Tag Archives: Work

New job day 1

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Holy shit, it’s 8.30am and there’s no one here. Why isn’t there anyone here? Did I get the time wrong?

Dammit. Just caught the elevator down and ran into the new boss. Explaining I was going downstairs made me feel a bit dumb, but at least we bonded over his camping story from the weekend.

It’s 10.30am and my stomach is rumbling. How embarrassing.

Ok just requested a break for 10mins, I’ve crammed in morning tea and a loo break. Hope that takes care of it.

Goddammit. 11.30am and struggling to keep my eyes open. I’m sure it’s noticeable and thankfully we have just broken for lunch. Energy drink required STAT.

Where the hell did that lunch break go?? Just sculled a can of red bull so I should be right for the afternoon. Can’t believe I have brought myself to the point where I need energy drinks. Early night tonight.

Waiting for the boss to return, he asked for 15 more mins. Just realized I don’t freeze with the aircon in this office and it doesn’t blow directly on me. Win.

End of the day. It’s been excellent so far. For my plans for the rest of the week including my surgery so I’m set. Everyone seems to be pretty cool, but I have already picked out who the pedantic nerdy developer is. He reminded me we had met a year ago. Oops.

Let’s see what the rest of the week has in store.

It’s not my problem anymore

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I’m on the final count down until I leave my current place of employment, as I just recently quit my job (YIPPEE). I have a new job to go to, so while it’s super exciting it’s still not one of those “I’ve won the lotto and am off to travel the world” type of moments. I wish!

It’s so strange to know that I’m leaving.

It’s also exhilarating.

For so many years I have stressed about particular aspects of my job. I have pioneered various projects that have hit stumbling blocks, and to this day still haven’t been completed to the level I would have liked them to be at, and not through any fault of my own. My forehead is theoretically bruised from bashing it against the wall so often. There are so many frustrations I have about my current job, and while there were also a lot of perks about the position, I am seriously beginning to love the fact that I can just drop all of this stuff and run away.

It’s not my problem anymore.

I love that.

52 in 52: Quit my job (and why I did it)

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I quit!

When I first wrote my list of 52 things in 52 weeks back on the first day of January, writing “Quit my Job” was pretty ambitious. I didn’t know if I would be leaving in order to join the police service (as I’ve been wishing to do for many years), or if I was going to find something else altogether.

There were several reasons I wanted to quit my job:

  • To join the police force (life time dream)
  • I needed a new challenge
  • More money

Back in 2001 when I finished high school, I decided I was going to take a gap year before going to uni to complete a Bachelor of Science. However, it didn’t quite pan out that way. Within 3 months I was bored. I was working at a cafe for 6 hours a day earning a small wage generally used to socialise and fuel my car. I wanted a change. I saw an offer for a traineeship in Business Administration, applied, and got it. 9 years later I’m with the same company. We’ve gone through some name changes, a lot of personnel changes, and my role has changed substantially from when I first began. I changed from being a gangly teenager into a geek, picking up a lot of skills along the way.

But now it’s time to stretch my wings.

Last year I had interviewed for a company and didn’t get the job, but they had assured me they were greatly impressed by me. At the time I figured it was just a nice let down and didn’t think too much about it. Until last week.

I was head hunted. They rang me, told me about the new position and asked me to come in ASAP. All up, it took two phone calls and an interview, and now I have a new job, a nice new title, a new challenge, and a great big pay rise coming my way. The new job offer justified quitting my job; it met 2/3 reasons. I was never going to say no.

It was incredibly difficult resigning. Not so much in telling my bosses, that part was awesome. I dreaded telling my colleagues. The last time I quit I was 19 working at a cafe, and that pretty much entailed saying “see you around guys”.  At my current job, there’s a close knit group of 4 of us that have been together since when I first began. We have been through so much together, which I can’t go into out of privacy for my workplace and my desire to keep that part of my life separate from my blog. It truly wouldn’t be an overstatement to say that it felt like I was telling my family I was leaving them. That’s exactly what they’ve been to me – a family.

My last day is on the 28th, and I wouldn’t be surprised if I shed a tear. I’m leaving the nest, and going beyond my comfort zone.

New relationship, new house, new job. 2011 has been a bloody big year.

The situation stinks

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It’s not the situation. It’s your reaction to the situation.

- Robert Conklin

Sorry Robert, but sometimes the situation freaking stinks.

I don’t often whinge about work on my blog, purely because I don’t like to discuss work matters on my own personal site. But sometimes you’ve just gotta write for yourself and let your emotions out.

There is one particular person in my company who I just don’t gel with. Never have, never will. It has gotten to the point where I purposely restrict my interactions with that person purely for my own mental health. I think I would have shot myself (or them) if I had to work with them closely on a day-to-day basis. I know the ex-workmates I have that read my blog will know immediately who I’m referring to, no surprises there.

The most basic of queries quickly turn into a gigantic debate, that is, if I get a response at all. On occasion I will even get an insult in response, without ever answering my question. Nice.

Just recently I asked for a particular reference number for something they had pointed out to me, and after 2 days and countless follow ups they are refusing to reply. Yet I know that same person snoops on me and keeps a close eye on my work, despite not even working in the same department that I do.

Rude much?

So yes, it might not be the situation, and it might be my reaction of getting completely frustrated and wanting to stab something, but after having bazillion millions of these same situations happen, you really can’t blame me for getting annoyed.

Thanks, needed to get that out.

The day feels so much longer when you work 9 – 5

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My job entails taking calls from clients all over Australia, with the majority being in the southern states on the east side of the country. These are also the states that observe daylight savings, whereas my home state of Queensland doesn’t.

Apparently it has something to do with confusing cows. Whatever.

To make sure that our customers don’t lose out on access to my services I also shift my working hours from 9 -5.30 to 8 – 4.30, then when daylight savings ends I go back to the 9 – 5.30pm shift. Unfortunately for clients on the western side it means that during daylight savings they lose an hour, but that’s catch 22 for them when they’re not the dominant group of our clients.

I’m an early person, so I’m usually up by 5.30am on any given day doing some sort of activity, usually running or kayaking. Working 8 – 4.30 suited me perfectly, since it meant I could come home, have breakfast and be straight on the go to work. The day would fly past quickly, and before I knew it I was back home chilling out. Well, that’s not really true. I would probably start watching a uni lecture or prepare to go out to the latest extracurricular activity I had signed up for.

I’ve only been working 9 – 5.30 for a day, but I can already feel how much my routine is out of whack. This morning I got home at 7am after going kayaking for an hour with my dad. Had I been working at 8am I would have jumped straight into the shower, had some breakfast and been out of here. Instead, I jumped straight into the shower, had some breakfast, then twiddled my thumbs. I’ve got roughly an extra 45mins in the morning and I don’t know what I’m meant to do!

I can’t start uni because I will just get into tje flow of learning when it’s time to leave. I’ve used the time today to write a blog post, so perhaps I’ll dedicate this time to blogging. I know I’m behind in posting my photos again, so for the next few days that will keep me occupied. Or perhaps I should use the time to read some more. I guess I just preferred to have the extra time at the end of the day because it meant that I had gotten everything out of the way and I could dive headfirst into something.

Maybe I should just learn to become a night person and enjoy the time to have a sleep in.

Nah.