Employee Says HR Told Workers to Take on More Work After Coworker Was Fired—’No Extra Money’

A Reddit user's experience with a human resources employee has sparked discussion about workplace expectations. That’s because an interaction they had with an HR employee didn’t go quite as they expected and instead left them crying in the bathroom afterward. And it all stemmed from another employee being let go who, according to the poster, u/Ok-Poem9255, was a “crucial team member.”

HR Tells Employees to Take on More Work After Coworker Is Fired

The Reddit user explained that they were pulled into the HR office after the “crucial team member” was fired, and that HR actually did this one by one with their coworkers.

During the meeting, they thought HR would be checking in to see how things were going since the workload had gotten a little heavier after the firing. But they say they were totally wrong.

Instead, they say, “He spent the entire time telling me that Gen Z feels entitled to money and that we should focus on taking on as much work as possible with no extra money.”

While they say they understand that hard work is important and the reward is usually seen later on down the road, they took away from the conversation that this HR rep “seemed to be personally offended by my generation.”

While they did express to the HR employee that they were feeling a bit overwhelmed with the workload, he then told them that he “disagreed with my feelings of overwhelm, basically that one person leaving should be seen as an opportunity to take on more work and learn.”

They say he also showed them a graph of what an “A player” looks like, in case they didn’t know.

But the pep talk didn’t end there. The HR employee then allegedly told them, “Your manager and the sales director don’t have amazing things to say about any of you guys, so know that you guys aren’t irreplaceable,” while also adding, “I hope you don’t hate me, but I figured I’d give you million-dollar advice.”

While they say one employee wasn’t bothered by the meeting, it left them in tears in the bathroom and now questioning whether they should turn their “passive job search into an active one.”

One commenter suggested they ‘Act your wage,’ while another joked that the HR employee sounded like ‘someone has a case of the Mondays!’

The Daily Dot was unable to independently verify the events described in the post, which are based solely on the Reddit user's account of the workplace interaction.