What's your worse workplace mistake?

[lokiju]

I'm going to still go with the same reason as I did in this thread that was posted almost exactly a year ago.

Originally posted by: lokiju
I lost some hardware key dongle for some security system server I was setting up for a multi million dollar security system at a very large hospital.

The dongle cost $10k to replace

My boss wasn't very happy about that.

That worst part was that we explained to the company that we couldn't find it and (truly) weren't even 100% sure that it came with the package and they still refused to send us a replacement at no charge.

 

[kranky]

Customer called to reserve a week in the sound studio four months in advance. I confirmed it. Forgot to write it in the book. Four months later, customer shows up with his musicians. Studio had been booked for another customer. Next available week was three months later.

We ended up letting them use the studio at night for 1/2 price, paying our sound engineer double pay to work nights with them, and I had to be there every night to be their gofer - running out for meals/coffee/soft drinks/anything else they could think of, and they went out of their way to keep me running.

 

[judasmachine]

My worst workplace mistake was not hitting the MILF that hit on me on my last day working there.

 

[Squisher]

Biggest mistake would be not exerting myself and forcing maintenance to to fix a problem with the wiring in a forging press. I discovered that a press had been put into service in which the clutch brake could be engaged while the press was running. I told the supervisor of the electricians and the head of maintenance that this was wrong and dangerous. They said they'd fix it when they had time. I should have put my foot down and called safety. Two weeks later an operator that wasn't too intelligent was killed when the 150 HP electric motor blew up on that machine. I've always thought that the reason it blew up was because he had been running the press with the brake on for like 15-30 minutes.

At the time I was a pretty big fish in a little pond. If I had put my foot down, maybe he'd still be alive.

 

[spaceman]

applying

 

[krylon]

Originally posted by: shortylickens
Hynix Semiconductor.
I worked in Photolithography.
After a monthly maintenance action on a machine that exposes wafers, I made some little little error while performing minor calibrations with a test wafer. After the procedure was done it apparantly had an offset of 1 or 10 or 100 microns, I forget which.
Anyway it was bad. The kind that make a microchip useless. About 20 or 21 casettes went through before a process tech caught the error. Luckily, Etch was running slow that night and none of them had been processed. If they had, we estimate that about One million, five hundred and seventy five thousand dollars worth of silicon would have been ruined.
As such, the time required to reprocess those wafers only cost us about one-hundred thousand.

In my defense I had been on the night shift for about 17 months and had never caught up on my sleep. I was making mistakes left and right. For that matter, so were most of the rest of the folks in the place. I simply dont do that well on a 12-hour night job. I had to learn that the hard way. Of course, I had already learned in the Navy I am useless when tired, but I always assumed that was because I never slept. Turns out that not all sleep is the same.
In Psychology class we learned that there are 5 stages of sleep, and you body cycles through stages 2,3,4, and 5 throughout the night. If you dont get plenty of each stage, you're mental alertness will fail you througout the day.
Apparently, since I was sleeping days and working nights, I was NEVER getting proper sleep, ever. Nor were most of my coworkers, but some of them were better than others at faking alertness.
Statistically in a group of 1200 people, only about 3 or 4 of them are truly nocturnal. The rest are normal people trying to get by.

nice tangent

 

[Azraele]

Originally posted by: Sea Moose

Originally posted by: Azraele
Not mine but I witnessed this. At work there are huge machines that tear and fluff fiber to be blown into pillows. One of the machines was being fixed and all the panels were off, so all the safety features were pretty much bypassed. The machine got turned on for some reason or another, and one guy either got his hand too close or something and the machine basically tore his hand off.

Fuck this wins, the repair person should have isolated the power supply and tagged/locked the isolation switch.

It was pretty bad, and the company did get fined. He's lucky to be alive, actually. The machine was not at full power (takes a while to spin up) and was shut off almost immediately. The rollers in it had him trapped, and put enough pressure on his wrist to keep bleeding under control (enough pressure it broke his arm). And because the machine was not at full power when he was caught., it just got his hand. Otherwise, it's have just ripped his arm off and he'd have bled to death.

 

[Gibson486]

accepting my current job. Yeah, getting back on the market sucks. Once you get into consulting, no one takes you seriously anymore.

 

[BoomerD]

WORST? I "broke" a crane once...literally. Broke an outrigger beam and dumped the crane. (they're ugly as hell when the rubber is in the air!)

I'd been writing that crane up for months for a variety of problems...and the shop kept signing off on the problems...until that day...the swing gear finally quit and the wind blew the crane into its weakest position...with a load on the hook.

Once it got over that weak corner, I felt the beam break (weld where the beam was welded to the hydraulic jack cylinder) and I knew I was fucked...I COULD have bailed out, but I stayed in the seat and tried to minimize the damage. It was headed for a couple of trucks in our staging area...and about 30 people milling around. I was able to "steer" the boom enough that when it went in the dirt, it didn't hit anything or anyone.
When the owner of the company showed up, the first thing he said was, "Do you know how much this is gonna cost me?"

I told him, "I'm fine and no one got hurt, thanks for asking." :roll:

He didn't fire me, (I had too much documentation of the problems with the crane and the union would have backed me) BUT, he did stop finding work for me...so I went to work for someone else a couple of days later.

Never really gave a shit about breaking the crane, shit happens, but I was always glad that on one got hurt.
You can be the best crane operator in the world and no one cares, but if you kill someone, you'll ALWAYS be "that guy who killed so and so."

Over 30 years in the seat and that's the only accident I ever had (I was in one where another crane collapsed onto me, but that's not my doing) and in all those years and hundreds of thousands of lifts, many of them dangerous as hell, I never had anyone get hurt under my hook. I'm proud of that safety record.

 

[AreaCode707]

Don't have one of my own, but I have two I witnessed at my old company.

Payroll manager downloaded the entire employee database (past and present employees), with all personal info (SSN, home address, etc.) and took his laptop on a trip with him. In full view of his director (who was also a moron) he checked the laptop in his unlocked luggage. Guess what was missing when he picked up the luggage? He got fired and 90,000 people got free credit watch for a year.

Payroll director let little fish in the pond use his computer to send each exec in the company their pay information. Only little fish sent each exec ALL the exec compensation information. Director got fired, little fish didn't. A good thing, actually, since the director was incompetent and was responsible for a lot of less visible screwups.

 

[Red Squirrel]

Originally posted by: BoomerD
WORST? I "broke" a crane once...literally. Broke an outrigger beam and dumped the crane. (they're ugly as hell when the rubber is in the air!)

I'd been writing that crane up for months for a variety of problems...and the shop kept signing off on the problems...until that day...the swing gear finally quit and the wind blew the crane into its weakest position...with a load on the hook.

Once it got over that weak corner, I felt the beam break (weld where the beam was welded to the hydraulic jack cylinder) and I knew I was fucked...I COULD have bailed out, but I stayed in the seat and tried to minimize the damage. It was headed for a couple of trucks in our staging area...and about 30 people milling around. I was able to "steer" the boom enough that when it went in the dirt, it didn't hit anything or anyone.
When the owner of the company showed up, the first thing he said was, "Do you know how much this is gonna cost me?"

I told him, "I'm fine and no one got hurt, thanks for asking." :roll:

He didn't fire me, (I had too much documentation of the problems with the crane and the union would have backed me) BUT, he did stop finding work for me...so I went to work for someone else a couple of days later.

Never really gave a shit about breaking the crane, shit happens, but I was always glad that on one got hurt.
You can be the best crane operator in the world and no one cares, but if you kill someone, you'll ALWAYS be "that guy who killed so and so."

Over 30 years in the seat and that's the only accident I ever had (I was in one where another crane collapsed onto me, but that's not my doing) and in all those years and hundreds of thousands of lifts, many of them dangerous as hell, I never had anyone get hurt under my hook. I'm proud of that safety record.

Wow that's crazy, had you bailed out the crane probably Would have killed or hurt people, and you'd think the boss would praise you for attempting (and succeeding) in keeping the safety of the others.

This is also another example of cheap companies that give you equipment that has issues and refuses to fix it. Had they fixed the problems you wrote up, and inspected it in general they could have prevented that. Seems lot of work place accidents happen because of neglect.

 

[xSauronx]

when i worked for my dad at his drycleaning plant, some preacher brought in a robe that had some metallic threads all over it.

i did cleaning and spot removal, and it got sent to me for a rusty looking spot, so i squirted on a little rust remover, steamed it out, balanced it with some other chemical and steamed that, dried it and sent it on.

turns out that it was finished inside-out, so what i thought was the outside, was the inside...and the outside of that area was a lot of metallic thread that i just put hydrochloric acid on....so it ruined a spot that was maybe 1" x 1" on the front of this guys robe. looked....well it looked bad.

so we call him, say we will replace it and he tells us the robe cost him 800 fucking dollars. :Q

after he called where he got it from, it turned out that was the cost for the whole getup he had, and that one piece ended up costing me like $150 to replace =(

 

[olds]

I got into a fist fight with a co worker (he started it) in the managers office. I was beating his ass and he ran behind the manager for protection. I drug him out of the corner while the manager was screaming for me to stop. I told her to get fucked and I kept wailing on the dude. We both got fired and I got evicted. I worked for the same apartment complex that I lived in.

 

[BabaBooey]

Falling asleep at the wheel of my 1 ton dodge ram and rolling it on a clover leaf ramp,then found out I had diabetes and sleep apena <------15 min of REM sleep a night is what I got on 3 different sleep studies,it's a wonder I have not gone mad .....yet ...

 

[Mo0o]

Originally posted by: oldsmoboat
I got into a fist fight with a co worker (he started it) in the managers office. I was beating his ass and he ran behind the manager for protection. I drug him out of the corner while the manager was screaming for me to stop. I told her to get fucked and I kept wailing on the dude. We both got fired and I got evicted. I worked for the same apartment complex that I lived in.

awesome. care to share the back story on that?

 

[GodlessAstronomer]

Originally posted by: oldsmoboat
I got into a fist fight with a co worker (he started it) in the managers office. I was beating his ass and he ran behind the manager for protection. I drug him out of the corner while the manager was screaming for me to stop. I told her to get fucked and I kept wailing on the dude. We both got fired and I got evicted. I worked for the same apartment complex that I lived in.

dragged?

 

[olds]

Originally posted by: Mo0o

Originally posted by: oldsmoboat
I got into a fist fight with a co worker (he started it) in the managers office. I was beating his ass and he ran behind the manager for protection. I drug him out of the corner while the manager was screaming for me to stop. I told her to get fucked and I kept wailing on the dude. We both got fired and I got evicted. I worked for the same apartment complex that I lived in.

awesome. care to share the back story on that?

I was a maintenance mechanic for a property management company. I was about 22 and he was older. I had worked there longer than him but he thought he was or should be smarter/know more than me.
We were in the manager's office when a call came in about a fridge not working. I said that is was likely just the breaker and the manager sent him to take care of it. He came back saying it wasn't the breaker so I went back with him.
I reset the breaker and the fridge came on. I teased him some as we walked back to the office. The managers asked if it was taken care of and I stated it was and it was the breaker like I had initially said. He called me a smart ass and a punk and took a step towards me. I saw red (back then I had anger issues) and let him have it.

 

[SonnyDaze]

Originally posted by: zerocool84
I dropped a pallet of doors when I was bringing them down with a forklift.

:thumbsup: Been there, done that.

I was unloading some doors (special ordered....with lots of glass) that were banded upright on a pallet. I was backing up with the forklift and went to turn and the banding material (poly strapping) broke and the doors went crashing to the floor.

 

[Via]

Definitely going to work still drunk after partying until 6 am instead of calling in sick.

 

[Leros]

I was driving a forklift and I snagged a 440v wire on the floor, ripping the socket off the wall and exposing the bare wires.

 

[clamum]

Originally posted by: ggnl

Originally posted by: JohnCU
going to work thinking i was fine but fucked up on sleeping pills/alcohol and hit a car in the parking lot, almost fired

ditto...except sub klonopin for sleeping pills

No one ever found out but one morning after taking klonopin the night before I threw up in a company truck.

Also took too much painkillers and threw up about every 20 - 30 minutes at work. Just got up and acted like I was going to the bathroom but I'm sure my co-worker was like "wut".

 

[clamum]

Originally posted by: Via
Definitely going to work still drunk after partying until 6 am instead of calling in sick.

I've done something similar, not quite 6 am, but it was pretty rough. Took me like 5 tries to even fucking remember the password I type MULTIPLE TIMES, EVERY DAY, to log into Windows.

 

[bctbct]

One day last year I backed a uniloader into a parked truck...$500 damage.

About an hour later I backed the same uniloader into a tree limb which shattered the back window, causing the broken glass to be blown into the raditor at a high rate of speed causing multiple leaks. $1000+

Everyone laughed, fuckers docked my year end bonus.

 

[imported_Imp]

Allowing the wrong person to be picked up by handicap public transit. A lot of people screwed up in this. I didn't know the person's name, someone else ordered a ride at roughly the same time without telling anyone, someone mis-identifying a name, miscommunication all over. Person was found, and problem solved luckily, but it sucked for all.

Oh, and I stayed 1 hour overtime at my desk, using the internet browser for standard slacking (non-porn/NSFW) sites. Knew I wasn't getting paid, supervisors made it sound like I trashed the place, and still got flak for it months afterwards. Some bullshit security/liability issue apparently. Another time, I got bitched at for staying less than half an hour late, actually doing work on a site visit. Lost my respect for a lot of people that summer. After that, I deliberately left early and on the dot, so fuck them.

And just so we're clear, they didn't give a shit what I was doing afterhours. They were just pissed I was physically present.

 

[ModerateRepZero]

hmm probably my worst might've been working the opening shift, and forgetting to turn on the refrigeration unit where all the toppings/ chicken wings etc. are stored in the preparation/makeline area for ~7 hours . thank goodness all the food gets run thru the oven, and I didn't hear anyone complain about food poisoning...