Boss bragged after posting an image of his team working late on a Monday — the backlash was swift

It's weird how bosses nowadays take pride in forcing employees to work long hours. Cameron Zoub (@czoob3), co-founder of Whop, an American social commerce platform, took to his X account on December 9 to post a picture of his employees working till late on a weekday. However, it was the comments that immediately humbled him, turning his pride into silence within minutes. Well, Zoub, also the Chief Growth Officer of his company, clicked a photo of his engineers working at 9:15 pm on a Monday. The workers looked exhausted and burned out while their eyes were fixed on their giant desktops, but for Zoub, it was a matter of pride, his way of showing how hardworking his employees are. "Not a single Eng[ineer] has left yet. The only thing to do in life is build," he wrote in the post. The post has been viewed 47.7 million times on X so far. 

Working overtime isn't unusual now. In fact, a survey of over 1000 American employees by ZenBusiness found that over 1 in 5 U.S. working professionals reported frequently working beyond official hours. What's most surprising is the fact that most of these employees work overtime without compensation. You will be shocked to know that in 2023 alone, workers across the US worked around 46 billion unpaid overtime hours. That means, employees were forced to work almost six extra weeks. The survey also found that the trend of overtime experienced an increase of 313% in 2023 as compared to 2022.

While Zoub thought the picture was enough to motivate others to sacrifice their personal lives and work around the clock, the reality was far from it. In fact, people went all out, slamming the company's work culture and him for boasting about something so obnoxious; for instance, @blackevilgoblin commented, "No, this is a toxic policy. Look for efficiency, not the maximum time possible at work. Period." Similarly, @enamulhaque_1 said, "I am not sure what to brag about here. No one looks happy." @costcopm wrote, "This is sad af. I see a bunch of young guys disconnected from the world in isolation while their youth slips away…"

@tomwatkins1994 shared, "I did this sort of thing for a number of years, but it didn't benefit anyone but the people who owned the company, so I stopped; my life is significantly better now." @yourmom_backup2 shared, "I’m so sick of seeing bad work-life balance being celebrated! It’s nothing to be proud of. Go spend time with your family, or go get a girlfriend and build a family." @groundhogredman commented, "If you are having to work late every day, then it’s one of two things. Your strategy is a mess, or your workforce planning is a mess. Far too many software engineers are getting burned out and not being as creative as they want to be. I know this, as I build tech teams for large corporations."

@tawhakithegod said, "Nobody ever lay upon their deathbed and lamented, 'I wish I had spent more time in the office,' retards. Absolute jaw-clenching imbeciles." @joshsisley wrote, "You will eventually learn that there is much more to do in life than work. Work being your identity will eventually burn you out." @spudsecurity commented, "Yeah, no, this isn’t the flex you think it is. This isn’t healthy, and I’d cut anyone from my team who tried to encourage this as an unhealthy schedule. There's nothing to gain from this." @retireb4 said, "I used to do this in my 20s. It’s what I wanted to do. While it worked out for me, I would never want to do it again at my age now. There is so much more to life than working for someone else."

You can follow Cameron Zoub (@czoob3) on X for more work-related content. 

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