satisfaction - Cerebral Insights

moving on…yet again

I guess I hit rock bottom when I took the cliff dive. A month ago I was so eager to make the jump that I must have jumped without really looking or thinking, that is. Not that I have any regrets for jumping – I relish the adrenaline rush of the thrilling escapade yet I will be a hypocrite if I feign success over what I did.

Nope. I was not successful. I fell, dear reader. I did. And the bruises hurt.

I love the job I have right now. There is nothing compared to the joy of figuring out the words being dictated – medical words that are really hard to understand coming from a non-native English speaker. The joy that rushes through my veins whenever I understand that the doctor was saying Coreg when all I can hear was courage is uncomparable.

Yet for all my praises for this job, equally are my disgrunts on how the company works. I know there are no perfect companies out there but this company exceeds the limit. For one there is the constant dispute over our very minimal salary. I learned today that PGS stands for President Gloria Macapagal-Arroyo Scholars. We are called PGS trainees at work. I learned that PGS were given something like 10k, half of which goes to the company and half to the trainee or training costs I figure. This would include our allowance. What I do not understand then is how come, with such a fair amount of budget, are we entitled to get only a hefty 50php allowance per day? And to think we are already learning account specifics. Shouldn’t it be that when one trangresses to learning about account specifics they earn higher, possibly not a trainee’s allowance but an employee’s wage? Sad to say that it not my case.

And yesterday, when my mom learned that we were the ones who would still have to laminate our IDs and pay for our ID cords, she was astounded – urging me not to report to work any longer and to quit from the training. She goes further to state that by what she observes of my current health status, the allowance won’t even cover for my medical bills.

Furthermore, she states that I do not need to really work – a daughter’s dream, I must say. How many kids now a days can hear their parents tell them that they must not work yet? That the parents would still be willing to shoulder their kids’ expenses? In reality, my mom just wanted me to stop tiring myself out in a work that promises no higher compensation for the amount of work I put in.

She further urged that I could always do freelancing especially now that I can see the potential I have in that field. Working at home does seem like a very appealing idea especially when your alarm rings at 5 am on a very rainy morning.

Yet I procastinate. I must give my intent to leave now – if they will let me go, I really do not think so – not after the performance I’ve set in in the past weeks (Trainee of the Week for 2 weeks.. hmm..). But I want to leave. I do want to rest for a while. Not be employed but rather stay at home doing odd jobs or freelance jobs. Not answering to any boss. Working at my own convenient time. Of course there are downsides to it but that is yet to be explored. 😀

I may get in trouble for this. I hope not though. In the end, I realized that although mental satisfaction can be provided by a job, compensation or salary is still an important consideration for work satisfaction. And if one or the other is not met, work quality suffers in the end.

can’t help but write

Ganito pala talaga siguro pag writer ka. Or feeling writer. Hindi mo mapigil and iyong sarili magsulat. Parang bawat ideya na dumampi sa iyong utak kailangan mong masulat. Di kaya baka tuluyan na nitong lisanin ang iyong isipan.

In any case I am now writing using the basic and primitive resources for any writer – a pen and paper. Sad to say I am at no liberty ot use my preferred means – the computer. I am now at work and eventhough I have access to the PC, there is no means for me to publish what I write using it. So I have to contend with this.

And speaking of computers, my mother’s observation was right when she noticed that 90% of my waking moments are spent in front of the computer. My work requires me to be in front of the computer all the time and when I get home, I still choose to be in front of the computer writing my blogs!

Yet nothing gives me more joy than to write; to see people reading what I’ve written and reacting to it – either in agreement or disagreement.

When I told a co-worker that I’d be resigning because I find my job boring, repetitive and non-challenging, he said, that all jobs in due time become as such.

I beg to disagree. I believe writing as a job will never be boring nor repetitive nor non-challenging. Not unless you write obituaries for a newspaper. But then I believe that there are jobs out there which are not boring or repetitive or non-challenging no matter how many times or eras you do them.

Do you think the hosts of NatGeo documentaries or Discovery Channel Travel shows ever become bored with their jobs? Do you think journalists or international correspondents ever become unchallenged by what they do or find their tasks repetitive?

Point is: There are jobs out there which will constantly challenge you, push you to the edge and require you to constantly change and improve yourself for the better.

And its those jobs that I long to do. I long to have. Some may think I’m crazy. I already have a job that in all respects is easy and does not require too much of me. I go to work, take calls, go home and that’s it. What more could I ask for?

But then I do long for more. I am not made or cut-out for jobs such as this. There are people who appreciate the "static-ness" of it all but I’m not one of them.

I know God made all of use unique and gave each one of us a niche in this world. To go against that plan or to reside in a niche not for you will eventually end up in disappointment, dissatisfaction and disillusionment.

I yearn to find my niche and live life to its fullest!

Post script: Ang hirap pala i-type ang naisulat na. Di na ako sanay. At parang iba din ang writing style. O imagination ko lang un?

Paid to be a BUM

The human persona is a very interesting thing – one moment it could want one thing and the next, it could abhor that specific thing it badly wanted in the first place. In my case for example, one moment I was ranting about my dissatisfaction in my current job and now, I am raving about how satisfied I am with it. Or maybe last I heard I was pushing him away, then now I am terribily missing him. But that is another story.

So moving forth in this job issue, the past days saw me disgruntled, yet again, on the current state of my career life. I felt like my full potential was not exploited and I was all too ready to get out of the BPO industry, of which I know my potentials are not deeply appreciated. But some reality check later, I found out that I have no choice but to stay where I am now, for the moment that is, until some circumstances in life, uncontrollable by myself, changes. And since such is the case, I need to make the most of what I have or where I am now. And thus saw the advent of the e-books.

I know I could read e-books at work, but I never had any inclination that in another part of the network, initially inaccessible to me, there exists a whole collection of the latest and most wonderful e-books. But my entry is not suppose to start like this so let me change track.

If before I wanted to be promoted the soonest time possible, now I want to remain Tier 1 as long as probable. Again, see the conflicting thoughts or emotions that I earlier said was interesting? What made me feel as such? The e-books were just the eye-openers. There were several graver observations that led me to such feelings.

Based on what I’ve observed, the higher you go up the ladder, the more your responsibilities increase. Of course that is to be expected as this is the normal course of things in any corporate setting. But in the BPO, there is a twist to this normal course of things. The responsibilities and workload not only increases as one gets promoted – it EXPONENTIALLY increases. Let me illustrate.

A Tier 1 agent (that is me) only has to report for work and take calls for 8 hours (including breaks). After his shift, he goes home or to wherever he needs to go, and spends the rest of the day the way he wants (most of the time catching up on sleep). And if it’s not queuing (huge volumes of call), a Tier 1 agent is free to do whatever he wants during the shift – read e-books, fix her nails or eyebrows, gossip to other agents, etc. Now when the Tier 1 agent gets promoted to Tier 1.5, that is a Senior Agent, he still retains the same job description as the Tier 1 agent, that is take in calls. However, he will sometimes be “asked” by the bosses to do something especially if he wants to be promoted to a higher level. He will constantly be asked to do floor walks, that is examine if the other agents need any assistance with their calls, and take escalations whenever necessary. And then he might also be “asked” to render overtime (OT) in addition to his 8 hours shift. Quite light, you may say, but look at the next level.

When one gets promoted to Tier 2, or an SME (subject matter expert), the workload dramatically increases. Not only is one required to do floor walks and take escalations, one also acts as an assistant supervisor, making reports, following up on agents’ performances and customers’ surveys, etc. etc. etc. And if one hasn’t yet done all the work one has to do, two hours is the minimum OT time required to finish all the humoungous workload. And it is possible to be forced to report for work even when one is on day-off or vacation leave. Talk about a life!

And when one rises up a notch, Tier 2.5 or to a Supervisor (or Team Lead) or a QA (Quality Analyst), the workload increases further, the amount of time spent at work becomes more demanding and the responsibilities becomes graver (or more serious or encompassing). I cannot bear to illustrate them here. And what do we expect when the level increases further?

Of course these are all based on my observations and for all I know the actual job descriptions and responsibilities may vary. What about the salary compensation? I heard it was not that large an increase. There are also exceptions of course, like trainers, who are also Tier 2.5 but I believe have a lesser workload, especially when there are no new hires. Also, the person at level 4 or 4.5 seems to have lesser workload, too, though more responsibility (that post will now be the PM or Program Manager responsible for maintaining the performance of the entire account or in other words making sure the supervisors or people below him are doing their jobs – you get the picture). But for the immediate positions near to my Tier 1 level, the workload and responsibilities are staggering. No wonder they kept on telling me to enjoy Tier 1 life as it is the most relaxed stage in the BPO industry. And no wonder, a lot of agents wishes never to be promoted, even when they have been in the job for more than a year now. Somehow, to preserve their sanity, they just keep switching accounts.

Then of course this is what employment is all about. I’ve had a taste of entrepreneurship and now employment and I could say that I have been able to compare both sides of the coin. Nothing beats entrepreneurship. I still believe I would make a fine entrepreneur and if I want the kind of freedom I’m thinking of, this is the solution for me. But for the moment, I must make do with employment, and hope that when the uncontrollable circumstances in my life changes, in the not so distant future, I would be able to move on to much more exciting and rewarding waters.

For now though, I must content myself being a Tier 1 – there are still a lot of e-books to read and my supervisor has agreed to allow me to bring in paperbacks when the need arises. I know it won’t be long when I myself am promoted to a higher level and subsequently given larger workloads and responsibilities – my nature would crave for that, but for the meantime, I relish this freedom I’ve found. I am free to do as I please provided I still get the job done by the end of the day.

And this I can say makes me content – for the moment. How long this will last, I cannot tell. Maybe as long as I have interesting e-books to occupy my boring shifts and Mafia Wars to play on my breaks. 🙂

Post Script:

Watch out for my reviews of Thorton Wilder’s play Our Town and Frank Collymore’s short stories like Shadows and The Man Who Loved Attending Funerals. These two books were my latest read and I can’t wait to share how much I’ve loved them.