The wonderful world of temping
Posted on: 7 April 2010
As a follow-up to the 2-week temporary filing work at Sureterm, last week I was back at the company, doing a single day of work. Except this time, I was on the phones. Now to say this type of work is my idea of hell is a little strong, but it's somewhere in the ballpark. I never thought I would ever do this type of job, and suffice to say I don't think I ever will again. I disliked this job for 3 reasons: I'm not a great fan of telephone conversations in general, as a means of communication. I am not particularly gifted in the art of "small talk", or "inane chit-chat". I.e. the type of conversation you would have with someone you do not know. Thirdly, I do not like not knowing what I am talking about. And having to pretend to people I do.
So there I was, last week, 9:30 and I'm eating my breakfast. Telephone call: "Can you come in and work 11:00 - 7:30 at Sureterm today? Nothing too hard, just a bit of phone work." Me: Errrrrrrm... *somewhat reluctantly* ooookay."
The day started with around 3 hours of basic training and practise. I knew off the bat I was not going to enjoy this. I pick up stuff reasonably quickly, but I've always had a problem with memory, or lack of. If someone tells me something specific that I must remember, chances are I will have forgotten it by the time they've finished speaking.
By the end, I was starting to get the hang of it, and I think I'd definitely be good enough to do the job full-time with a few more days practise. Would I want to do the job full-time? Oh hell no. I like to help people; the specification for this job was essentially to take down the callers name, number & reference number and e-mail it off to customer services (I was sort of the 'in-between man'). Therefore, I wasn't directly helping anyone. And unfortunately, there are a some customers who aren't particularly happy with this system, and are a little peeved that all I can offer them is a promise of a call-back later in the day. "Sorry sir, that's the best I can do".
It was definitely an experience, and I feel I learnt a lot from it, so it can't be all bad. As for the people who work 9-5 in call centres across the world... how do you do it? I've never felt so relieved to finish a working day.