If you are ‘smart’ enough to copy an entire project, you shouldn’t try to make the person who created it help you make it work! They’ll likely find out you copied them!

I thought this was an unspoken rule of copying, but time and again, it turns out I’m wrong, and it seems you can’t assume people will behave coherently. All in all, this example is rather righteous, and the bad guy of the story only made matters worse for themselves. So to each their own!

Apparently, divine justice exists, and bad guys who took our credit will eventually fall without our help. Of course, this doesn’t happen every time, but we surely should enjoy it every time it does.

I don’t think this employee should assume any informal responsibility and help his former colleague be further celebrated for a project he created. The thing is, it is not in anyone’s best interest to seem bitter and uncooperative, so the thief’s empire should fall without their involvement.

The only way to remain dignified, in my opinion, is to subtly mention that he created the project, without making a big deal of it, because it reflects badly on him, and to be willing to cooperate with a positive attitude.

The hardest part would be to remain calm and agreeable while your ego is fragile and you feel a little envious, because, let’s face it, I think he feels a little envious, and that’s the root cause of all this drama.

Do you think he would’ve gotten the promotion if managers knew the project was his? I’m not really sure…