**This post is dedicated to my dear friend Katie with my heartfelt apologies for having been away for so long.**
And thus concludes my tenure at Gosh-shoe. After 1.5 months they kicked me to the curb. Fortunately for me, a certain company that I worked for last year at this time, that helped spawn adventures called my temp agency and requested me back - s there's that until the end of the year. maybe they'll pick me up, permanently.
More about them calling me back: they called me back in mid-august while i was still at Gosh-shoe, and wanted me immediately. I put them off because gosh-shoe was paying decent money and I frankly liked the job/location/people better (also, i had my own office) anyway, they accepted my terms and i start on tuesday. this should give me ample time to update adventures, assuming of course the job has not radically changed. also from what i remember from last year, things didn't get terribly busy until mid-november - so like i said, ample time for blog updating/news coverage. and there will be many things to discuss - from my theories about falling gas prices to my predictions for midterm elections.
Additionaly, Gosh-shoe has a permanent job opening up sometime soon that I am mostly qualified for and I think I could convince my former boss that I could figure out the rest. Unfortunately, the job has not been posted yet (though I unofficially applied for it already) and my boss and i had a series of run-ins at then end of my time at gosh-shoe. some incidents were my fault, some were not my fault and one was sortof my fault.
first, i arrive at work one wednesday morning to find an email from my boss. i open it - expecting some sort of request, for a meeting to be scheduled/something to be added to her calendar/someone to be called back. But no. the email is addressed to me and CCed to the woman i nominally work for. the email says that there are well over a thousand metro passes waiting to be processed and that with only a five day period in which to process them, i was very behind and was i sure that i had my priorities straight? a few things: 1) not the first thing i want to see in the morning 2) over 200 pass requests come in per day 3) she faild to account for the fact that it is 5 business days and a majority of passes had come in over the weekend 4) in ideal conditions, doing nothing else, one can process only 100 passes an hour
++interlude++
tasty has his paw on my fingers as i try to type, truly he abhors the wrtten word.
++end interlude++
5) i never worked in ideal conditions 6) the woman i nominally worked for (hereafter WINWF) offered to assist with some passes on monday, they languished on her desk until wednesday morning, not a one was done. 6) monday and tuesday i was completing tasks that were time-sensitive and thus has only a small amount of time to devout to the passes. ergo - my priorities were not fucked, i was in no way slacking and had been the victim of a co-worker not doing the work she sad that she was going to do. note also, that i was hired to help WINWF with the passes, but ultimately they were her responsibility. please note further that the email was directed soley at me and WINWF made no effort to clarify that she had been complicit in the passes un(not)doing. i would say this event qualifies as not my fault.
next, same day. bossman goes to a meeting that i have placed on her calendar (more on that later) she comes back at 9:30, i say to myself, hmm, i thought that meeting was going to last for longer than that, and think nothing more of it. several minutes later i get an email:
Jalynn,
I went to this meeting at 9:00...as it was on my calendar.
Thanks.
Bossman
(attached was the email's history including when she has asked me to add the event to her calendar)
this email perplexed me for quite awhile... why was my boss telling me that she had gone to the meeting. very good bossman, you went to a meeting. i don't get it. clearly, i was missing something. i scrolled through the email's history, i checked her calendar. then, it hit me. i had added the event to her calendar incorrectly - ok, my fault. but really
"Jalynn,
I went to this meeting at 9:00...as it was on my calendar.
Thanks.
Bossman"
was that really necessary? let alone professional. how about, hey, jalynn, you got this wrong, can you see that it doesn't happen again - instead, i got passive aggressive crap. not cool bossman, not cool.
why did she have me add events to her calendar when it would have taken less clicks to just add them herself? i hardly believe that she is so busy that she couldn't add an event to her calendar or, get this, open her own mail. yep, one of my duties was to remove her mail from any envelopes and place it in her mailbox, she just couldn't be bothered. she really is a fan of just piling more and more crap on people's heads, jalynn? in addition to answering two phone lines and department email, and processing metro pass orders, and processing motorist assists, voids, and appeals could you open my mail, add events to my calendar, maintain the department calendar, return phone calls for me, do this invoice (that you don't know how to do), schedule this meeting, rework this agreement, oh! send this fax and answer this additional phone line and could you work this weekend?
and for some reason i want to continue working there. for now i'm just looking forward to watching that place crash and burn without me. this is not me being arrogant. who will process those metro passes - when i left on friday there were in excess of 700 waiting to be filled - that will take at least 7 hours under ideal conditions, those conditions which cannot be met by melanie who now answers three phone lines, department email, works the counter and processes large amounts of other paperwork. who will open bossman's email? or return calls for her? or schedule her meetings? what will they do when the phone won't stop ringings and then line is out the door for the counter and it takes two weeks for students to get their passes? (sidenote: that pass only works for one semester, they have to do it all over again in the spring, that means filling orders for more than 15,000 passes. this will take under ideal conditions at least 150 hours, or almost four interrupted weeks, assuming that person does nothing else. melanie was right when she said that program needed its own staff of at least three.)
boy, it sure sounds like they could use another person in that office in addition to the person for permanent job that's being created- which has nothing to do with the aforementioned job functions and they could have had me, for $2 less than what i will begin making on tuesday and some benefits. was that too much to ask? i suspect they will ask for me back when december rolls around and they are faced with the staggering task of 15,000 pass requests waiting to be processed. until then, i'll get my updates from melanie and laugh a little bit inside.
speaking of laughing gosh-shoe students sure are funny, especially the law students. one student came in because she had ordered a permit online and had never received it. the computer said that we had mailed it out awhile ago. we suggested that she check with the post office to make sure that they didn't have it. she said that she had already paid for it and why couldn't we just give her another one, why did she have to go through another step. uh, because we mailed it and that's where our responsibility ends we said. we offered that we could issue another if she would just fill out a form so we could report it lost/stolen, she said that she had already filled out a form and didn't think that she needed to fill out another. we can't issue it until you do, we said. "i am a law student," she said, "i a not trying to rip you off, i couldn't pass the bar, if i was committing a crime." she said. just fill out a form, we said. "i don't want to admit to doing anything wrong," she said. "you're not," we said, "we're just saying that you don't have it and we don't have it!' she finally filled out the form, but not without a great deal of more yelling. law students.
then, i talked to a kid that was angry because he had received a ticket and he was assured that we were not ticketing and why had he received a ticket. "this is a warning ticket," i said, "see, there's no fine amount." "but i was assured that they would not be ticketing, will this be on my record?" he said. "yes" i said, "but it's only a warning ticket- it doesn't mean anything, it's just to let people know that they need to get a permit." "is there someone else that i can talk to?" he said, anguished. "no," i said, "no there's not."
enough belated bitching, stay tuned for adventures to continue our regularly scheduled progams back in cubeland on Tuesday
And thus concludes my tenure at Gosh-shoe. After 1.5 months they kicked me to the curb. Fortunately for me, a certain company that I worked for last year at this time, that helped spawn adventures called my temp agency and requested me back - s there's that until the end of the year. maybe they'll pick me up, permanently.
More about them calling me back: they called me back in mid-august while i was still at Gosh-shoe, and wanted me immediately. I put them off because gosh-shoe was paying decent money and I frankly liked the job/location/people better (also, i had my own office) anyway, they accepted my terms and i start on tuesday. this should give me ample time to update adventures, assuming of course the job has not radically changed. also from what i remember from last year, things didn't get terribly busy until mid-november - so like i said, ample time for blog updating/news coverage. and there will be many things to discuss - from my theories about falling gas prices to my predictions for midterm elections.
Additionaly, Gosh-shoe has a permanent job opening up sometime soon that I am mostly qualified for and I think I could convince my former boss that I could figure out the rest. Unfortunately, the job has not been posted yet (though I unofficially applied for it already) and my boss and i had a series of run-ins at then end of my time at gosh-shoe. some incidents were my fault, some were not my fault and one was sortof my fault.
first, i arrive at work one wednesday morning to find an email from my boss. i open it - expecting some sort of request, for a meeting to be scheduled/something to be added to her calendar/someone to be called back. But no. the email is addressed to me and CCed to the woman i nominally work for. the email says that there are well over a thousand metro passes waiting to be processed and that with only a five day period in which to process them, i was very behind and was i sure that i had my priorities straight? a few things: 1) not the first thing i want to see in the morning 2) over 200 pass requests come in per day 3) she faild to account for the fact that it is 5 business days and a majority of passes had come in over the weekend 4) in ideal conditions, doing nothing else, one can process only 100 passes an hour
++interlude++
tasty has his paw on my fingers as i try to type, truly he abhors the wrtten word.
++end interlude++
5) i never worked in ideal conditions 6) the woman i nominally worked for (hereafter WINWF) offered to assist with some passes on monday, they languished on her desk until wednesday morning, not a one was done. 6) monday and tuesday i was completing tasks that were time-sensitive and thus has only a small amount of time to devout to the passes. ergo - my priorities were not fucked, i was in no way slacking and had been the victim of a co-worker not doing the work she sad that she was going to do. note also, that i was hired to help WINWF with the passes, but ultimately they were her responsibility. please note further that the email was directed soley at me and WINWF made no effort to clarify that she had been complicit in the passes un(not)doing. i would say this event qualifies as not my fault.
next, same day. bossman goes to a meeting that i have placed on her calendar (more on that later) she comes back at 9:30, i say to myself, hmm, i thought that meeting was going to last for longer than that, and think nothing more of it. several minutes later i get an email:
Jalynn,
I went to this meeting at 9:00...as it was on my calendar.
Thanks.
Bossman
(attached was the email's history including when she has asked me to add the event to her calendar)
this email perplexed me for quite awhile... why was my boss telling me that she had gone to the meeting. very good bossman, you went to a meeting. i don't get it. clearly, i was missing something. i scrolled through the email's history, i checked her calendar. then, it hit me. i had added the event to her calendar incorrectly - ok, my fault. but really
"Jalynn,
I went to this meeting at 9:00...as it was on my calendar.
Thanks.
Bossman"
was that really necessary? let alone professional. how about, hey, jalynn, you got this wrong, can you see that it doesn't happen again - instead, i got passive aggressive crap. not cool bossman, not cool.
why did she have me add events to her calendar when it would have taken less clicks to just add them herself? i hardly believe that she is so busy that she couldn't add an event to her calendar or, get this, open her own mail. yep, one of my duties was to remove her mail from any envelopes and place it in her mailbox, she just couldn't be bothered. she really is a fan of just piling more and more crap on people's heads, jalynn? in addition to answering two phone lines and department email, and processing metro pass orders, and processing motorist assists, voids, and appeals could you open my mail, add events to my calendar, maintain the department calendar, return phone calls for me, do this invoice (that you don't know how to do), schedule this meeting, rework this agreement, oh! send this fax and answer this additional phone line and could you work this weekend?
and for some reason i want to continue working there. for now i'm just looking forward to watching that place crash and burn without me. this is not me being arrogant. who will process those metro passes - when i left on friday there were in excess of 700 waiting to be filled - that will take at least 7 hours under ideal conditions, those conditions which cannot be met by melanie who now answers three phone lines, department email, works the counter and processes large amounts of other paperwork. who will open bossman's email? or return calls for her? or schedule her meetings? what will they do when the phone won't stop ringings and then line is out the door for the counter and it takes two weeks for students to get their passes? (sidenote: that pass only works for one semester, they have to do it all over again in the spring, that means filling orders for more than 15,000 passes. this will take under ideal conditions at least 150 hours, or almost four interrupted weeks, assuming that person does nothing else. melanie was right when she said that program needed its own staff of at least three.)
boy, it sure sounds like they could use another person in that office in addition to the person for permanent job that's being created- which has nothing to do with the aforementioned job functions and they could have had me, for $2 less than what i will begin making on tuesday and some benefits. was that too much to ask? i suspect they will ask for me back when december rolls around and they are faced with the staggering task of 15,000 pass requests waiting to be processed. until then, i'll get my updates from melanie and laugh a little bit inside.
speaking of laughing gosh-shoe students sure are funny, especially the law students. one student came in because she had ordered a permit online and had never received it. the computer said that we had mailed it out awhile ago. we suggested that she check with the post office to make sure that they didn't have it. she said that she had already paid for it and why couldn't we just give her another one, why did she have to go through another step. uh, because we mailed it and that's where our responsibility ends we said. we offered that we could issue another if she would just fill out a form so we could report it lost/stolen, she said that she had already filled out a form and didn't think that she needed to fill out another. we can't issue it until you do, we said. "i am a law student," she said, "i a not trying to rip you off, i couldn't pass the bar, if i was committing a crime." she said. just fill out a form, we said. "i don't want to admit to doing anything wrong," she said. "you're not," we said, "we're just saying that you don't have it and we don't have it!' she finally filled out the form, but not without a great deal of more yelling. law students.
then, i talked to a kid that was angry because he had received a ticket and he was assured that we were not ticketing and why had he received a ticket. "this is a warning ticket," i said, "see, there's no fine amount." "but i was assured that they would not be ticketing, will this be on my record?" he said. "yes" i said, "but it's only a warning ticket- it doesn't mean anything, it's just to let people know that they need to get a permit." "is there someone else that i can talk to?" he said, anguished. "no," i said, "no there's not."
enough belated bitching, stay tuned for adventures to continue our regularly scheduled progams back in cubeland on Tuesday
posted by JaLynn at 4:19 PM
1 Comments:
joy to see you back!
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