Let’s face it ― most of us have told a workplace porkie.
Maybe you arrive at every new job with all grandparents and extended family members supposedly alive and well. Perhaps you’ve stretched your CV a litttttle far.
But sometimes, a white lie balloons into an impossibly fairytale you feel compelled to keep up around your colleagues ― at least, that’s what happened to some members of Reddit’s r/AskUK.
Yesterday, Redditor u/orangesapplespears asked: “What’s a lie you’ve told at work that got slightly out of hand?”
Here are some of the most-upvoted responses:
1) “The older security guard at the front gate called me Jeff on my first day. I didn’t quite hear him so didn’t correct him.”
“I responded to him calling me Jeff for the next few years, I would often stop and chat.
“One day I forgot my pass and had to manually sign in. The look of hurt on his face when he found I wasn’t called Jeff haunts me to this day.” u/Ill_Refrigerator_593
2) “We had a new hire starting and I told a couple of people in passing that I knew him from years back and that he only had one leg.”
“Fast forward three weeks when he joined and I’d forgotten all about it until one day he tells me people keep staring at him when he gets up and walks to the toilet. I let him in on the secret and he started playing on it more and more.
“It got to a point where our manager wouldn’t send him out to meet clients if they were too far apart as they didn’t want him walking really far. Everyone finally found out during a work Tough Mudder when he wore shorts. Now he’s the best man at my wedding next year.” u/BlaMenck
3) “A few jobs ago was working IT support and would get calls from users saying their PCs were slow.”
“Instead of troubleshooting what was usually a ‘placebo’ issue I’d increase the pointer speed.
“Word got around that I was the guy to make workstations run faster. Spent a few months increasing pointers speeds on the sly.” u/No_Objective006
4) “There was a company-wide quiz night every year. Very competitive, lots of trash-talking, tactical team members. You get the picture. In my first year, I joked that I should be picked for the best team because I was a member of MENSA (I am not).”
“Somehow word got around and I was indeed asked to join the reigning champions team. I am actually a good quizzer but not a genius.
“We won and the lie evolved. I was asked about it by the CEO at the Christmas party that year and I just smiled and nodded but remained silent.”
5) “I was prescribed a steroid inhaler for my asthma. I joked at work that it meant my Olympic dreams were dashed. Somebody took me seriously.”
“Even back then I thought it was painfully obvious I was not athletic. Oops!” u/Flibertygibbert
6) “I had to join a half marathon after a panicked excuse when I was briefly dating a fellow teacher and wanted to keep it secret.”
7) “I would like to submit my dad’s work lie. He convinced three fellow staff members that he had a twin brother who would occasionally cover shifts for him.”
“The only difference was he used to style his hair in the other direction and wear an earring. As proof, he used his brother’s fancy camera to make it look like there were two of him sitting on the sofa. He let several of the residents (of the nursing home) in on it and they further perpetuated the rumour and had a wonderful time doing it.” u/Aloogobi786
Do you have anything to add? Let us know in the comments below!