I work in retail, and my manager gave me a task on Wednesday to put images on a word document and format it. He sent me over 150 photos from a furniture expo he went to. I was the only person on the shop floor that day as my other colleague was doing a stock count so I had to assist customers, answer phone enquiries and put through all the sales for the day.
For this task, he gave me zero context, and did not specify a deadline so it seemed as though this was non urgent, as we get many leisurely tasks like this which can be completed over days. So like any other I thought I could complete this during the week when I had time. I managed to save all of the photos and start on a page. At the end of the day I told him I was going to be off tomorrow and he said okay that’s fine.
Yesterday when I was off I got a text yesterday from him at 11am asking where the images were saved which I then told him. I come into work this morning and he’s not in but his assistant gives me a telling off in front of my colleagues for the task being incomplete and told me that it was very important and due this morning for the retail head, and that he made my colleagues stay behind to finish the board yesterday evening.
This was really embarrassing but I feel like it would’ve been completely different if he had given context and a deadline for this, but I got nothing, why do they do this?