Meghan Markle has faced boundless bad press of late for all the reports about her fostering a toxic work environment, but to be fair to her, it sounds like being a horrible boss is a family-wide epidemic. Is Meghan unpleasant to work for? Maybe, but it turns out so are her father-in-law and her brother-in-law, King Charles and Prince William.
New book Yes Ma’am: The Secret Life of Royal Servants aims to lift the lid on what it’s really like to work for the Royal Family and, in news that honestly hardly comes as a surprise, it turns out that it’s not all that fun. For starters, it seems the current and future holders of the crown are two peas in a pod — because they’re both being portrayed as demanding and exacting employers who have a tendency to fly off the handle when they don’t get everything exactly to their liking.
Ex-Royal staffers reveal Charles and William’s tantrums over shoes, ties, and bathwater
As per extracts from Tom Quinn’s book shared in The Times, King Charles and Prince William have one major thing in common: they are both known to throw “tantrums” if their staff don’t do everything for them quite the right way.
One former staff member Quinn spoke to revealed that both father and son are “prone to tantrums if things are not done to their liking.” The ex-staffer continued, “They both get irritated very quickly. They are very picky. It comes naturally to them.”
So what sort of things are the royal duo so picky about? Well, as per this former palace employee, Charles and William’s suits “must be pressed and laid out after a period of consultation the night before,” while their “shoes must be polished, ties chosen.” Not to mention that their “baths must be run at precisely the same time each day.” We take that to mean the king and the prince both have their own bath times, not that they sync them up so they can bathe together. That would be taking the Royal Family eccentricity just a tad too far.
In Charles and William’s defense, the book makes plain that they aren’t the worst Royal to work for, and nobody will be shocked to find out who that is. Yes, it’s Prince “I Sleep with 50 Stuffed Animals” Andrew. The disgraced younger brother of the king is claimed to have fired someone because he “disliked a mole on the man’s face,” and had someone removed from his service for “wearing a nylon tie.” Even the generally benign Prince Edward supposedly “tore a strip off his driver for looking too often in his rear-view mirror.”
The world got a small hint at how King Charles treats his staff in a viral moment from back in 2022 when he made an angry gesture for someone to remove his pen at an important ceremony. On the other hand, William has a reputation for being a much more personable sort so it may be disappointing for his fans to hear he’s a chip off the old block in this way. Bottom line: if you’re considering a career in royal employment, you might want to reconsider.
Published: Feb 7, 2025 09:28 am