Stories From People Who Got Fired Shortly After Getting Hired

Some pass the test with flying colors and go on to have a long-lasting career. Others fail miserably by showing up late, sleeping on the job, causing expensive mistakes, or yelling at the boss. Needless to say, their career doesn’t last long. Here are 40 cases of a person not making it past their first day.

Through a lack of supervision, interns get an understanding of how everything fails to work! For example, the unsupervised intern above was told to cut apart the zip-tied cables. Instead of cutting the zip ties, he cut the cables – costing the company $2,000 bucks!

Well, everyone but this wild newbie. On his first day as a kitchen porter, he tossed a giant bag of cheese into the deep fryer – causing the head chef to get scalding burns. Our only question is: why? 

It’s an upfront cost and time commitment that many people decide to make – and some decide to fake! Unfortunately, in the world of tech, that fakery unravels pretty fast the second a boss or coworker asks you a technical question and expects a reply. 

This can be seen in the *cough* *cough* “I’m sick” call, “forgetting” you work this Saturday morning, or going out for a cigarette break…and never coming back. The last one is what happened to this unfortunate employer. We just hope that it didn’t mess up the shift too much. 

An important part of that cleaning process is power washing the golf carts and building exteriors. It seems this golf cart wasn’t quite ready before this unlucky (and, to be honest, inattentive) golfer decided to take it for a spin. As you can read from above, it didn’t work out too well.

That being said, most people put up with the grind through a dark sense of humor or by muttering curses under their breath. Others, like the girl above, are more outspoken in their hatred – and that leads to them getting booted out of the restaurant world. 

His cashier days didn’t last a full day –- and neither did his flirting tactics. The employer justly took him off the job before his creepy attitude led to an unsafe workplace. People just want to work when they go to work, not worry about warding off the advances of an over-eager high schooler. 

When he chose to stand up for himself and argue with the person who asked him to take out the trash, he forgot to read that person’s name tag. Unfortunately, that person’s name tag read “General Manager.” Whoops! Not someone you want to argue with on your first day… or ever. 

However, three broken rules on your first morning is a bit too much. When you consider that your “first morning” involves getting a space shuttle ready for launch, that level of clumsiness is unacceptable. Unsurprisingly, it led to a costly mistake – and, most likely, a job. 

The guy above isn’t “most people.” Instead of a business trip, he waited a granted total of 50 minutes before piling on the “work expenses” – namely his favorite songs from iTunes. This “work expense” eventually cost him his job.

After a few hours of work, the hungry employee asked about a lunch break. That led to a permanent break, aka getting fired. Although that’s horrible, it’s better to find that out on day one than on day thirty when you haven’t had any pay or breaks for a month. 

Not the teacher described in the above story. That fifth-grade teacher was probably harboring some misplaced anger toward privileged little rich kids. Sure they won the birthplace lottery, but that doesn’t mean they deserve snide remarks. Unsurprisingly, the administration decided to fire her.

Well, not so much. As you can see from the above quote, being a great shopper doesn’t guarantee that you’ll be a great employee. They’re two entirely different things. The staff immediately saw that and decided to fire her before anything else happened.

That being said, age should be taken into consideration. It’s a bit unrealistic to assume a 14-year-old busboy will master every task and role on his first day. Have these employers ever heard of a learning curve?

As you can see from above, the results of that experiment were horrendous – a lobster massacre. An expensive mistake that took lobster salad, sandwich, and bisque off the menu for the day – or week. Unsurprisingly, the new guy didn’t last too long. 

Some industries, like retail, have turned to automated personality tests that try to figure out if a new employee is the right fit. Unfortunately for the person above, that test found that they weren’t. Although it might be “scientific”, it still feels a bit harsh. 

As you can see from above, this new employee had no interest in working for the company. His interests were in looking respectable, deflecting attention, and then stealing from other employees before heading out the door. Talk about being unqualified for the job. 

The copywriter profiled above did none of that. Instead, he chose to plagiarize from the very person who hired him! Woah, talk about questionable ethics mixed with bad luck and plain stupidity. That writer didn’t last long.

The new employee above clearly forgot that commandment as he brazenly popped into the local theater to watch the latest flick. Unfortunately, the boss was sitting in the next seat. You can imagine how well that went. 

That doesn’t always mean you’ll keep the job, though. Before her first day of work, the co-manager’s sister found out the limits of nepotism. She assumed that her lame excuse for being late would be fine. It wasn’t – she ended up getting fired instead.

Overkill? We tend to think so. Perhaps the employee got cheated at other jobs and he didn’t want to repeat the mistake. Either way, the anger was resolved. Even though the trainee was fired, he continued to come back because the pizza was awesome.

Although the flakey friend got fired right away, we hold out hope for the more responsible one. Don’t worry, there’s still plenty of time to hang out on days off. Sometimes friends and jobs should be kept separate, and friends should just be friends. 

Unfortunately, his arrogance led him to crash into a support beam – which is the last kind of beam you want to damage, considering it, you know, supports the building. Needless to say, his forklifting days were short-lived. 

The new cook turned out to be very impressionable. When a co-worker dared him to stick his hand in the fryer, he did it. Yikes! We applaud the employee for bravery but suggest he find other ways to show it. The employer, understandably, decided he was too much of a liability.

The new employee above didn’t pass the clumsy test. Whatever the reason for it, the fact that they kept smashing their head on the “rack thingy” was enough to make the employer nervous about liability.

For employees like the girl above, however, it wasn’t a game – it was a nightmare. Although she had the right culinary experience, all that fast energy and customer demand was a bit too much for her personality. We suggest trying out the overnight bakery shift where you only have to deal with a few people. 

Instead, he took plenty of cigarette breaks while scrolling through his phone. Customers were ignored until his friends came in – and then they were given free drinks. A great example of how not to be a bartender.

Most waiters sneak a few bites from leftovers when they’re in the kitchen and no one is around. The waiter in the picture above chose to do the opposite – not be sneaky at all and to eat the food in front of the customer and manager.

Focusing on “employee retention rates” and other job specifics was a little difficult for both of them. This entire situation stinks – it’s embarrassing for the HR lady and uncomfortable for the job interviewee. We suggest an open-air office next time. 

The guy above called in help – from his mom. Although we think that’s a bit cute, we also understand the red flags that went up in the employer’s mind. Unsurprisingly, the negotiations didn’t go well, and the interviewee didn’t get the job.

So, when you spend $90 on truffles, you expect them to be, you know, truffles. For the unfortunate customer above, that wasn’t the case. Shortly after walking away, the customer realized the truffles were display-case plastic truffles. The new employee who sold them was fired on the spot.

Most likely it was an opportunistic crime. The new employee who was meant to sell the calendars fell asleep on the job. People walked up, took a calendar, looked at the sleeping woman, and walked away with the calendars. Enough people did this that, when the manager came over later, half the stock was gone! The sleeping employee was fired.

At night, he forgot to double-check the cooler. In the morning, that act of forgetting led to an expensive sea of melted fruit and ice cream covering the floor. Around that time, he was fired. 

Sleeping on the job. Great if you’re a test subject in a sleep study. Not so great if you’re a paid employee anywhere else. That’s not what the employer was looking for in a new hire, so the guy was fired shortly after his first shift. 

The new employee above didn’t get the memo. Before getting hired, she said nights and weekends were perfect to work; after being hired, she said daytime weekdays were perfect. Unsurprisingly, this new hire soon became a new fire. 

For them, as you can see from the quote above, it means jeans and flip-flops. Needless to say, this definition of “business casual” wasn’t shared by the company, and the flip-flopped employee didn’t stay too long.

The girl above, however, skipped the office hierarchy and went straight to the top by letting the franchise owner know her feelings about a co-worker’s work habits. When that didn’t work out, she started yelling at the owner himself! Although we admire the chutzpah, we don’t imagine she kept the job too long.

The new seaman above broke that rule by throwing a plastic bottle into the ocean. With characteristic calm, the captain took him inside and bought him a ticket home. That’s one “don’t litter” lesson the seaman will never forget.

In an unfortunate twist for the employee, the mistake ended up not being his fault as the formula specifications weren’t properly updated. The kid did exactly what he was supposed to do and got fired for someone else’s mistake. We feel for him and hope he had better luck at his next job!

In our view, the employee above did the right thing by calling up work to inform the boss that he’d be late. However, like the traffic conditions, the boss’s mood changed from moment to moment. What was ok on the phone became unacceptable in the office.