I was reading this whole thread flabbergasted and wondering "where the hell are people working that this happened" when it hit me:

I did work in a place where a manager was invoicing monthly "external design work" to the company to the tune of 5x his own salary, because the company's designer was "overwhelmed".

In the end he was just paying the hired designer a little extra to drag her feet and paying a Fiverr freelancer to do some cheap mockups with Figma. And obviously cashin' in the rest.

I only found out about several months after I left. It was interesting for me to have all this revealed because this guy was actively working to undermine all other engineering teams, with gossip and by blocking work. I didn't interact much with him or at all, but he was part of why I left.

The fun part: he was only fired a few months after the BOARD ITSELF fired the CTO, CPO and CEO all in the same day.

The company was 90 employees when I joined, 900 when I left, zero in 2024, and now was sold for scrap to a micro-sized competitor.

I wish I was a writer because the stories I have of that place would be an amazing book.