And then it happened

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The job I mean. I’ve got an IT job. I start working for the City of Nampa tomorrow as a PC Tech. Let me tell you the story. I’ve already posted that Manpower put in my resume for a PC Tech job and they wanted to interview me. It was set up for 9 a.m. this morning. I got dressed in my monkey suit…tie…the works. I plot my course on Mapquest and print it out. I update my projects resume to include the OS Migration I did yesterday and print out a copy. I’m set.

I show up my usual 10 minutes early at the Nampa City Hall. No one’s at reception, but a clerk in HR directs me downstairs to the IT department. It’s pretty informal…everyone’s in jeans. I meet Pete…the head guy. He’s really friendly, outlines the job for me…he likes my resume and asks me some questions. Nothing really hard. Mainly he wants to know if I have a problem with some light book keeping. Their department makes a lot of purchases and the person I’m replacing keeps track of that stuff.

Did I mention that I’m replacing a gal going on maternity leave. It’s not permanent. The job lasts until January 5th. Of course, I’ll have my foot in the door if they can hire someone after that. They’ve got a total of five IT positions running the city and one of them is full time at the Police Department.

The big problem is that the person I’m replacing goes on leave at the end of business on Friday so there’s only Thursday and Friday for this person to train me. They absolutely need someone on board first thing tomorrow morning.

I’m in agony. For almost four years, the Postal Service has kept me employed when I couldn’t find a job anywhere else. I’ve been able to feed, shelter, and clothe my family with this job…and even afford some extras. It’s so callous to just walk in and say that “I quit” at the end of today. I try to work something out, but the circumstances don’t allow for it. Pete has a couple of more interviews to do and he says that the other people will have to go a far way to match my qualifications but….if he finds someone equal to me who has no problem starting tomorrow, he’ll have to go with them. I don’t want to blow the job and don’t want to stiff my fellow postal workers either. I asked him to call me as soon as he makes a decision. He’ll call me by 1p.m.

I have to go home to change to my postal suit. I quickly hammer out three versions of a resignation letter giving today, tomorrow, and Friday as my last day (you never know). I spend a lot of the time talking to G-d about it all. I know he wants me to do the right thing…even if it’s difficult. I finally do my best to put it all in His hands and move on.

I get to work. Boy the supervisor is stressed: “You’re working the rest of the week”, she tells me. If I don’t get the job…I probably will. I start working at the case. The mail isn’t ready and there’s still a ton to do. My cell goes off. It’s Manpower. She says Pete wants me but I have to start tomorrow. It’s set in concrete. I’m in agony again. My recruiter tells me to take some time to think it over and call her back.

No amount of thinking or praying will make this any easier. It’s just plain wrong to stiff my co-workers without giving them at least some time to reschedule to cover the workload. Finally, I get ahold of my supervisor and ask her help with “a moral decision”. I give her the story in brief and expect her to explode. She says the most amazing thing.

She says that my hours at the post office are drying up starting next week. All the people who were going to go on vacation have gone and come back. They’ve hired a new crew of PTFs (permanent postal slaves that get paid more than I do but can be made to work long hours) and they have to be offered hours before casuals (total temp slaves) like me. Any significant work hours…at least in the carrier craft would disappear until next summer. She tells me that of course, it throws a real monkey wrench into her plans but, if she were me…she’d take the job.

And I did. I called my recruiter back. I go by her office at 7:30 a.m. tomorrow to fill out paperwork and report to work in Nampa by 9. It’s all happened so fast, I haven’t really had time to emotionally or mentally prepare. I think I’m still in shock. I called my wife on her cell to tell her but, since I’ve been home, I’ve only had a chance to tell two out of three kids (David’s writing an essay).

I guess I thought there’d be more fanfare or something. I was worried that management at the post office would be miffed but, when I finally got back in off the street, the late supervisor pulled me aside, gave me a big “ataboy” and, on behalf of Main Office management, a gift certificate for a meal out for the family. Who knows? I may end up working as a “Postie” again, but at least I’ve got my shot. That’s all I’ve ever asked for.

 

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Trip, that is FANTASTIC! I'm well chuffed for you . Even sounds as though you haven't burned any bridges with the Post Office either. Good luck and let us know how your first day goes.

 

Wooooot 2

Great news Trip, best of luck!

 

One down, two to go?

Congratulations Trip - Let us know how it's going once you start, or have you I get confused with the time differences!

 

Glad to hear that trip, excelent

 

GREAT NEWS Trip

May you enjoy your new job.

 

Thanks, gang. It's not even 4:30 a.m. here yet. I can't sleep. Too keyed up. I kept dreaming about delivering mail and waking up to realize that I wouldn't be doing that today. Big blabber mouth that I am, of course I'll share my adventures on the new job with you all. Ok, guys...I'm depending on you. Let's go for a "triple play" to use a bit of American baseball lingo.

 

We normally get our post/mail at 6am - I thought all Postmen and Postwomen were up at 4:30 making mugs of tea and polishing their shoes

 

Not in the US, Sandy. We used to go in about 6 a.m. to start our day, but policy changed. The mail processing plants said they needed more time to get the mail ready to ship to the stations so all postal carriers are officially notified that their workday starts at 8 a.m. 80 percent of their mail should be ready to be cased by them at that time. Depending on the volume of mail and the route, most carriers are out on the street between 10 and 11 a.m. and back by around 4 -4:30 p.m. That doesn't account for carriers who are ill, on vacation or otherwise unavailable. People like me were responsible for handling their routes. Typically, I'd get a full route to case and carry plus part of another route, which kept me out until 6:30 or 7. As winter approaches, it gets dark pretty early and delivering mail in the dark is not only no fun...it's dangerous.

I'm glad to leave that part behind. My kids are thrilled that I'll be home by 6.

 

(tears of joy)

Well done Tripwire

 

Well done tripwire

Good luck mate, all the best from chilly scotland, baa baa!

Cheers.

 

STUNNING NEWS, Trip - Excellent, my Friend - really well done !!!

I believe you when you say you were in agony during as minutes and hours progressed.

I guess the quite words you had with Him sure paid off then.

Well done again :P

 

There's nothing quite like the first day at a new job to make you realize just how stupid you really are. I can't even describe it. It's not "stupid" so much as it is just trying to absorb all of the details of the job. It's part technical and part purchase clerk. I have to accept any orders for computer hardware and software for the city, order the stuff, keep the tracking and billing system...the whole shebang.

There's a backlog of tasks that haven't been done because the gal in the position I'm taking over for has been swamped. It's easy to see why. The city is really informal. They've only had an IS department for five years and there's no formal help desk function for taking and prioritizing work requests. Pretty much, anybody who calls or grabs you in the hall has your attention. Sure, if someone's speakers don't work (they want to listen to their favorite music while they work) they get a lower priority than someone who can't print or needs some sort of software loaded onto their pc or need a network drive mapped.

We got to travel to different city departments to do this and that. I'm responsible for monitoring some of the servers including the backups. There's laptops to unbox and configure, wireless equipment to install in the city library, a kvm switch to install at waterworks, three scanners to install at another department.

The person I'm replacing is going out on maternity leave. Baby's due next week. She's been on the job for about a year and, when she came on board, there wasn't a procedure for doing what she's doing. No one knew who we had accounts with for purchasing so she ended up having to call around to find out. Active Directory didn't work. The whole place was a mess.

It's still a semi-mess but only because the IS department is constantly playing catch up. In less than three months I'm not going to come anywhere near knowing the job like the regular person does. I'm just going to have to muddle along, do the stuff I know how to do first, and research the rest. That's pretty much what the gal who's in that spot now did it when she was first hired. It was her first job out of school but now she's the person who gets things done...at least the day to day junk while the other IS folks work on the enterprise networking. They're having trouble with their exchange server now. E-mail works, but they can't access the server. The desktop is a literal blue blank.

Man, what a day. I had a headache the whole day and it's still hanging on. I'm glad this is going to be a "short week". Next Monday will be the real test when I'll be flying solo. I think I need more "wish me luck" now than when I was interviewing.

 

I feel for you Trip, I was in a very similar position at the beginning of this year. I got my job working at the school and the guy that help the position previous had already left, the other tech was of sick and had been of now for more than 6 months and I was expected to get everything up and running ASAP. We had a pot of money for new equipment but I hadn’t got a clue what procedures were for purchasing, who we had accounts with who handled the finances etc etc.

Out of 300 PC's I'd say 220 worked the rest had just been left and nobody used them (classed as broken so don’t use), nothing was documented my boss who is also a teacher was always teaching so getting any info from him was very hard and to add insult to injury my office had been a dumping ground for anything electrical that had stopped working over the past 6 months.

But looking back now, I loved it. Hard work and testing at times but a great environment to show off. Prioritising my workload and doing the jobs that mattered to other staff was the first thing I did. I wanted to make an impact so did all the jobs that would make others think "Great we've got a tech again, he knows what he's doing". even though at time I didn’t.

You'll be fine Trip, I can tell you’re a man that won’t give up. Once you’ve lived this experience you can look back with pride at what you've achieved. Good Luck friend.

SimonV

 

Thanks Si. First order of business is to get organized. I've broken down the general areas into:

To do (outstanding jobs needing to be done...prioritize this list)

Regular Tasks (done on a regular schedule, like back up)

Common Tasks (things done "commonly"...know the procedures)

Names (the various signon names/passwords I'll need to know...keep secret)

Contacts (who to go to for what and how to reach them)

I also considered keeping a "this is what I've done" catagory, but I figure the to do list...as I cross off tasks and add more to the list will serve just fine. This will be the basis for updating my resume. I figure at the end of three months, it will be loaded.

Time to leave for "round two".