SheSue Experience

When I moved from being a homeschool mom to ‘What am I going to do with the rest of my life?’ I struggled to find work that I felt I wanted to do as a career.  I decided to try out temping.  I had heard that it can fun because you get to try out different sorts of jobs.  You also aren’t committed to the point of working for a pension.  Instead you are working for the temp agency.  After enough hours, typically around three months of continuous work, you qualify for health insurance and paid vacations.  I love variety, so I decided to give it a try.

To apply, you fill out a job application just like for any job.  You are then interviewed to find out what your skills are, what type of jobs you are looking for, what type of jobs you won’t do, where geographically you want to work, etc.  Next is a battery of tests.  The kind of tests depends on the type of work you are applying for.  I had to take typing, computer skills and basic clerical skills like alphabetizing and grammar.  And then you wait.  You are called when jobs that fit your skills match an opening. You are encouraged to sign up for several temp agencies as job openings do not come along every day.

There are two types of jobs to apply for: temporary – those that last a day up to a few weeks; or temp to hire – when the employer is checking you out to see if they want to hire you full time. If the job is a temporary job, you just show up, do the required work and go home.  The temp agency gives you the work address and who to contact when you arrive.  The contact person will fill you in on what is expected of you and you are put to work.  If the job is a temp to hire, you are interviewed once again by your prospective boss.

I signed up to do clerical work as that was where my skill strength lies and it paid better than production work.  The first job I got was as receptionist at the temp agency.  I answered phones, signed people up as being available to work and passed out work applications.  It was okay, but definitely not brain surgery.  The next job I got was once again a receptionist.  This was for a boss who didn’t want to give me anything harder to do than put labels on file folders.  I spent a great deal of time reading my book as there are only so many folders to label.  Then she decided I wasn’t necessary.  A little training would have been nice.

I soon found that each time you begin a new job, you are the unknown.  Nobody knows if you can even put things in alphabetical order, so you get assigned menial tasks. You are also not considered an employee, so you are left out of all employee functions.  I worked for a company where all the clerks partied every Friday afternoon in the break room.  At tax time I worked for a company mailing out thousands of tax returns.  I worked for a local grocery store as they were getting ready to go on-line.  I had to weigh and measure hundreds of products in the store.  After about 6 months, I finally got tired of waiting for the next job to come.  And with each new job, I got tired of being the nobody.

It was interesting, I did get to learn about a lot of industries.  To keep me working, I was signed up with four different temp agencies.  The pay scale varied widely for each job, all much better than minimum wage.  All in all it wasn’t a bad gig.  If I wasn’t as desperate for a steady paycheck, I might have stuck it out longer.  Once you build up a good reputation, the jobs come more frequently I was told. But I needed money coming in every week, so I perused Craigslist and found the job I am currently at.

What’s your job?

Today I begin a new category; What’s Your Job?  I’ve always been very curious about what people do at their various jobs and I’ve had some interest from readers.  Not one to be shy about asking, I’m going to get out there and find out.  Sort of like job shadowing, I will be there in the background and, hopefully, try my hand at some part of the job.

My first entry is one of many jobs I’ve had in the past.  My husband has never made that much money, so I’ve always had to work.  While homeschooling my children, I worked many part time jobs to make ends meet.  One of these jobs was as a janitor.

You can work as an independent contractor on your own, or you work for a large company.  I worked for a large company.  I was assigned offices to clean.  Rather than clocking in on a time card, each job was assigned a time that it was estimated you should be able to complete the work.  For example if I had to clean 10 offices, it was estimated I should be able to get the job done in 2 hours and was paid for 2 hours no matter how much time it took me.  I found that their estimates were pretty accurate overall.

Some offices I cleaned every day, some every other day, some twice a week.  I cleaned offices of attorney’s, graphic designers,  architects, and city maintenance.  It was kind of interesting getting to know how much personnel it takes to run each of these offices.  An attorney’s office has the receptionist, legal assistants, clerks, sales and the attorneys.

I was assigned my own set of cleaning tools including vacuum cleaner, duster, bucket, mop, and various cleaning products.  I was given keys to the various buildings.  Every once in a while somebody was still in the building, but for the most part, I was alone.  It was kinda eery at first.  I mean I felt like I was snooping into these people’s lives without them knowing about it.  You could tell right away who was the slob and who was the neat freak.  But you don’t have enough time to do any real snooping.  Time was money.

Each office had their own set of rules as to what to clean, where, if I could move anything, etc.   You had to be very careful dusting.  You wanted to get at the dust, but not move anything.  And if you did move anything, you’d better get it back in exactly the same place.   I vacuumed, dusted, cleaned the bathrooms, cleaned the break rooms and carried out garbage.  I think the worst were bathrooms when there was a shop in the building.  I’m sorry, but men are pretty messy.  The sinks were gross and let’s just say that aim was not on their top priority at the toilet.

The worst thing that ever happened to me was when I got locked out of a building.   This was back in the days of no cell phone for me.  I went in the back door like usual and carried in some of my cleaning products.  When I went back out to the car, I thought I had unlocked the door from the inside, but alas no, I hadn’t.  So here I was out in the middle of a business district.  No handy pay phones on the corner.  I was beginning to despair when I saw a light on in a building a block away and saw a lady in the window.  I was terrified at how she would react, but I didn’t know what else to do.  I knocked on the window and she about had a heart attack.  But she was very nice and let me in to make a phone call to my head company.  Then I just had to wait for them come to the rescue with a second key.  I definitely lost money that night.

The work was not that difficult, but it got old after a while.  And, it was all at night and on the weekends, eliminating precious family time.  The pay is better than fast food, but not that great, but it didn’t require any experience or much training.  It can be more lucrative if you go out on your own.

What’s Your Job?