Micromanaging boss punishes employee for following work process, ends up regretting it immediately

A Reddit user, u/AlienAnimaReleased, shared how a boss’s obsession with 'process' backfired almost instantly. The user had recently been reassigned from the business side of a company to IT during a reorganization. The official explanation was "better alignment with software delivery." The real reason, according to the post, was that they were "expensive," didn’t "do sales," and often rejected IT builds that failed to meet specifications.

"Since joining IT, everything has to be a ticket," the user wrote. "Doesn’t matter if it’s a question, a clarification, or divine revelation — no ticket, no work." Project managers were responsible for ticket creation and prioritization, which slowed things down for a role focused on solving problems and advising teams. "Bureaucracy over brains," the post added. The issue began when clients started reaching out directly with requests. The user typically replied and then created a ticket afterward for record-keeping, but management insisted all communication go through project managers. After a disagreement over response times, the boss instructed the user to stop replying to client emails altogether.

"I explained, patiently, that these emails often come from executives and need a quick turnaround," the employee recalled. The boss replied, "Follow the process or we won’t know how overworked you are." A week later, the CFO of one of the company’s biggest clients emailed asking for details about a custom build. Normally, the user would have responded within a few hours. Instead, they CC’d the boss and project manager, confirmed receipt, and asked for a ticket to be created.

When no one followed up, the CFO sent another message: "We need this by Friday." The user again copied everyone and apologized for the delay, reminding them that the request was waiting on assignment. Behind the scenes, they had already prepared the estimate and informed the client privately of the hold-up. Soon after, the boss sent a message asking why the CFO hadn’t received a response. The employee pointed out that they had followed instructions, only working on assigned tickets and copying the boss on every email. "There was a long, delicious silence before he finally replied: 'Okay… you don’t need a ticket for everything. In the future, if it’s from an executive, just respond and make a ticket afterward'." the post noted.

After that, the project moved forward, and the policy quietly changed. There are similar workplace issues that have been documented in research. A study published in The American Journal of Sociology found that organizations with multiple procedural layers often slow down decision-making and responsiveness. The research concluded that when employees are required to follow too many formal steps, they tend to prioritize compliance over efficiency, creating bottlenecks and frustration that reduce productivity. The story struck a chord with Reddit users who have dealt with similar management habits. 

u/Stoonkz wrote, "For the record, IT people need tickets because that’s how they are judged on their work. Their bonus and pay rise are tied to ticket volume. There’s no reason to stop you from creating a ticket after responding, though." u/ol-gormsby commented, "Reminds me of my last job. New manager with zero IT experience decides we need a ticketing system. A few months later, someone asked why response times had doubled. My reply: 'You’ll have to ask the manager. It’s his initiative.'" u/CaucasianHumus added, "This is me right now. You need a three-minute fix? Nah. Needs a ticket, then approval, then a meeting to discuss why the fix was needed. All for something that used to take five minutes."

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