Today my boss asked us to supply her with a picture of our holiday decorations. For context, we are all remote employees on my team. Next week she’s going to have a game where she shows the pictures and we have to guess who’s decoration it is. I dont decorate, at all. I actually think decorating is kind of a waste of space/time. Not to mention, temporary seasonal decorations end up in a landfill. Permanent seasonal decorations must be rotated and stored. I can’t be bothered. I guess in retrospect, I could have pulled a stock image and sent it to her from the internet. Being neurodivergent I told her I don’t decorate and left it at that. She basically said I’m ruining the game… it isn’t my job to decorate for her 💀🤷 I am also not Christian. I find no point in pretending to please others. I’m not going to buy decorations for a picture at work when I’m a remote employee. AITA
Add on:
It’s my bosses first time being a manager. She started about 4 months ago. Last week, she told us there was mandatory overtime. She made us all sit on a 2-hour video together. This was a 13 hour day for me. We found out the next week that the overtime was not, in fact, mandatory, and she was just manipulating us.
NTA. She’s being ridiculous. Accepting this isn’t a glorious waste of time, I’d think it be fun to match “No” to the right team member. But I appreciate folks with your POV even though I’m opposite.
NTA. Not everyone decorates, nor celebrates, nor even participates in Christmas.
NTA However, your boss certainly is an AH. Your boss has no right to demand that you decorate or provide her with photos of your home, and she can still run her guessing game without a photo from you. These kinds of guessing games often have mismatched numbers – 6 photos and seven employees for example.
NTA. Send in a picture of your not-decorated space. It’s the most honest to the prompt. Or go ahead and use a stock image. Or maybe an obviously publicly decorated space.
You can still participate in the mandatory fun without compromising your space & values. Or really do ask to just not participate. Personally I think including a fully average undecorated living room in the mix would be funny.
As a Jewish person I also do not have a Christmas tree or any Christmas decorations. Your boss is completely out of touch with reality. Not every person in your company is a Christian or celebrates Christmas.
Yeah I am really quite shocked. There was a lot of Jehovah Witness at my workplace and everything was referred to as a Holiday.
I’d think a photo of zero decorations would actually
Add to the game too!
Lmao, imagine trying to force someone to celebrate a religious holiday.
That’s insane.
So listen. NTA, but not smart. You can be right and stupid at the same time. You could play the game by sending a pic of one stupid candy cane taped to your fridge. Everybody gets a laugh, you come off as a good sport, and everybody will know it’s you.
Reddit always wants to go the nuclear option. This is for team building. The candy cane taped to a fridge is a funny idea or even a pic of the center of a blank wall. As long as it’s made clear that it’s humorous, it will be fun and add some levity to what is otherwise likely a boring corporate job. Not everything is fight worthy and going to HR. People need to chill.
Do you have a single candle?
Place it in front of a contrasting color cloth. Photo. Send.
“That’s all I got, Boss.”
ETA: it’s more fun if it’s a black candle, BTW.
Send her a picture of your lack of decorations, the team can guess who doesn’t decorate if she shows your picture. Personally, I wouldn’t want to be sharing pictures of my home. They can see whatever is on the screen during video calls and that’s it. Nta
Meh, NTA. I \*am\* Christian, but we have no family or friends to celebrate with. Why do I want to rub salt in that wound by decorating for no one?
Worse yet, why should you be forced to decorate \*your\* home for your damned boss?
On TOP of that, if in the US? She’s basically demanding you conform to a specific religious celebration, and last time I checked that is illegal.
NTA.
A key part of being a manager is being inclusive when planning things like this. They should have considered, at the very least, that there might be people on the team who don’t celebrate the particular holiday and just never thought to mention it, and should have had some alternative way to participate.