It took me awhile to write this post. My last two weeks have been rather crazy. This was my first weekend not working in a long time. I was employed at Teavana for a very long time. I really enjoyed working there, but recently working my shifts got harder and harder. After winter break I started to lose steam. We had to consistently push for sales, which was not my style. Company policy was to push customers to the point where we would only relent after five no's. In my mind this was ridiculous. I don't know what a customer wants anymore than they do. If somebody pressed me that much just to buy some tea, I would just leave. After the holiday season my sales number started dropping after our customers were not as plentiful. After struggling for the last couple months, I started looking for another job. After I got my second job, I was ready to quit, but had some doubts. I really wanted to take a trip to Norway this summer and contemplated working both jobs to make more money.
My first week of working double hours was not too bad. However, the week before last Teavana scheduled me for thirty five and a half hours! This is way more than part time and way more than somebody with a full credit load should be attempting. I told my boss that I thought this was a bit much, but instead of helping me out, she asked me to swap shifts with someone else on Friday. I agreed because it would free me up in the evening, and I believed I would be able to do all of my homework on Thursday night.
When Thursday night arrived, I went to my friend's house after working. He was familiar with the computer work I had to do, and I had the software ready to install on my computer. This friend is a computer science major, and I figured my work would be done quickly. I was very wrong. I could not get the software to install. After an hour of trouble shooting, we had to install the software on his mother's spare laptop. Installation itself took over two hours, just transferring files to the computer. By the time this was all finished I had to go home. I had work at my second job in the morning. I had until midnight to finish my homework and was very nervous now, that between working two shifts it would not get done in time. Especially now that I had to work at Teavana earlier in the day and could not get into the computer lab if necessary.
I slowed trudged through the parking lot, into the mall to start my shift. I was so frustrated and the last thing I wanted to do was push people to buy tea. I walked to the escalator and saw in front of me the girl who's shift I was supposed to be covering! I walked into the store with her and asked her why she was there. She said her appointment had been canceled. But no one had thought to call me! This was it, the end of what I could bare. Here I was, without the ability to do my homework and she was jsut hanging out in the mall. I was beyond frustration and asked my assistant manager to talk with me in the back. I told her how I felt and that I would like to put in my two weeks notice. She begged me to stay. She told me a new manager would be coming soon and that everything would change. She agreed that it was ridiculous that I had to come in today, and that I could go home. I agreed to go home, but mostly just to do homework, not to think about whether or not I wanted to quit. I knew I wanted to quit.
The next day I went into work for my shift, having talked with family and friends the night before. In the end it came down to this: I have a fixed amount of hours at my second job, no more, no less. It will never interfere with school or frisbee. It is a matter of minutes away from my house, instead of having to drive for thirty minutes both ways to work. This was all really sealed by the fact that I no longer wanted to go to Norway over the summer. It was not necessary for me to work so much anymore.
I approached my manager and told her of my plans, but emphasized that I wanted to do two weeks notice because I would like to potentially work there again over the summer. She promptly told me that I was not rehireable because my sales numbers were too low. That is all it took. As soon as there were enough workers in the store, I told her I was going home and left. After months and months of tirelessly working for nothing, I was free. I was embarrassed that I had to walk out, but there was an endless sense of relief that swept over my body as soon as I was out those doors.
This weekend I had my first free weekend and it was wonderful. I was able to clean my entire apartment and do all of my homework. I got to see friends and attempt to sleep in. The whole thing was very lovely and completely worth it.
No comments:
Post a Comment