I Survived: The MSP That Made Me Cry at My Desk
Toxic culture is a red flag covered in our MSP Red Flags guide.
I'm writing this from my kitchen table at a new job — at a not-for-profit that does genuinely good work for the community. I can see the sun coming through the window. I don't feel sick. I don't feel the dread. I'm writing this because six months ago, I couldn't have imagined either of those things would feel like luxuries.
I was a network engineer at a small MSP in Brisbane. Twelve staff. The kind of place that had "family values" on the website and a boss who screamed at people in front of clients.
Let me be specific.
The Environment
Know your Fair Work Rights — bullying has legal consequences for employers.
Our director — let's call him "Dave" — had a temper that would make a drill sergeant blush. If a ticket ran late, he'd call you into the open-plan office and dress you down in front of everyone. If a client raised an issue, he'd forward it to the whole team with a comment like "Can someone please do their job for once?"
I was the only woman on the team. I want to be careful here because I don't want this to sound like I'm saying I couldn't handle the work. I could. I held Cisco CCNA, had done my CompTIA Network+, and had been in the industry for three years before I joined. I was good at my job. Dave just made me feel like I wasn't.
The culture was a weird cocktail of laddish bravado and genuine fear. The guys on the team — some of them were lovely — had learned to keep their heads down. They'd developed survival instincts. Don't volunteer for anything. Don't ask questions in team meetings. If Dave's office door was closed, don't knock unless the building was on fire.
The Hours
Sixty-hour weeks were "expected." That word — expected — doing a lot of heavy lifting. Nobody said you had to stay. You just knew that if you left at 5:30, Dave would make a comment the next morning about "some of us putting in the effort."
I was living in a rental in Ashgrove, driving 30 minutes each way to the office in the industrial part of South Brisbane. I'd leave at 6:45am and get home at 7:30pm on a good night. On a bad night, 9pm. Weekends? If a client's email server went down, you answered the call. No exceptions.
I started drinking a bottle of wine a night. Not because I wanted to. Because I couldn't sleep otherwise. My brain would loop — the things Dave said, the way I'd frozen when he yelled at me during a client visit in front of the client's entire board, the constant low-grade terror of being "found out" as not good enough.
The Breaking Point
It was a Tuesday afternoon. I was running a network upgrade for a new client — a medical practice in Indooroopilly. Dave called while I was on-site. He wanted to know why a ticket from three hours ago hadn't been updated. I said I was on-site and couldn't check. He told me to "stop making excuses" and hung up.
I finished the job, drove back to the office, sat at my desk, and my hands started shaking. Then my chest tightened. Then I couldn't breathe. I thought I was having a heart attack. A colleague called an ambulance. At the hospital, the doctor said it was a panic attack. He asked about my work. I told him. He put me on stress leave immediately.
I called Dave from the hospital. He said, "Take the time you need," in a voice so flat I could tell he was already calculating how to bill my absence to the client.
I never went back.
What I Have Now
I work at a not-for-profit. My team is six people. Our manager checks in on us weekly. If I'm struggling, I can say so without fear of being screamed at. I finish at 5pm. I don't check emails on weekends. My wine intake is back to "social glass with dinner." I sleep.
The pay is less. About $15K less. I don't care.
What I'd Tell Others
If you're crying at your desk, that's not "toughening up." That's your body telling you this is wrong. Listen to it. I ignored mine for a year and it nearly broke me.
Mental health leave exists for a reason. If you need it, take it. Don't let anyone make you feel guilty. Your employer wouldn't hesitate to fire you if it suited the numbers.
Small MSPs can be the worst offenders. There's often no HR department, no anonymous hotline, no process. It's just one person with too much power and too little accountability.
You're not weak for leaving. I thought I was. For months. Leaving wasn't weakness. Staying was self-harm.
What I Learned
- Trust your body. A panic attack isn't weakness. It's a physiological response to prolonged stress. Your nervous system is telling you the truth your brain is trying to rationalise away.
- "Family culture" without boundaries is just abuse with a friendly name. Real families have rules about how you treat each other.
- Get it in writing. If your boss promises flexible hours or a review in three months, email them to confirm. Documentation protects you. Memories don't.
- Fair Work takes toxic workplaces seriously. If you're being bullied, document it and contact Fair Work. You have rights under the Fair Work Act, and workplace bullying orders are a real thing.
- Your career is long. One bad MSP doesn't define you. The skills you have are transferable. There are employers who will treat you like a human being. They exist. Go find them.
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