During lunch recently, I was asked by a customer if my company was non-profit. I had to stop myself from laughing when I told him "Not through choice". What I dislike about working in sales is how I am encouraged to feel responsible for if the company is making money or not, like how when as a team we are told that sales needs to bring in about £100k before the end of the year if the company is going to avoid making a loss. The direct implication being: work harder. It's your fault if the company doesn't make a profit.
A few months back, when I went to the open mike poetry in Shoreditch park, I read a piece about "Gross Domestic Happiness", and the idea of it being a business model -- so, like the Himalayan kingdom of Bhutan, success was measured by happiness rather than by profit. It was a very clumsy analogy, and not a very good poem either -- but I still entertain sometimes the idea of a company whose sole aim is to make people happy, the customers and the employees.
A colleague of mine recently left the sales team, and it was quite sad. She wasn't happy working in sales, which was fair enough -- it's not for everyone, and probably not ultimately for me, either. Her mistake, though, was to let on. As soon as she mentioned that she needed a reference for some unpaid voluntary position she was applying for, things turned sour. Suddenly she was having to have meetings and being told her performance wasn't up to scratch and that the company valued loyalty. In the end, she chose to quit shortly after a meeting where she was presented with evidence from google that had found her posting on an online message board about her plans for working abroad next year. The whole thing didn't make anybody very happy.
I've been writing on and off about the proposed new opportunity for me in the company. A chance to be creative and to get away from telemarketing. I felt flattered that the boss would take into consideration what I was good at and what I would enjoy. When interviewing new candidates for the sales team recently, we even made oblique references to it -- pay the company with loyalty and stick things through and they will pay you back.
Except this week I've learned that's not the case at all. We had a team meeting yesterday to discuss our targets for next year and the changes that the hiring of new staff will bring, as well as the sales manager's impending maternity leave. I was told that the new job we had been discussing for weeks or months is going to be put on hold for now. It seems that all the talk before was really just talk. The year ahead is going to be a complicated one, with roles in the team changing and our responsibilities increasing to take on more managerial and mentoring roles. But still with the main focus on telemarketing.
Don't get me wrong, I shouldn't really complain. The job has afforded me a lot of luxuries in recent months, and the next year will bring a small payrise, along with higher targets which bring with them higher earnint potential. Just the same, when what I wanted was to be appreciated for what I am good at, it feels like a kick in the teeth.
After the class and program with Screw Work Let's Play didn't work out recently, I have jumped at the chance for something similar -- an intensive, 21 day program designed for creative people who are tired of jobs, offices and only living for the weekends. Maybe that's all of us, but I don't want to spend another year just complaining about it -- I don't expect a miracle, but I am hoping to take away from it something to get me doing what I love, and getting paid for it. Check it out yourself: Escape Your Corporate Cage.
I guess that's where we find me this week. Let down, beaten up, overworked and disheartened, but perhaps in just the right place to start something to break me out of my rusty cage.
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