Employee refuses boss' demand to create detailed manual within 2 days before they resign

Securing a desirable job is undoubtedly a challenging endeavor. Often, many positions impose unreasonable expectations on employees, leaving them in a state of helplessness. Reddit user u/Ill-Bridge3129 shared their employer's absurd request to write a "manual" detailing their responsibilities at the organization. Moreover, the manual was to be written in 2 days. The post has gained 2.4K upvotes on the website with 1.1K comments. The employee wrote about how they took up the job "in a pinch." Upon joining the job, they found out that the company did not pay employees adequately and they had outdated practices. It was despite the company having earned $2 billion in profits the previous year.

The individual was a fresher and applied for graduate school out of state. They received a very good job offer while waiting to hear back and decided to take it up. The individual submitted their formal resignation letter to their boss. Upon receiving the letter, the boss started to conduct daily meetings to change the employee's mind and gain information about the new position and how to do their job. They write, "She cannot lose me but cannot match or beat the new offer."

It is also revealed that the boss' previous team walked out on her and there were already three other employees who were going to quit. Not wanting to support her antics during the last few days, the individual decides not to give her any information about the new job. At this point, the boss begins to insist that the employee create a manual about the job. This booklet would be similar to the already existing "internal booklets" at their company.

The employee says, "I cannot begin to explain how I created this, edit it, or the technical aspects required in just two days, her given deadline." They even mentioned that they had to use four different editing software to create the manual. With such a challenging deadline, the employee decides to ask for an extension and even offers to continue working remotely till their boss can find a replacement. The employee happens to be trained in creating specialized interactive programs and demos, which is not an easy skill to learn. Furthermore, the employee does not have sufficient time to complete the guide as they have to finish up a beta testing program for the same company. They elaborate that the testing would take up the remaining week to complete.

People on the platform sided with the employee and gave their suggestions in the comment section. u/cero1399 commented, "Why do you feel the need to help her at all? You're leaving; she has no power or control over you." Another user, u/Watsons-Butler, said, "You've been there four months. You're still onboarding and not the person who should be writing company policy manuals. What are they going to do? Withhold your final paycheck? That's a lawsuit for wage theft."

u/LeviathanGank shared a similar story: "I handed my resignation for a production management position for a printing firm and they want me to train the new replacement.. he was cheap and acted his wage, literally didn't pay any attention so after my last week was up we had a meeting with the boss and we discussed his role with him and he agreed he knew what he was doing. He did not. I told them to stop contacting me after several calls a week later. He couldn't even edit the Excel sheet for stock."