‘That’s how ALL CORPORATE JOBS ARE’: Texas AT&T worker takes allotted 1-hour break. Then he gets a DM on Teams

‘Amazon be on the same bull.’

This former AT&T worker thought he was following his job’s break policy correctly. He says he would take his allotted lunch break and make sure to return on time. Then, one day, a message from his manager led to a confusing meeting.

In the video, Isaiah Cantera (@zaythemuse22) shares a story about working at a corporate AT&T call center. According to Cantera, employees received a one-hour lunch break in addition to two 15-minute breaks. Cantera says he was careful about taking only his allotted hour for lunch. He says if he clocked out at 1:00 p.m., he would make sure he was back at 2:00 p.m.

However, he says that one day after returning from lunch, he received an unexpected message from a manager.

Fair Policy or Micromanaging?

“I came back from my lunch break, and I took a phone call, and then one of the managers messaged me … and he was like, … ‘Aux into a team meeting when you get done with this call.’” Cantera says.

Cantera explains that when he joined the meeting, there was a white slideshow on the screen that said “20 minutes.” He says his manager asked him if he knew what that meant, and Cantera said he had no idea.

“He goes, ‘So, that’s the amount of time that you have gone over your lunch,’ and I was like, ‘No, that’s not true. I always clock back in exactly an hour. I never ever go over. I’m always an hour to the tee,’” Cantera explained.

According to Cantera, his manager agreed that he was technically clocking back in at the one-hour mark. The problem was the seconds.

“‘No, you’re right, but the thing is that you don’t clock in exactly at an hour. You have seconds, so these seconds, they add up, and … it added up to 20 minutes. So, that’s why I’m having to talk with you,’” Cantera reports his manager saying.

Cantera says he then asked if it would be better for him to clock back in five minutes early. However, he says his manager told him that wouldn’t work either because he could get in trouble for not taking his full one-hour lunch break.

“The best thing I can tell you is as soon as you clock out, set a timer for exactly an hour and just make sure that you race to clock in exactly then,” his manager said, according to Cantera.

“Yeah, that was the beginning of the [expletive] end, dude,” Cantera says.

‘I Worked AT&T 20 Years All True!

Viewers had plenty to say about the level of monitoring Cantera described. Some said they had similar experiences working for AT&T and other corporate jobs.

“That’s how ALL CORPORATE JOBS ARE,” one comment says.

“Att loves to micromanage. I made it 4 months before I had to go,” another person says.

“Yes they do!!! I left after 15 years working in a cor store!!” someone else says.

“I’ve been with a competitor for years and worked from home since 2020. The micromanaging has really stepped up over the last year and it’s driving me insane,” another viewer writes.

However, one commenter suggested that Cantera’s experience may have had more to do with the individual manager than the company itself.

“That’s not the company that was your manager,” they say.

The video has 9,440 views and almost 300 likes as of this writing.

Can Micromanaging Employees Backfire?

What is micromanaging, and can it hurt more than it helps? Micromanagement is a management style where managers monitor the staff that reports to them in a way that feels punitive and excessive, focusing more on small details rather than the scope and quality of the work. It zooms in on a person’s workflow in a way that doesn’t make space for nuance or context. Considering Cantera always followed the lunch policy and clocked in right on the hour of their lunch break ending, his manager’s actions could be seen as micromanaging.

According to workplace well-being platform OpenUp, constant oversight can create a sense of distrust and take away an employee’s feeling of autonomy. The OpenUp webpage notes that micromanagement can contribute to a number of negative effects on workers that might hurt a company more than help. For example, it can lead to increased stress and anxiety, lower confidence and motivation, burnout, frustration, and decreased productivity.  

“Nearly 75% of workers call micromanagement the biggest workplace red flag, and 46% say it’s reason enough to walk away from a job,” the organization’s webpage says.

Cantera’s situation raises a larger question about how closely companies should track workers’ time, especially when employees are still completing their assigned hours and returning from breaks around the expected time.

AllHipHop has reached out to Cantera for comment via TikTok direct message and comment and to AT&T via email. This story will be updated if either party responds.

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