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Employee says manager told him he's 'too young to have a life' while demanding unpaid overtime: 'Really exhausting'
A Redditor alleged his manager demanded unpaid overtime and tried to control his life outside work, telling him he was “too young to have a life.”
A Reddit post describing a manager’s alleged attempts to pressure an employee into unpaid overtime and control his personal life has sparked a discussion online, with many users sharing similar experiences and offering advice on setting boundaries at work.
In the post titled “My manager expects unpaid overtime, controls my personal life, and told me I’m ‘too young to have a life’ while HR says he’s wrong but cannot move me yet”, the employee wrote that his manager routinely pushed him to work beyond her 8-hour shift without pay, despite him meeting deadlines and completing all assigned tasks within office hours.
“He is convinced my performance is slipping because I do not put in unpaid extra hours. There has been no formal performance warning, no missed deadlines, and no refusal of work. I complete everything assigned to me within office hours,” the user wrote.
The Redditor said that when he approached HR, he said they agreed the manager’s expectations were inappropriate, but told him they could not move him to another team yet due to a lack of open positions. “So for now, I am stuck reporting to the same manager,” he said.
The situation escalated when the manager allegedly began targeting his personal interests and relationships at the workplace. “My manager found out about my interests outside of work, and this is what he said directly to my face. He told me he will not give me any new or extra responsibilities anymore. He said I only work for the money. He objected to me talking to coworkers who share my interests. He told me not to sit with those people at lunch or during breaks. And the worst part, he said that because I am young, I should focus only on work and not have a life,” he wrote.
“At this point, he is trying to control what I do outside office hours, what I am interested in as a person, who I talk to at work, where I sit at work, and even whether I am allowed to have a life at all,” the Redditor said.
(Also Read: US-returned NRI shares why he's leaving India again: 'Couldn’t tolerate third-world life’)
Social media reactions
The post quickly drew hundreds of responses from users offering support and sharing their own workplace stories.
“Manager tried. I quit. Manager got pissed. I didn’t care. Found a new job. Paid better. Have been following the same policy since. Let me work and I will do wonders for you, try to control me and my resignation is always in my drafts. Brash? Yes. Radical? Totally. Am I prioritising the right aspects of my life? 100%,” one user shared.
Another commenter advised him to “become a rebel employee,” while a third recommended maintaining strict boundaries. “Do your job, ignore extra, avoid manager for talk other than job, and prepare to switch if you don’t get to move internally,” the user wrote.
(Disclaimer: This report is based on user-generated content from social media. HT.com has not independently verified the claims and does not endorse them.)
