Yeah, that means I am no longer working at former place of employment. I didn't tell many people when my last day was. In fact, it wasn't supposed to be last Sunday, it was supposed to be tomorrow, but somehow wires were crossed and I got cut off. This means that I shall have to buy my brother-in-law's present at full price! Scandalous. I'm not sure I even know how to read the price tag without automatically taking the discount off. Seven years of internal math will do that to you. That whole thing is typical of why I got so tired of the place at the end.
It was a fine place. Some very good people. But there were idiots too - both fellow employees and customers. My sister would have me believe that every workplace has these problems, these idiots working there. But I like to hold on to the dream that somewhere out there is a place where only sensible, clever, and fun people work. A place where team work is second nature. Where people aren't afraid to do something that's outside of their job description.
Well, I love where I work now. Ummm ... I don't know if it's the dream. But we'll see.
Meanwhile, I cleaned out some of the former place of employment memorabilia. For example, I have a small purse that I used for the last 7 years specifically for my old job. It started out that I needed a bag 5" x 7" or smaller to carry things to work: lunch money, necessities, etc. We weren't allowed to take anything larger than 5 x7 into the store. So I had a small purse, given to me by a friend in Japan, measuring almost exactly 5 x 7 that I used. I kept money, fingernail clippers and nail file, feminine hygiene products (when necessary), contact info, and business cards in it. I never cleaned it out, except when I got new business cards. I would replace the old ones with the updated ones with a new address, number, etc. I also kept the business cards of other employees. Like MaryAnn, when she got her Customer Service award, she got new business cards that said "Customer Service All-Star." I kept one. Or Pam Henderson, who gave me a card, with her personal number on the back, just in case I'd need to call her to cover a shift or something. I also have a post-it that has my very first official job offer for a management position. A post-it! Can you believe it? Would you like to know how much I started out making?
$20,808 base salary + $10,192 in commission = $31,000 average yearly salary
not including overtime and bonuses, and the maximum per month for the bonus was $1734. My sales per hour expectation was $35.
That's what the post-it said. In case you're interested, I did make bonuses, and I ended up making quite a bit more than the post-it said. At first, I forgot the post-it was in there. But then I found it and I kept it, to remind me of how far I had come. Plus it represented good times, a good job, a good boss. I did very well when I first started. Well, ever since. As it turns out, for the six years that I was a manager, I only missed my bonus 5 times. I bonused every other month that we were able to sell. There is a caveat though. For the whole first year that I was in Boston, I didn't bonus, because I didn't have last year figures to compare to and the plan was impossibly high. Maybe that was the beginning of the end.
Yeah, I think you could rightly call that the beginning of the end.
I really liked being instantly rewarded for having done a good job, whether with money or with recognition. Somewhere in the end, it just stopped happening for some reason. I guess I felt like I wasn't ever getting rewarded. It was not a good time, not a good job, not a good boss.
Ok, I'll say it. She wasn't a good boss. She thinks she was. Other people think she was - think she IS. She's able to fudge her way through it because she's pushy. And pushy works on most people. But it doesn't work on everybody. Her inability to recognize that is why she wasn't so great.
Well, she's been gone a while, so that's over. Aw heck - it's all over. It's a little sad.
But it's over.
