Each of us perhaps dreamed of becoming someone really outstanding in our childhood. An astronaut, a sailor, a firefighter, a football player, a programmer… Years have passed, and for some people this childhood dream has come true, but in most cases, of course, we choose far from the occupations that we dreamed about in our early years. Reality and adult life, as usual, make their ruthless adjustments…

However, perhaps this post will calm you down a little, and here’s why. It is likely that when we dreamed about certain jobs or businesses in our childhood, we did not take into account various facts about them, usually known only to those who have been in this profession for a long time. Who knows, maybe this information would actually influence our dreams?

Be that as it may, an incredibly interesting thread once appeared in the AskReddit community, the topic starter of which asked just one question: “What’s a dirty insider secret in your profession?” As of today, the original thread has around 1.1K upvotes and over 1.3K different comments, highlighting jobs we know well from completely different angles, revealing unknown skeletons in their closets.

Bored Panda, especially for you, has collected a whole selection of unexpected, intriguing, discouraging and simply the most popular facts about a wide variety of professions and businesses, so please feel free to scroll to the very end of this list, and for those of you whose jobs also have some ugly secrets known only to you – just share it in the comments. Could it be your voice that will become decisive for some teen in their upcoming professional choice?

More info: Reddit

#1 Health Insurance

Health insurance.

The squeaky wheel gets the grease. If we refused to cover something for you, COMPLAIN. File a complaint with the Department of Insurance in your state. Complain to your Human Resources department if it’s employer-provided.

So many people accept the first thing they’re told. Don’t. Be aggressive.

Image credits: Holaroooo

#2 IT Companies

A whole lot of IT guys aren’t that tech savvy. They just know how to Google well.

Image credits: MatrixGodfather0435

#3 Consulting

Consulting: In many cases, your boss hired us because he doesn’t trust your ability to do the job. We will go talk to you, take your ideas, package them nicely, and present them to your boss. And charge your company a small fortune while doing this. If your boss realized that you really are competent, we’d be out of work.

Image credits: Count2Zero

#4 Housekeeping

I’m a housewife. Sometimes I just put dirty dishes in with the clean ones in the dishwasher and run it again so I don’t have to unload it.

Image credits: muststayawaketoread

#5 Medical Labs

I work in a medical lab. I see people touch everything without gloves ALL THE TIME. I also see people use their phones with gloves on ALL THE TIME.

Image credits: lady_laughs_too_much

#6 Drain Cleaning

If you call a drain cleaner to clear your bathtub and all it is just a bit of hair right on the strainer, he will probably just run the snake for 10 minutes to sound busy and charge you full price.

Image credits: DerpWilson

#7 Customer Service

Call Center Agent working for customer service.

We will put you on hold and pretend to ask the supervisor, but actually we will b***h about you.We cannot change company policy for you.

But if you are polite we will try our most to bend the rules for you, because we deal with so many entitled people.

Worst the ones pretending that they are smarter than you and don’t really need your help, but desperatly need your help.

Image credits: ditasaurus

#8 Armed Forces

People in the military make wasting time an artform. The sheer amount of hours we spend getting compensated by taxpayers to do *absolutely nothing* is astonishing.

Image credits: appa-ate-momo

#9 Hotel Front Desk

Hotel Front Desk staff here, if you are nice and respectful we will do everything we can to make your stay as enjoyable as possible so you will come back.

If you are an a*****e we don’t give two s**ts about you. Bonus points if your a walk-in. Even if we have rooms we will send you elsewhere because we don’t want to deal with you.

Edit: I worded part of it poorly, I didn’t mean walk ins as a bad thing. I meant people walking in and being an a*****e demanding and being deliberately rude and causing an issue.

Image credits: SirenSkye17

#10 Food Packaging

I worked at a cheese packaging factory a few years ago. We got big blocks of cheese in, cut them or shredded them, then packaged them for sale. All the same blocks of cheese, but we’d change the film and suddenly it’s a different brand.

Next time you go to Walmart and think the more expensive shredded cheese must be higher quality, think again. Just get the store brand. It all came from the same blocks.

Image credits: anon

#11 Pest Control

In pest control when we come to spray your place if you demand we spray some areas that legally we are told not to, such as chair cushions, couches, entire doors for example, we’ll straight up fake it and through in some fancy chemical words to make it sound like we did. Sorry but not sorry, we’ll do the best we can cause we know pests can legit be a medical problem and we want nothing more than to help, but we don’t care if you say “just off the books lol” we’re not about to get fined or sued when you get a rash from a pesticide covered chair that you requested. (We don’t care if you don’t care about that, we do and that’s all there is to it)

Image credits: TerrificTenor

#12 Pricing And Discounts

Pricing for custom work is very subjective. Treat us well and we’ll figure the price very fairly. Act like a jerk, there are plenty of ways to pad the bill. Start the conversation by demanding a discount and the price goes up 20% before your precious 10% discount comes off.

Image credits: StrangeJournalist7

#13 Construction

I work in construction. I have a lot to say but I’ll leave you with this one; never look behind the walls, in the ceilings, or in any crawl spaces or otherwise tight and infrequently visited places in your house/building, unless you want to find soda and beer cans from decades past.

Image credits: Mercurydriver

#14 Manufacturing

Nepotism is so regular in manufacturing its not even worth talking about.

Image credits: DonBocUlosis96

#15 HR Department

The HR may not agree with management’s decision either but has to still drive it within the organisation. We are employees of the organisation just like everyone else, but our performance is evaluated based on other employees.

Image credits: Titpainfromhell92

#16 Financial Advisor In Training

For the short time I worked as a financial advisor in training, the reason some people got promotions/better pay than all the other people who were better qualified was due to some people complaining/backstabbing other employees on a daily basis.

Yes, corporate raiding/shark tactics is common and that everyone around you is trying to screw you over/gain an upper hand. Also, don’t be surprised by nepotism.

Image credits: Cheetodude625

#17 Programming

The code behind the software/application you’re using is an absolute mess

Image credits: baller5

#18 Call Center

Call center rep, the more pi**ed off you are, the less we care, and we’ll have already forgotten your name the second we answer another call.

Image credits: Deadcrowes

#19 Welding

The majority of welders have no certifications, tickets, professional training or qualifications. They just get an opportunity to try it and stick with it.

On a daily basis I see lifting points, holding several tons, welded incorrectly and not tested.

Image credits: DonBocUlosis96

#20 Marketing And PR

I’m in marketing and write a lot of press releases. Unless someone was actually interviewed by a reporter, every quote you read was written and thought up by someone other than the person allegedly saying it.

Image credits: tierneyb

#21 Hospitals And Doctors

I used to work admin for a hospital and they would purposely overbook patients for appointments in the hope that some would not make it. Whilst this meant that we got through the amount of patients relatively easily, every now and again, the department waiting room (which was basically a corridor with 4 chairs on the side) would be full of pi**ed off patients who are all booked for the same time slot and won’t be seen until 2 hours after their arrival.

Image credits: drax3012

#22 Higher Education

higher education: many people who are paid specifically for being smart are in fact really dumb.

Image credits: indarye

#23 Restaurants And Cafe

Im 19, currently work at a restaurant, you would not believe the amount of s**t talking we do towards customers

Image credits: nillaisthewhitenword

#24 Trucking

Old school outlaw truckers absolutely do still exist. If you ever have a livestock truck that’s tricked out blow by you doing triple digit speeds at night, he’s waaay overweight and running illegal logs.

Most trucks are lumbering beats of burden, but anything agricultural stopped progressing with the rest of the laws two decades ago.

Image credits: Beekatiebee

#25 Audits In Big Companies

If you’re a multi-million dollar company, odds are we don’t give a s**t about errors under a certain amount of dollars. This is called “materiality”, and most auditors rely on the calculation in order to not give a s**t, and get the work done.

Image credits: SpyOfGeneralTso

#26 Pharmacies

I work in a pharmacy

Yes, we drop some of your pills on the floor, and yes we put them back in your bottle.

Image credits: Johannes–Factotum

#27 System Administrating

Sometimes I have no f*****g clue why your computer did what it did until I do some research. Majority of my job is reactive. Unless I can change what happened.

Image credits: bwalz87

#28 Agriculture

WASH YOUR PRODUCE.

If the guy picking your produce needs to pee, is he going to walk all the way to the outhouse, or is he just going to p**s on one of the many plants around him?

Image credits: anon

#29 Communicating With Customers

If you yell and scream and throw a big enough fit you get better service. It pi**es me off so much. Our management just rolls over for difficult customers.

Image credits: agreeingstorm9

#30 Software Engineering

We don’t know how to use the software we make

Image credits: SaltyChickenDip

#31 Sales

The key to being good in sales is convincing the costumer ur not in sales and helping the costumer.

Meaning a lot of non-sales people who help you with certain info (finding the right cellphone, car, insurance company,…) actually know very little on the topic, and aren’t trying to find you the best company.

They just are secretly sales people who know a lot about sales and how to trick you into thinking their best pick isn’t secretly the company they work for.

Image credits: tigerbend

#32 Real Estate

There’s a huge difference between brokers/agents in real estate. Don’t just use a friend or relative because you can. It could mean the difference of thousands of dollars and important information missed.

Image credits: throbbingliberal

#33 Post And Delivery

At FedEx ground, we can get away with purposely skipping a delivery.

I’ve held somebody’s packages for an extra 5 days because they swerved around me and cut me off in the neighborhood.

Edit: This is because the Ground branch of FedEx operates through contractors. We don’t technically work for FedEx, we work with FedEx.

Moral of the story (at least with me) if you order often and are nice to me, I’ll treat you and your property with love and respect because you earned it. But if you p**s me off and order deliveries often, you can expect half of them to be not on time. Or at the bottom of your front steps instead of up at the front door. This was just a one off for me though, I’m generally very nice to my customers.

Image credits: omegaljr1997

#34 Bakery

I’m a baker, not at my current job but my former, the boss was tight as hell, didnt buy in wholemeal flour, for wholemeal bread we used 100% white flour with gravy browning
Source: boredpanda.com