A Reddit post has gone viral after an IT worker revealed how a manager’s strict “no phones” rule spectacularly backfired and left the company in chaos.
The employee (@Mother_Soraka), who works in IT support for a medium-sized firm, explained that staff had always been allowed to keep their mobile phones at their desks.
“We’ve always been allowed to have our phones at our desks. Sometimes, family emergencies happen, doctors call back, whatever. As long as we weren’t scrolling social media all day, nobody cared.”
That changed when a new manager arrived. After spotting one employee checking a text, he introduced a strict ban.
An email was sent stating: “Effective immediately: No personal phones during work hours. They must be left in your car or locker. This means 9-5, No Exceptions. Anyone caught with a phone will be written up.”
‘No phones at work’ policy backfired:
The IT worker revealed that the same manager often worked from home and relied on staff answering their personal phones whenever servers went down after hours or at weekends. The company did not provide work phones.
On a Friday afternoon, just before the end of the day, a major server issue struck. The Redditor saw the server problem but didn’t fix it, because his phone was locked in his car. When he checked it after 5 pm, he found 17 missed calls and lots of messages from his manager. The server had already been down for 30 minutes, and many departments were unable to work.
When the manager asked why he didn’t answer, the Redditor simply said he was following the “no exceptions” rule.
By Monday morning, the policy had been changed again, with a new email stating that phones were now allowed for emergency use.
“Monday morning? New email: “Personal phones are permitted at desks for emergency purposes,” the post adds.
Check out the post here:
Redditors react:
Reddit users found the story hilarious, with many praising the employee for sticking to the rules exactly as written.
One of the users commented, “Awesome work, but I would have driven home first…”
A second user, “I don’t use my phone in the car, it’s unsafe.”
“Left my phone in my locker and it went flat, my charger didn’t work, and that’s why I’m calling you from home at 7 pm, sorry boss, but this is as per policy,” another commented.
