The craziest thing that my Boss has ever asked me to do was...."Take a break!"

One of the craziest things I think I have ever been asked to do: Pick up a boss's daughter from school (elementary), then pick up some cheese coneys on the way to dropping her off at home! Oy Vey! He needed a nanny, not an Admin. Assistant! (By the way, he was truly one of the worst bosses I have ever had, to date)

ha ha ha.... OMG! watch out for the tomatoes!

I had a boss do the same thing, but her dog wasn't house/officebroken.

I've worked for several executives, and here are some highlights I could remember.
1. A VP asked that I sew his jacket tear up for him, and a button on another one.
2. A President of company asked that I give money to the building engineer who wanted to by tools from a guy on the street that was selling them for a good deal with the price tags still on them from some of the leading stores. (told him no.)
3. A President of company expected me to wash out his mug and lunch dishes and utensils daily. I was not allowed to throw out the plastic forks even if one prong was broken off, because it was still usable.
4. A CFO wanted to set me up with her brother.

Bring his dogs to be groomed (and pick them up).
Order new checks for his wife's checking account.

I had the same experience with a Vice-Chairman. Entered the office cup in hand every morning and put it on the edge of my desk which meant I was to get his coffee. And that was only a little over 10 years ago!

I was onced asked to have a menu from IHOP professionally framed and an engraved plaque was added to the frame that said "Come intoxicated... Leave stuffed".

OMG...that's hillarious! Did you tell him you'd get to it right after you put the steel toes on your high heels?

Scrapbook pictures on company time. We had a lot of pictures of firm events and I got to shop for scrapbooking stuff and I made a scrapbook to be used for displays for career-day and other events. I also helped type, proof and correct homework for a bosses son.

Ewww!

To stay late on Christmas Eve and wait for a personal package to be delivered; something he purchased for his wife for Christmas!

Watch for his ant farm to arrive in the mail and set it up for him while he was out on vacation. I hate bugs!

1. Pick out (but she went and bought them), and wrap the Christmas gifts she was giving to her team, including mine. She was just so busy on some special projects, she didn't have time to do it, and I didn't mind. The night of our Holiday Party, when she gave a thank you speach to everyone for their hard work throughout the year, she told everyone what i had done for her. They teased her about it for the whole next year. She never asked me to do that again : o ).

2. One day she had to work, but her children were out of school due to a bad storm. She couldn't get a sitter, so she brought them to work with her, and asked if I'd mind watching them.

A couple of years ago my boss held an offsite staff meeting at his cottage. After lunch, he offered a pontoon ride and water skiing so we all changed into our swimwear. We were about to launch the boat when my boss bent over and had me spray sun guard on his balding head. I got teased about that one for quite a long time!

My boss called while driving her car and asked me to figure out where she was using a state map. She told me which county road she had just passed and which highway she was on.

One morning, my boss called me from her home. She was hysterical. She had a mouse in her home, and was petrified. She could not move to get ready for work. I went to her home and tried to catch the mouse (to no avail). I stayed with her until she was ready for work. The next day the mouse came back and another co-worker went there and caught the mouse - Thank God!!!

A new assistant manager had been hired and was moving here from out of state. Rather than the company paying his moving expenses with a professional mover, they used one of the company semi trailers. Several of us male employees were forced to go to his new house and unload everything off the semi and move it all into his house. Basically, we were forced to be his moving crew.

Years ago when I was an Executive Assistant for a young up and coming VP, the President of the company found out that she had bought a dog and he wanted me to throw a surprise party for her dog. I had to call her husband and have him take time off his job to bring the dog to the party.

Guess what I did? I threw a surprise party for her dog and it was a darn good party too... the dog and everyone else loved it.

I guess the way I see it is, if what is asked of me does not compromise my morals and values then okay. But if it does, then I have a decision to make.

There is nothing wrong with someone asking me to do something, its up to me to decide how far I would go for a job.

I once had to leave work to go get a prescription for my boss. And to make things worse, he gave me his credit card to use to pick up the prescription and when I went through the drive-thru window, I was asked to verify his home address and phone number (which I couldn't remember). I had to call him on his cell phone to get the information, but felt very stupid. I felt like the drug store was thinking I was trying to take someone else's prescription. Totally uncomfortable feeling. I was not very happy. Not to mention, we're not even supposed to run personal errands on company time (corporate policy).

Drop off a urine specimen to his doctor; buy clothes for his 80 year old mother without her;

oh and also, for his friend, he sent a photo of his head to a cell phone and me and another girl at work had to pick out his eyeglasses just by looking at a tiny photo on my phone! There are measurement needed for this and everything! If anyone has purchased eyeglasses before they should know how difficult this was :)

I worked for the President/Owner of an ice rink. He was very particular about his building and I remember one day he took me around and we picked gum out of the carpets with a set of keys.

My boss, who was the president of a company, asked me to take a Johnny Mathis record album cover to a tailor and find material the same as the jacket Johnny was wearing on the album. I never found the material!

I was working for an insurance company and we had a bomb threat called in that day. My supervisor at the time asked us to do a sweep of the office to look for "anything suspicious looking." I politely declined and phoned the police department.

One boss (that had been recently hired as Pres.) requested that I order lots of alcohol for the company Christmas party because he wanted to see what everyone acted like when they were drunk so he would know 'what kind of people they really are'. Well, that told me all I needed to know about what kind of boss he was... I left the company not long after that conversation for various boss-related reasons and (surprise, surprise) he no longer works there either now. Hmmm...wonder why... ;)

Jo - Makes you wonder if we didn't work for the same boss. :)

I had a boss about 10 years ago who would have his personal tailor come into the office and while they sipped tea at the marble conference table, I held up bolts of fabric for them to view. This same boss also asked me to return an automatic nose hair clipper to the manufacturer. Apparently it didn't work well because it was obvious it had been USED! GROSS!

Right in the middle of year end tax prep....I had to stop and order heating oil for the boss and his son's home while the receptionist plays computer game.

At least you had the housekeeper give them to you. My boss had me go to her house and get her favorite underwear out of the drawer and fed-ex them to her at the conference she was at. There are too many to list but this is the one I get teased abotu the most.

One boss I had expected me to check his pencils daily to be sure they were sharp enough. If not, I was to sharpen them but to the correct size for his hand. If he deemed the pencil too small, he would give it to me and nastily tell me to save it for my children. (I was not married and had no children.)

I've had a few in my career.
1. One boss brought in his Christmas purchases and wrapping paper and asked me to wrap all of them for him.
2. Another boss wanted me to do his personal taxes. I managed to gracefully back out of this one.
3. The strangest request was from a boss who wanted me to put prescription eyedrops in his eyes three times a day after his cataract surgery.

Several jobs ago, I worked for the CFO of a software company. He asked me to go out to the warehouse, and construct a model of everything in the warehouse, including shelves, boxes, etc. with colored paper, and to scale. When I finished this project (??) I turned it in to him. He glanced at it and said, "Very nice. Thank you," and promtly TOSSED IT IN THE TRASH. I quit the same day...

I worked for a Sr. VP and he wanted me to purchase a bottle of Jack Daniels, wrap it, and deliver it on his behalf on New Year's Eve to a millionaire friend of his in the hospital who had recently had a stroke. The old guy's room had so many flowers I thought I was at his funeral, so I guess Jack Daniels was a good gift to give.

Another time, he wanted me to research the location of a WalMart in the Bahamas for his family vacation and call in advance to make sure they had a certain brand of diapers, so he wouldn't have to pack them when he and his wife brought their 6 mo. old on their trip.

My boss needed to submit an application for a promotion but it was an electronic application and he didn't know how to work the system. I had to come back early from vacation to fill out then submit his application. When I tried to call him to get some information that it requested, he said he was too busy and to just figure it out.

I once worked as an admin to the vice-president of a telemarketing company. I was told to clean the BUGS off the ficas plants!!!! I was only 18 years old and did what I was told. Unbelievable.

I once was an assistant to the owner of a large company who would take his dog everywhere he went, because the dog could not be alone and the owner would not crate him. I had a chaise lounge chair in my office for the dog (110-pounds) to lay on the days he was there. We moved into a new office building and I had to paint my office walls ox-blood red because that was the dog's "favorite color". It was a beautiful once decorated, but strange because everyone else's office was neutral.

I had to take the dog out three times a day and make sure he didn't pee on anyone (he would pee on people he didn't like). I also made several day trips with the owner and the dog to different stores on their private plane to make sure the dog had someone to be with at all times.

I love dogs, but this was a little much. The job paid well with excellent benefits, so I put up with it until I got enough experience to get a better position.

In the 1970s I was the assistant to a manager who turned out to be asociopath(I didn't know it at the time) who had no respect for personal boundaries. He called me at my home at midnight from an out-of-state location. This was before the days of answering machines, and I picked up the phone, thinking it was a family emergency. After all, who would call me at midnight? He had decided not to pay his hotel bill and wanted me to "fix" things. As I handled all expense reporting, I was able to "fix" things, but shortly thereafter I transferred to a better job (with a promotion) to another division of the company. This man was able to sell snow to the Eskimos. He would get a job and then after a year his superiors would give him a year to find another job because they were too embarrassed to admit that they had made a mistake in hiring him. I think life finally caught up with him: his wife divorced him, and when I saw him on the street about 15 years later, he looked really beat.

In her last job, my coworker had a little kitchen in the office, and since it was getting expensive taking clients out, as an AA she was instructed that she had to cook for the clients. She told her boss she didn't cook and they got her a receipe book and told her to follow instructions. She had to go out to buy the ingredients, cook, serve, and clean. And when the "boys" had an evening gettogether in the office after work, she was left with a mess to clean the next day.

On top of being their executive chef, waitress, and maid service...they made her a carpenter one day to help demolish the bosses' old home and operate a giant excavator. They're lucky she was smart enough to figure out how to operate the machine and not to knock down the new house. She was also smart enough to get out of there to come work for us.

The craziest thing my boss ever asked me to do was to go to the hardware store and pick-up a power drill and a certain size of screws, nuts and bolts. I then had to take the drill and supplies to his home and help his wife put together a bookshelf they had just purchased.

I have done many crazy things for more than one boss. An eye surgeon I worked for (as a transcriptionist, first, and personal assistant, second) definitely takes the cake. Following is a sampling of my "duties."

1. Got a change of clothes for him from his home/bedroom.
2. Delivered his many vehicles to and from work, home, repair shops, etc.
3. Paid all of his personal bills.
4. Put money into the bank accounts of his six grown children.
5. Ordered his clothing, including silk boxer shorts (I submitted my resignation shortly thereafter!)

She had been hospitalized for a few days. She didn't have a ride home from the hospital. I don't know where her friends and family members are!! SHE asked me to pick her up from the hospital, stop by the pharmacy to get her prescription filled and take her home. We are NOT friends - I work for her!!