- Gen Z employee refused to attend virtual meeting physically at 6:30 am as demanded
- Manager threatened disciplinary action including suspension for non-compliance
- Employee responded saying they will attend virtually, calling threats "PowerPoint abuse"
A Gen Z employee's response to an official instruction, asking to be in the office at 6:30 am for a virtual meeting, has gone viral. Sharing a post on X (formerly Twitter), a user (@niilexis) labelled the Gen Z generations as "not the heroes we deserved, but the heroes we needed".
The post contains a screenshot, which allegedly shows either a manager or someone with authority asking an employee to be "physically seated" in the office half an hour before the 7:00 am virtual meeting, and failure to do so will be treated as "insubordination".
"Please be advised that continued non-compliance may result in disciplinary action, including suspension, as per company policy," the message continued with threathing tone.
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But the response, which started with the word "noted", has won hearts and resonated with many on social media.
"Noted. For clarity, I won't be physically appearing for a virtual meeting. I will be attending virtually, as the meeting format suggests. Threatening suspension over location rather than attendance feels less like policy and more like PowerPoint abuse," the employee wrote.
I'm online."
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Social Media Reaction
The post reached more than seven million users, and thousands have commented on it. The incident highlights the growing tension between employers pushing for in-office work and Gen Z employees prioritising work-life balance.
"If you try to play semantics when your employer tells you to be at a meeting physically, you're about to learn a very valuable lesson in power dynamics," one user wrote in the comment section.
"You want him in the office by 6:30 for a virtual meeting. If the employer really needed him there, why didn't they just make it an in-person meeting?" another user wrote.
"This reminds me of a past manager who told me and my coworkers that although we started work at 8 and worked remote, we should still come into the meeting 15 minutes early, just as we would if we had to travel through traffic," a third user wrote, sharing a personal experience.
