When I first came to the USA I obviously did not have an EAD (employment authorization document) which would make it legal for me to work. I started to work at this place as a non-paid intern. 6 months later I got my EAD and I found out that the owner literally logged my hours without my knowledge and paid me a bonus for the last 6 months. He was an Egyptian immigrant and he said he knew how difficult it was. I owe a lot to that guy.

I worked security a while back for a private mom and pop type company. The boss, D, was a God amongst men. First off he had a glorious ass. Second was he was just exceptionally down to earth and kind. During my interview I had just come off a night shift and accidentally swore. I immediately realized and apologized. He just said “Oh I don’t fuckin care” with a smirk. I worked for him for a while before getting posted to a mall. He would pick me up occasionally or drop me off if he knew the busses were bad. Not because my being late would mess the schedule. Just because he could and wanted to.

With all the trauma I was still processing and with severe ADHD, my brain ran wild and imagined way too much. This is really bad when your job is just to stand at an entrance all day. After a couple of days where I just started crying randomly, I went to the security office of the mall that we were contracted to and said I had to dip. Boss called me on the way home asking why and if I was okay. I explained. He said to take as much time off as I needed, zero questions asked.

After a week he called me back asking if I was okay to come back. I said I wanted to take another week. He said sure. He paid me a minimum amount of hours I didn’t ask for in that week and when I brought it up he said that he didn’t know what I was talking about and then said the word wink. After that second week he called back and I was not okay. I was rapidly falling apart. I said I appreciated the opportunity he gave me but I’d have to quit so I didn’t waste his time and I’d bring the uniform in in a couple days. He said he didn’t allow me to quit and hung up. Couple days later I got papers in the mail saying I had been laid off instead so I was able to collect EI benefits and get extra med and health coverage.

Nicest boss I’ve ever had and I don’t know if anyone could come close.

I put my degree on hold because I just couldn’t summon the motivation at the time to finish. 2 subjects shy of graduating.

FF 8 years later and my then current boss asks about it, I said I’d never finished it because reasons. He offers to help pay for any subjects I need to take to complete. It turns out if I’d left it on hold for any longer I would have forfeited the whole thing.

He not only paid the money for me to finish those last two subjects; once I graduated he bumped my pay substantially because now he had a university-educated staff member on the books.

I was sad because my friend was dying in the hospital. My manager noticed my demeanour and asked what’s wrong. She asked me if I needed to be there, but I said there’s nothing to be done.

Later that day I got a phone call from another friend saying it was the end. I put on my jacket and went to my manager’s office. I didn’t want to, but I started crying. She hugged me, got her jacket, and drove me to the hospital herself. (I didn’t have a car then, I’d planned to take the bus.)

My friend died, and that was the saddest time ever in my life. But I’ll always remember and appreciate the kindness my manager showed me.

I worked at a gas station for a while, at the time I was deeply depressed and suicidal. My boss had to deal with me vanishing from being hospitalized over a suicide attempt and he didn’t fire me, or reprimand me, he got me a get well soon card, and told me to let him know when I was up to come back.

I eventually left and ended up on disability, but even when I quit he was understanding, wished me the best, and told me if I was ever looking for work again to apply there.

Good fucking guy, really did his best to make our lives easier, and make sure we were doing ok.

Someone once came into my department’s office and started chewing me out for not getting a task done on time. My boss literally stepped in between me and the other person and told them, “we’ll do our due diligence and get back to you,” and then insisted they leave the office.

He and I then checked, and I had completed the task both correctly and on time. Someone else in a different department dropped the ball.

My boss then went to the office of the person who had yelled at me and gave them what-for.

When I worked for NCL America on the Pride of America we were getting ready to make way out of the dry dock in Bremerhaven and taking on all sorts of company big wigs. Me and another guy were on the bullshit task of sweeping the entire cargo hallway or whatever it’s called (big hallway that went from the fire to aft of the ship to make moving goods brought on board easier) and a bunch of dudes in business suits come onboard. One of them starts talking to us while they were all waiting for the porters and grabs a broom to help for a while.

The porters come and take everyone to their cabins, dude helping us sweep apologizes and takes off with the others. Immediately after he leaves the area, our direct supervisor runs over yelling at us. “What’s your problem? Why are you making the CEO do your jobs?!” To which we had to explain he just started doing it himself, but also we were kinda shocked that guy was the CEO of the entire company.

My direct supervisor was kind of an ass. But the captain of the ship was cool and so was the CEO.

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My current manager is the best boss I’ve ever had so far. He doesn’t micromanage and he lets his team be as long as we do our jobs. He also approves almost anything we want to do as long as it’s reasonable. Lastly, he fully supported me to be relocated (which is hard to get approved and very expensive), which basically changed my life.

I’ve had several great bosses through the years. Ones who considered teaching me and developing my skills/career to be part of their primary job duties instead of feeling threatened. I learned a ton from them.

My current boss is also amazing. I’m a nurse at a hospital that just unionized, and she really puts her job on the line to make sure we have what we need to keep the patients on our unit safe. She’s a lot of the reason I didn’t quit a long time ago.

I’m a really shy person and tend to keep to myself but my boss at a startup I worked at once was an extremely friendly guy and got me to come out of my shell. He and his family are still my good friends now, a decade later. They’re my role models for what the family I would create should be. Once or twice a year, I take a week off and stay at their house. (It doesn’t hurt that they live near the beach in Florida now.)

I still introduce him as the guy who fired me :)

I got ‘hired’ on at my current job as a non-employee temp worker with no health insurance or sick days, as it was the only kind of role I could get remotely related to my field since I was a fresh immigrant here in the US. My boss fought tooth and nail for me to get hired full-time with a 30% raise and our amazing health benefits. Now just 6 months later, she’s petitioning her boss to give me a promotion when I feel like I just got here, and would have happily spent the next year or two learning before trying to move around. I owe a lot to her for giving me a chance when nowhere else would.

A previous employer. I had left so I heard about it later. A new boss had taken over, after the owner sold up. He was originally head of finance, so a beancounter through and through, or so I thought.

The warehouse manager (relatively young) was diagnosed with cancer. Obviously a big deal. He gave a heads up that he would need to take some time off for treatment etc, but would try and minimise it. He was (effectively) told ‘fuck that’. Instead he was only to come in when he wanted too. If he kept working, that’s fine, if they didn’t see him for 2 years, that’s also fine. No pay cut or worrying about his job.

He came in intermittently, as his health allowed. The warehouse mostly ran itself, since he’d done his job well. He had far less stress, and could focus on fighting, and his family. Unfortunately, cancer still won. The boss, (among other things) organised paying his widow over 6 months of his (the manager’s) salary. He couldn’t do much to help with the pain of loss, but he could make sure that financial stress wasn’t added to it.

It turns out bean counters can have a lot more heart than we give them credit for.

When I had to care for a friend with terminal cancer my boss basically told me to go away and come back when I was ready. Same boss came in one day when I was having a health panic and offered right then to pay for a private doctor. These are just two instances but he is a great boss.

My step uncle is one of the most thoughtful and considerate bosses I have ever experienced. It was just him, myself and his best friend Artur doing construction for years after hurricane Sandy. The pay wasn’t amazing for any of us but it was how he treated us and the other couple people that would rotate in that really stayed with me.

It’s the only place I’ve ever been encouraged to take the breaks needed when doing grueling, back breaking labor in the blistering heat and freezing cold. I was also encouraged and told to take the time actually needed to complete a task as long as it was done correctly. I honestly only saw us mess up a bare handful of times in the five years I worked for him.

He bought us lunch every day. Normally at some cool local joint he knew in the area we were working in. And lunch was almost always closer to two hours than one. We pretty much would finish lunch then have poop time because we were all on the same schedule.

My work day “started” at 8am. But that just was when I got to his house and he’d be there reading the paper eating breakfast. I was offered anything at the table, always given coffee when I asked. About thirty minutes after I showed up, I’d be asked to go grab Artur from his little studio apartment out back.

I wasn’t treated this way because I was family. Anyone that worked with us was treated the same way. Like a human being.

Don’t get me wrong. We absolutely busted our asses and did high quality work. And if we had to pour a foundation or something time sensitive, that shit always got done in the time needed.

This is how bosses are supposed to be. Leading from the front lines. Leading by example.