When IT Demands a Ticket for Every Folder: A Hilariously Petty Tale of Malicious Compliance
Picture this: You’re elbows-deep in the innards of a power-electronics unit that’s seen more action than most of us see in a lifetime. You need access to some dusty old schematics, buried deep on the company’s servers. But to get past the digital gatekeepers, you must embark on a quest—a quest through the labyrinthine bureaucracy of a global IT helpdesk.
Sounds like the start of an IT horror story, right? Well, for one intrepid power-electronics tech (Redditor u/Colonel_Khazlik), it turned into a saga of deliciously petty—and oh-so-satisfying—malicious compliance.
The Ancient Relics and the IT Gatekeepers
Let’s set the scene. Our hero is a seasoned fixer of broken electronics—anything from barely-used warranty returns to grizzled, decades-old devices that wouldn’t look out of place in a museum (or maybe a Flintstones episode). When one such relic landed on his bench, he needed access to legacy data: circuit diagrams, test procedures, and other ancient wisdom, all carefully hoarded in the company’s digital archives.
Of course, access to these mystical folders was locked down tighter than Fort Knox—because, you know, those pencil-drawn schematics might be the crown jewels of the corporate world. So, like any beleaguered employee, our protagonist puts in an IT request.
A week ticks by. (Because what’s corporate life without a little waiting?) IT, after consulting the “Global Head of IT”—let’s picture a wizardly figure in a high-backed chair—grants him access… to a single directory. Not the one he needs, mind you, and certainly not the treasure trove of subfolders beneath it. Just the root.
It’s like being handed the keys to a locked house and being told, “You can look at the doormat.”
A Comedy of Tickets
Our hero, undeterred, politely asks for access to the actual folders he needs—the whole caboodle, please and thank you. But IT, citing “policy and data-protection initiatives,” tells him he must submit a separate ticket for every. single. sub-directory.
If you’re picturing hundreds of folders, you’re not wrong.
And so, in a dazzling display of malicious compliance, he does exactly what he’s told. The tickets start flying, as fast as the clunky IT web client allows. Copy, paste, tweak the folder name, submit. Repeat. Outlook is closed—partly to avoid the avalanche of ticket notifications, partly for the comedic effect of being unreachable.
IT’s ticket system, designed for efficiency and order, is suddenly ablaze with a blizzard of requests. Each ticket pings their metrics, their KPIs, their very sense of order. Chaos reigns.
It doesn’t take long. IT, now in full panic mode, calls his manager and begs for mercy. The message: “Please, for the love of bandwidth, make him stop!” Turns out, the original IT rep was misinformed. Only a single ticket was needed all along.
The Real Lessons of Malicious Compliance
On the surface, it’s a classic tale of employee vs. bureaucracy—a David-and-Goliath with email tickets instead of slingshots. But let’s dig a little deeper:
- Malicious compliance is the art of following the rules so literally that the rules fall apart. It’s a form of silent protest that exposes the absurdity of red tape.
- Communication matters. If the IT rep had clarified the policy—or used a little common sense—this entire episode could have been avoided. Instead, the system became the punchline.
- Metrics aren’t everything. When your KPIs can be nuked by one person following the letter of the law, maybe it’s time to rethink the process.
Most importantly, it’s a reminder that sometimes, the best way to highlight a broken system is to show exactly what happens when everyone does “exactly as they’re told.”
Have You Been There?
Have you ever found yourself caught in a web of corporate rules so tangled that the only way out was to follow them to the letter? Did it end in chaos or catharsis? Share your own tales of malicious compliance in the comments below—or tag a friend who’s lived through their own IT nightmare.
And next time someone tells you to “just submit a ticket,” remember: Sometimes, the ticket IS the message.
What’s your favorite story of corporate absurdity? Drop it below and let’s commiserate—one ticket at a time!
Original Reddit Post: IT wanted a ticket per sub-directory