Three weeks. I was in a contract-to-hire software position at Alaska Airlines. Every work environment has its little quirks and weirdnesses, but I swear everything at this place was quirky and weird. When the manager casually asked how it was going I answered honestly, saying it was all fine but I wasn’t really interested in FTE, so I wouldn’t mind if he asked the agency for a different person and I would be happy to stay until then. He called them and I was gone that afternoon. He was a man of few words - might have said a hundred to me the whole time I was there lol.

About 6 months when I was 19 years old. 3 months in I tried to book a week of vacation 3 months in advance (they asked for at least 1 month notice) and the power tripping substitute manager declined it immediately without checking the schedule or anything. As far as I remember there was no “first come first serve” BS, he just wanted to be a douche about it.

So after another 3 months the time came and I went on the most epic camping trip with 8 friends and had the time of my life.

Came back to civilization to a full voicemail inbox of my direct manager asking where I was, sighing, and eventually saying I was fired for it.

I regret nothing.

Pretty fast. Not myself, an ambulance driver wanted to get to a nurse’s birthday party - and back - during their lunch break, or somenhing. Sirens wailing.

Two months. Got brought in as a sales engineer with no one to train me. My days mostly consisted of spending 8 hours alone in my office reading ISO and ASTM standards for the test services the company offered. Got sent to Minnesota for further training for a week with no one to train me there either. Found a job right after and left my boss bewildered like he couldn’t believe it after I kept reminding him no one was actually teaching me how to do the job.

I think it was like 3 or 4 days. Telemarketer for MCI long distance phone service in the late 90’s. After getting hung up on several hundred times in a single day I realized I was just making lots of people angry and didn’t want to do that.

3 shifts as a table busser at a sports bar. Obscene hours (10AM to 3AM ish), no breaks, going home reeking of cigarettes because it had an outdoor area that allow3d smoking. I got sick the day after last shift of the week, and just quit. Got paid in cash so i think i was paid under the table.

1 day. Got hired as a host for a restaurant. Did one training shift and then got violently ill. I called out the next day. It was also around the holidays and I was planning to go home to visit family. I told them I wouldn’t be available for a week or so. They never scheduled me again and didn’t pay me for the training shift. They also never even shared a salary with me until I called and demanded that they tell me the pay.

Under five minutes.

I interviewed, accepted the job offer at the end, showed up for my first scheduled shift and found out my manager wasn’t the polite manager I interviewed with.

For the record, I was supposed to start at 9am. It was 8:45 when I walked in.

Manager, literally yelling from about 300ft away: YOU’RE LATE!

Me, confused: I’m 15 minutes early?

Manager: I EXPECT YOU TO BE HERE HALF A HOUR BEFORE EVERY SHIFT, IF YOU’RE LATE AGAIN YOU’RE ON THIN FUCKING ICE

And I turned my happy ass around and walked out.

I don’t care if it was some bullshit tactic to “weed out” people, that is completely unacceptable behavior and in my younger years I have gotten into fist fights over someone speaking to another like that.

I had another job inside a week.

I don’t care if they had someone to fill my spot the next day. It wasn’t worth the time.

Six months. It was an IT-job, but the owner was related to criminal circles and acted like a criminal, with regular emotional and insulting outbursts directed at various employees. Imagine working with Tony Soprano.

I only made it about 6 hours at one job, a shift and a half.

I had a job in college digitizing betacam tapes (old BBC/PBS footage, pretty cool!) but it was on and off. During a long lull, I needed cash bad and took the first job that called - Jimmy Johns delivery driver.

First day was fine but I knew I would hate it. Second day I locked my keys in my car.

While I was waiting for my roommate to bring me my spare set, I got a call for a different gig (production assistant on a film). It was only 8 days at $50/day but I quit JJ on the spot. Late 2000s for context on how pitiful that is

I took a job at a “robotics” company after the owner sold me a huge line of bullshit (that I completely fell for which is a story for another time) after being in a toxic job for a number of years before. On day one at about 8:30am, I realized that it was not what I fell for during the interview. The boss was someoletely unhinged, the expected hours were not what I had agreed to and the work was constantly being micromanaged by the owner who knew just enough to look like a complete idiot when the discussions got technical. The only positive thing with the job was that I had some company stock coming in at 6 months so I held out until I was 100% sure they couldn’t screw me on the stock vesting and then immediately resigned.

Single day. It was work mixing cement with what was in a chemical lagoon for an ink factory. Basically the liquid would get pumped into a mixing machine and then piped over to a nearby site to make a more inert giant puck. Whoever was in charge of ratios was mixing things too thick and caused something to explode in a guy’s face. It wasn’t a big explosion, just enough to get the mixture all over him and into his eyes. I wasn’t really dealing with any of that yet, just starting on tarball duty where anything remotely black in the area around the lagoon was considered escaped contamination and got dug up with a shovel and tossed back in the designated area. This was in summer and we had to be in tyvek suits and rubber boots which both had to get taken off and thrown out in a special way every time you left the area. But seeing what happened to that guy just made me think all this wasn’t worth the risk and I didn’t come back the next day.

Not me but my ex spouse: They got a job as a breakfast cook. Came back the first day and started talking about the job the same way they talked about previous jobs shortly before they quit. I sat then down and was basically like “you might not see it yet but you’ve got to quit”. They quit the next morning and came home early it was great

3 days of real time, 2 hours of real work.

1st day, the boss has a problem with a truck, sends his father to guide us to the place and give us the tool. The father never finds the tools, cannot get his son on the phone, tells us to come back next day.

2nd day : no one on site. I call the boss, he seems surprised i’m here, gives me the number of his father. His father tells me he has an appointment with a doctor, tells me to clean the place til he comes back. I do so, 2 hours later i have nothing left to do. I wait one more hour, he doesnt come back. The boss sends me a message to be there next day.

3d day : no one on site, no one answer the phone. I waited one hour and went off.

Never got any message nor explanations. Sometimes they just don’t care, and anyway if they cannot provide you with a stable schedule, dont worry too much about leaving quickly

Never hold your breath when your superior tells you that they’d promote you.

I’ve had a boss who was telling me from the start that he had plans for me. Three years passed by, no promotion, no raise, nothing.

Then I moved to a new job. My boss never promised me anything. I never got my rank promoted (yet) but I’ve had more raise than I could ever ask for.