this post was submitted on 23 Oct 2024
1109 points (98.6% liked)

Malicious Compliance

19347 readers
1466 users here now

People conforming to the letter, but not the spirit, of a request. For now, this includes text posts, images, videos and links. Please ensure that the “malicious compliance” aspect is apparent - if you’re making a text post, be sure to explain this part; if it’s an image/video/link, use the “Body” field to elaborate.

======

======

Also check out the following communities:

[email protected] [email protected]

founded 1 year ago
MODERATORS
 
you are viewing a single comment's thread
view the rest of the comments
[–] [email protected] 142 points 11 hours ago (3 children)

Our boss was freaking out over people sometimes doing some private calls during work hours and at a certain point absolutely forbade it. So yeah, people would just end the call at 17:00 sharp and switch off the work phone. It took one week before that rule was rescinded.

[–] [email protected] 71 points 9 hours ago (2 children)

This reminds me of a work-to-rule or a "White Strike." It turns out that every company, even those that supposedly operate off of "unskilled" labor, utterly rely on employees making a ton of judgment calls and often working outside their job description. When employees start working to the letter of their job description, the whole operation quickly grinds to a halt.

[–] [email protected] 5 points 6 hours ago

Here we call it "standard operation" and it's also a kind of "white strike"

[–] [email protected] 27 points 9 hours ago (2 children)

"Other duties as assigned" is a bitch.

[–] [email protected] 25 points 8 hours ago

This is when "could you please send that request on writing via e-mail" becomes really useful.

[–] [email protected] 5 points 9 hours ago (1 children)

That's what gets struck in a white strike.

[–] [email protected] 5 points 8 hours ago (4 children)

If it's literally in your job description, as it has been in my last several positions, does it qualify?

[–] [email protected] 2 points 1 hour ago* (last edited 1 hour ago)

Okay, you've assigned me a duty. Give me exact, and I mean exact, instructions about how to complete it.

Now repeat for the thousands of tiny tasks everyone just does on their own.

[–] [email protected] 6 points 7 hours ago

A white strike, like all strikes works because of collective action, not because of some tricky technically lol.

[–] [email protected] 2 points 5 hours ago

Sure. It means they can ask you to do other things that aren't explicitly written in the original job description. But every time they tell you to do something beyond it, you just start doing THAT exactly to the letter of the request.

[–] [email protected] 5 points 7 hours ago

If everyone does it then it works.

[–] [email protected] 7 points 7 hours ago

And that's ridiculous on general because you know who also does regular work hours? Everyone else!

That means if you need a call with your doctor, bank, whatever, it's likely gonna be during the workday

[–] [email protected] 10 points 10 hours ago (1 children)

Teamwork makes the dream work.

[–] [email protected] 8 points 8 hours ago (1 children)

God, I hate how often my CEO says this

[–] [email protected] 1 points 1 hour ago

Sounds like he's a fan of unions. Take him up on it.