STEM PhD graduate fired via email just two months in for asking to be paid on time after repeated salary delays, and refusing to be blamed for everything: ‘He was the boss, HR, everything, I couldn't do much’

A new PhD graduate in STEM finally lands a job after months of interviews that kept falling through, but the relief doesn't last long. The workplace turns out to be one of those setups where the boss is the entire chain of command and runs things by mood instead of logic. Even basic requests like a proper chair or getting paid on time cause tension. Whenever something goes wrong, blame seems to land in the same place every time.

Two months in, the tension breaks. The employee asks about the delayed salary again, and that small request turns into a firing over email. The next day, the boss explodes, shouting and picking apart every possible thing, from attitude to tone to not using tools "the right way." It doesn't sound like an evaluation, it sounds like someone justifying bad behavior. With no HR or structure to turn to, the ending was probably inevitable.

Now the job sits as a two-month line on a resume that already shows years of academic work and applications that nearly worked out.

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The shock of how quickly it unraveled still lingers, and getting up each morning to look for new jobs feels heavier after years of study and effort. The story sounds like someone who did everything they were supposed to but ended up in a place that made burnout feel like failure. It’s probably not a question of ability, just terrible luck mixed with a boss who never should have had that kind of power.
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$Frigidspinner it sounds like you were working for a small business that was struggling, maybe I am wrong \- Manager criticises everything, probably because he is under a lot of pressure for company failures \- Nothing is available to you as an employee- you are struggling to even get paid \- You were let go probably because there was no money, not because you are a bad worker I would also speculate that your PhD attracted the manager- as a kind of moonshot to get the business back on track - he$

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