If it did, I had to tell another guy across the room who would then sort the quote and call the customer etc.
It was mind numbingly boring. The owner of the company never even introduced himself whilst seeing what we were all up to. I was never interviewed by him and never actually spoke to him once. He had his own office joined on to ours. He rarely came out of it.
As I say, I did this for the first 2 days. The 3rd day, I went home on my dinner break and never went back.
I didn't have a much better experience at a Toyota dealership either. Taken on as a trainee parts advisor and I initially liked it but soon found myself being at a bit of a loss. I didn't have my own desk or pc so rarely took calls. I rarely spoke to walk in customers as I didn't have a pc to follow up a quote with them either. I spent most of the first few weeks organising the parts in stock as the stockroom was a st hole. It was upstairs in a metal warehouse so was absolutely roasting the whole time in the middle of august.
The staff I worked with directly were ok. Two middle aged men who had both been there for years. The manager was an absolute tit whos idea of "banter" was randomly putting either of the other two men into headlocks or belittling them about their weight. He never tried either with me but I despised him, I probably would have knocked him to the floor if he did. The other staff hated him too.
After a month working there, still with no desk or pc, I spent most of my time sitting in for the mots pressing pedals for the tester. And making brews... I walked out in the end and never went back.
t jobs but I think the worst was being a "parts advisor" for a local ford spares company. Not new parts, essentially a breakers yard with an office selling on eBay and those find a part type websites Google always throws up.Far from being a parts advisor, my job for the first two days was to sit in front of a pc, hitting refresh every 30 second or so incase an quote request had come through from a find a part website. If it did, I had to tell another guy across the room who would then sort the quote and call the customer etc.
It was mind numbingly boring. The owner of the company never even introduced himself whilst seeing what we were all up to. I was never interviewed by him and never actually spoke to him once. He had his own office joined on to ours. He rarely came out of it.
As I say, I did this for the first 2 days. The 3rd day, I went home on my dinner break and never went back.
I didn't have a much better experience at a Toyota dealership either. Taken on as a trainee parts advisor and I initially liked it but soon found myself being at a bit of a loss. I didn't have my own desk or pc so rarely took calls. I rarely spoke to walk in customers as I didn't have a pc to follow up a quote with them either. I spent most of the first few weeks organising the parts in stock as the stockroom was a s
t hole. It was upstairs in a metal warehouse so was absolutely roasting the whole time in the middle of august. The staff I worked with directly were ok. Two middle aged men who had both been there for years. The manager was an absolute tit whos idea of "banter" was randomly putting either of the other two men into headlocks or belittling them about their weight. He never tried either with me but I despised him, I probably would have knocked him to the floor if he did. The other staff hated him too.
After a month working there, still with no desk or pc, I spent most of my time sitting in for the mots pressing pedals for the tester. And making brews... I walked out in the end and never went back.
I'm lucky in that I don't think I've ever had a bad job. My worst was 6 months working a second job at a Thortons shop in a relatively new shopping centre. I was working afternoons and evenings at a hotel, which I really enjoyed.
The store was franchised, and the manager was hopeless. She had no sales skills herself but acted as though she did, and was always talking about going out of business because sales were slow and the franchise cost was high. I was the only bloke working there, and for that, I got to wear black slacks instead of the brown polyster trousers the girls wore.
There was absolutely no motivation amongst the girls working there. I mostly worked alone, covering shifts when the others weren't in. Mostly, the girls had their preferred friends and wanted to work with them, but their craic was st so I was happy to work alone. It was a relatively small store so I could easily manage it alone. I was never the key holder, so the owner would open up for me and take over again in the afternoon and do all the st like cashing up.
I was so bored that my only distraction from daydreaming was to sell. We weren't allowed to listen to music because the manager wouldn't pay the PRS fees, but I was happy to put Radio 4 on. The original iPhone had only just launched so there was no standing round surfing the net all day.
I used to set myself challenges, on ever more audacious upsells and I really did feel as though I could sell sand to the Arabs. I began targeting the st products that were hard to sell. I convinced customers that the hard, dry chocolates that had stood for days in the display counter were worth a premium because you got to make your own selection over a box from the shelf.
However, this 'can do' attitude upset the other girls, because they'd convinced the hopeless manager that low sales were a result of low footfall in the shopping centre, or because Morrisons across the road sold a selection of our chocolates. They said that because they worked in pairs, their sales figures would naturally be less than mine, but when the gross sales figures for days worked were compared, I'd easily outsell both of the girls. I could do better on a weekday than they could on a Saturday.
I left after six months were up, having pissed off the staff by working too hard and making them look lazy. The manager was upset with me too. She said it was because I had left the job too quickly after she'd paid to get me registered and trained. I reminded her that I had told her before I joined I was only looking for six months as I had a proper job lined up. I suspect she saw me leaving as a gaping black hole in her takings that the other staff couldn't be arsed to fill.
The store was franchised, and the manager was hopeless. She had no sales skills herself but acted as though she did, and was always talking about going out of business because sales were slow and the franchise cost was high. I was the only bloke working there, and for that, I got to wear black slacks instead of the brown polyster trousers the girls wore.
There was absolutely no motivation amongst the girls working there. I mostly worked alone, covering shifts when the others weren't in. Mostly, the girls had their preferred friends and wanted to work with them, but their craic was s
t so I was happy to work alone. It was a relatively small store so I could easily manage it alone. I was never the key holder, so the owner would open up for me and take over again in the afternoon and do all the st like cashing up. I was so bored that my only distraction from daydreaming was to sell. We weren't allowed to listen to music because the manager wouldn't pay the PRS fees, but I was happy to put Radio 4 on. The original iPhone had only just launched so there was no standing round surfing the net all day.
I used to set myself challenges, on ever more audacious upsells and I really did feel as though I could sell sand to the Arabs. I began targeting the s
t products that were hard to sell. I convinced customers that the hard, dry chocolates that had stood for days in the display counter were worth a premium because you got to make your own selection over a box from the shelf. However, this 'can do' attitude upset the other girls, because they'd convinced the hopeless manager that low sales were a result of low footfall in the shopping centre, or because Morrisons across the road sold a selection of our chocolates. They said that because they worked in pairs, their sales figures would naturally be less than mine, but when the gross sales figures for days worked were compared, I'd easily outsell both of the girls. I could do better on a weekday than they could on a Saturday.
I left after six months were up, having pissed off the staff by working too hard and making them look lazy. The manager was upset with me too. She said it was because I had left the job too quickly after she'd paid to get me registered and trained. I reminded her that I had told her before I joined I was only looking for six months as I had a proper job lined up. I suspect she saw me leaving as a gaping black hole in her takings that the other staff couldn't be arsed to fill.
Not me, but a flatmate from uni. Enormously attractive welsh blonde farmers daughter type, back at uni after our first summer we were recounting the various rubbish summer jobs we'd had. She managed to top them all with the story of how all the portaloos from summer festivals etc. came from a firm down the road from her, and after they'd been shipped back from their various sites they were left in the lovely hot sun to fester until some unlucky student was employed to clean them with a fire hose and a set of waterproofs - enter Rhian
Bless her she was/is a lovely lass and clearly made of sterner stuff than me.
Bless her she was/is a lovely lass and clearly made of sterner stuff than me.
I am 45 now but I've only had two jobs!
The worst would be the first, then! I worked at Natwest bank straight from school for about 7 years, between two branches.
I suppose the actual job wasn't that bad but it just wasn't me- I am more an outdoors person so inputting data and dealing with ahole customers was soul destroying for me. I only applied for a job at the bank because my mate got a job at the same place and I did quite well in my exams so my folks thought id do well as an office worker rather than manual work!
The only positive was that there were quite a few fit women working in the place!
Left at 23 and went to college for a year to get qualified in horticulture and still do that now!
The worst would be the first, then! I worked at Natwest bank straight from school for about 7 years, between two branches.
I suppose the actual job wasn't that bad but it just wasn't me- I am more an outdoors person so inputting data and dealing with a
hole customers was soul destroying for me. I only applied for a job at the bank because my mate got a job at the same place and I did quite well in my exams so my folks thought id do well as an office worker rather than manual work!The only positive was that there were quite a few fit women working in the place!
Left at 23 and went to college for a year to get qualified in horticulture and still do that now!
Used to work for PC World. It was horrible. Hated it from day one. I was expected to meet sales targets from the start (first job at 16). Yet I was stuck on a till for the day.
I honestly can't say how much I hated it there. I had enough when I got told off for not selling the extras (anti virus etc) to a old couple who only wanted a basic computer to type letters out as they struggled to write. They didn't have the internet and had no interest in getting it.
That was on Sunday, on Monday I dropped my noticed off and never went back. Still won't shop in there.
On the flip side. My favourite job was at Power House. Worked there for two weeks before they went into administration. Got on with everyone, was treated the same as everyone. Bumped into my old manager a few years ago who offered me a job at his own business...often think I should have looked into it.
I honestly can't say how much I hated it there. I had enough when I got told off for not selling the extras (anti virus etc) to a old couple who only wanted a basic computer to type letters out as they struggled to write. They didn't have the internet and had no interest in getting it.
That was on Sunday, on Monday I dropped my noticed off and never went back. Still won't shop in there.
On the flip side. My favourite job was at Power House. Worked there for two weeks before they went into administration. Got on with everyone, was treated the same as everyone. Bumped into my old manager a few years ago who offered me a job at his own business...often think I should have looked into it.
Ki3r said:
On the flip side. My favourite job was at Power House. Worked there for two weeks before they went into administration. Got on with everyone, was treated the same as everyone. Bumped into my old manager a few years ago who offered me a job at his own business...often think I should have looked into it.
I remember them, bought my first and only hi-fi system from there and really got on well with the salesman. I was steered away from some pointlessly loud system and got a Technic's separates system which was £100 cheaper but more reliable and better quality sound. I've still got it 15 years later and only in the last year has it been slowly dying. Walk into Richer sounds makes me want to punch the salesmen for being typical of the type. Back on topic, my worst "job" was only really an afternoon on-the-job interview, I had to follow the salemen around some horribly deprived estates in Manchester trying to force talktalk down the throats of some possibly vulnerable older people. Started at 8am and finished around 7pm in a ridiculously cold March. They rung me back saying "you were really keen and came up well in the test", I said I'd got a better job offer so couldn't continue, but instead I continued to work as a shelf stacker in Sainsbury's for the next 6months as it was preferable.
Worst job was working for an 'elite' risk consultancy in London
Lots of money, but that was it. The job was essentially fraudulent; inventing risks that we could then 'sell' to our clients so that they would pay even heftier fees for engaging us. Sounds about right for that sort of industry, but when you're basically lying to someone that their children are being stalked by organised criminal gangs (when they're not) it's pretty grim.
Throw in a boss who was to all intents and purposes delusional about our company's competencies (He wanted to bid for us to design the Singaporean Govts cyber-defence strategy when between us all we could just about tell the difference between a Mac and a PC) and who refused to accept advice when it countered his own, and a second in command who inhabited some sort of fantasy world where the words 'direction' and 'guidance' were completely absent from her lexicon and the management aspect was horrific. That was only exacerbated by their belief that we were essentially MI6 in another guise, and that secrecy in everything was paramount (all phone and digital comms were thoroughly encrypted) to the extent that I couldn't tell the bloke next to me what I was working on. This despite the fact that I was getting all my information for my super secret investigation from the front page of The Times, which was simultaneously carrying out a very public investigation of exactly the same individual
To top it off, not only was most of my work was due diligence on obscure central Asian and Albanian mining/Oil companies, which was soul destroying in its sheer dullness, but I was simultaneously required to come up with novel and entrepreneurial ways of making the company millions, ignoring the fact that I had 3 months experience in the industry while the next least experienced person had 7 years behind them. The fact that no-one else was able to come up with anything beyond our core competency of physical close protection and personal security consultancy (which admittedly the company was very good at) was instructive.
All in all a bunch of fantasists who almost destroyed me by luring me out of a very good job with tales of responsibility, travel and huge bonuses and then dropped me right in the st from day 1. I got out though, and back to doing something that means something.
Lots of money, but that was it. The job was essentially fraudulent; inventing risks that we could then 'sell' to our clients so that they would pay even heftier fees for engaging us. Sounds about right for that sort of industry, but when you're basically lying to someone that their children are being stalked by organised criminal gangs (when they're not) it's pretty grim.
Throw in a boss who was to all intents and purposes delusional about our company's competencies (He wanted to bid for us to design the Singaporean Govts cyber-defence strategy when between us all we could just about tell the difference between a Mac and a PC) and who refused to accept advice when it countered his own, and a second in command who inhabited some sort of fantasy world where the words 'direction' and 'guidance' were completely absent from her lexicon and the management aspect was horrific. That was only exacerbated by their belief that we were essentially MI6 in another guise, and that secrecy in everything was paramount (all phone and digital comms were thoroughly encrypted) to the extent that I couldn't tell the bloke next to me what I was working on. This despite the fact that I was getting all my information for my super secret investigation from the front page of The Times, which was simultaneously carrying out a very public investigation of exactly the same individual
To top it off, not only was most of my work was due diligence on obscure central Asian and Albanian mining/Oil companies, which was soul destroying in its sheer dullness, but I was simultaneously required to come up with novel and entrepreneurial ways of making the company millions, ignoring the fact that I had 3 months experience in the industry while the next least experienced person had 7 years behind them. The fact that no-one else was able to come up with anything beyond our core competency of physical close protection and personal security consultancy (which admittedly the company was very good at) was instructive.
All in all a bunch of fantasists who almost destroyed me by luring me out of a very good job with tales of responsibility, travel and huge bonuses and then dropped me right in the s
t from day 1. I got out though, and back to doing something that means something.I have a fine selection of university vacation employment to submit here.
The summer after A-Levels I am eager to have some cash and yet have no qualifications with which to persuade people I am employable (and all the students got the good gigs as they started the temp contracts whilst I was sitting said exams and dying my hair blonde (which I wish I could say, “was the fashion at the time,” but shall instead call a 1990s rite of passage.
As such, I spent a summer doing the following jobs:
- Working as a KP at Maine Road
- Driver’s mate collecting GCSE exam materials
- Counting Tesco Computer for School vouchers…which were then checked by our supervisor by being weighed
- Making airline meals on the nightshift
- Making mobile phone lenses (injection moulded and printed) on the nightshift
The next year, I returned to spend 2 weeks doing jury service (read a lot of books) before working in the sub-contratcing and callcentre bits of an automotive organisation for that and the next summer.
Too few of the graduates that get hired in my current place of employment have done (or understand) truly st jobs; those that do/have done, tend to do quite well.
The summer after A-Levels I am eager to have some cash and yet have no qualifications with which to persuade people I am employable (and all the students got the good gigs as they started the temp contracts whilst I was sitting said exams and dying my hair blonde (which I wish I could say, “was the fashion at the time,” but shall instead call a 1990s rite of passage.
As such, I spent a summer doing the following jobs:
- Working as a KP at Maine Road
- Driver’s mate collecting GCSE exam materials
- Counting Tesco Computer for School vouchers…which were then checked by our supervisor by being weighed
- Making airline meals on the nightshift
- Making mobile phone lenses (injection moulded and printed) on the nightshift
The next year, I returned to spend 2 weeks doing jury service (read a lot of books) before working in the sub-contratcing and callcentre bits of an automotive organisation for that and the next summer.
Too few of the graduates that get hired in my current place of employment have done (or understand) truly s
t jobs; those that do/have done, tend to do quite well.Imagine a warehouse full of thousands, and thousands, and thousands, of battery hens, all laying eggs.
Now imagine the state the extractor fans got into.
My job was to clean the extractor fans, from the outside, while they were running, by blowing compressed air at them.
I quit after the first day,
Now imagine the state the extractor fans got into.
My job was to clean the extractor fans, from the outside, while they were running, by blowing compressed air at them.
I quit after the first day,
miniminter said:
Mine worked at burger king for 3 months , so soul destroying
At least you got paid, I had a young lad on work experience one Saturday morning and ask him if he was going to watch the football/ rugby in the afternoon while making conversation."No, i've got 5 hours work experience up at Burger King"
The poor kid had signed up to some work fare scheme and they had told him to go to Burger King and work unpaid as part of his work experience. Working in fast food never appealed to me at all but doing it unpaid must feel a whole lot worse.
Worst job I ever had was when i'd jus turned 18 and got a job working in an off-licence. The manager was seeing another assistant so she got away with doing very little. I imagine if he'd told her off then he wouldn't have got his cork popped that evening. Anyway apart from a bit of shelf stacking it wasn't very difficult. What I hated was the manager used to sit and watch the CCTV so basically you got spied on the whole shift which was a bit creepy.
Overall a fairly s
t paid job with the only advantage getting broken multipack bottles of beer for 10p each which at 18 wasn't so bad.Edited by BlueHave on Tuesday 25th July 02:00
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