Hello again and welcome to the third installment in my ongoing hunt for employment. I just got back from my appointment at a temp agency. I was told that they have one temporary position available that fits my availability. The problem is that it’s exactly one step above telemarketing.
I would be a Volunteer Recruitment Coordinator for the Muscular Dystrophy Association. The woman at the temp agency was careful to mention that it’s not telemarketing, although I don’t really see much distinction. I would be calling “local business leaders” who had been referred by other “local business leaders.” My goal would be to get these people to sign up to take part in a fundraiser for the MDA to send kids with muscle disease to summer camp. The information said that I would spend 95% of my time on the phone.
Pros[ul][li]It’s work.[/li][li]It’s for a nationally recognized organization.[/li][li]It’s for a good cause.[/li][/ul]
Cons[ul][li]It’s basically telemarketing.[/li][li]There is a 6 week commitment if I take this job so I would have to work it for the rest of the summer.[/li][li]If I commit, I won’t be able to find/take any other work.[/li][li]Did I mention that it’s basically telemarketing?[/li][/ul]
Unknowns
I just emailed the agency with a few questions that I didn’t think to ask until I was on my way home.[ul][li]Where is the job located?[/li][li]What does the job pay?[/li][li]When do I have to get back to them by?[/li][/ul]
What do you think? I won’t mention how I’m leaning at the moment for fear of skewing the opinions I’m hoping to solicit.
Do you have anything else in the hopper? Do you need the money?
If the answers are no and yes, take the job. Bird in the hand and all that.
I’ve had summer jobs that were “a step above telemarketing” – I did political phone polling one summer and people hated me as much, if not more, than people trying to sell them stuff. The job kind of stunk, but the paycheck didn’t, and being finite it was much more bearable.
Yeah, it’s telemarketing. But:
-The calls are to business; and
-They’re for a good cause.
Personally, as the guy that handles the phones at business, I find that both of these traits make a telemarketing call much less annoying.
That said, I wouldn’t take that job personally; I just would not enjoy it. Another tip for working through a temp agency: it’s better to refuse a job than to take it and then quit. Better still to take the job, of course, but if it’s something you think you might not be able to follow through on, don’t do it.
Were it me, I’d thank them for the offer, tell them that I’m not comfortable with making cold calls, and go register with two other agencies.
It doesn’t sound like he’s making cold calls, exactly, LHOD.
From the POV of someone who despises telemarketers, I have to say that if you were to call me, it wouldn’t bother me. I’d probably say no, because I always say no to phone solicitations, but I wouldn’t be annoyed, because I know that charities have to do everything they can to bring in money, and they’re not the bad guys.
It definitely boils down to whether you can really stand doing it or not.
I have done telephone fundraising as a part-time job and enjoyed it, for the most part. It was for my university and for Minnesota Public Radio. I felt it built character and my “good phone voice” has served me well into my professional career, for example holding my own on conference calls with executives. That said, if you don’t feel any inkling of a positive vibe toward it, don’t take it. Also, if they are asking you to do this 8 hours per day, that would be brutal. I enjoyed what I did, but 4 hours per day was about the max. One key thing to find out, before accepting the job, is what “take part in a fundraiser” means. Does it mean staff an event, or commit to raise x$?
As Daniel alludes to, and as I mentioned in my earlier post, things get better as you add more temp agencies.
Also, one of two things could be going on with the agency you went to: either they don’t have many good openings, or for some reason they felt you were not qualified/suitable for their good openings. If they don’t have better gigs, find a better agency. If/when you call them and say “Sorry, outbound telemarketing is just something I don’t think I can do, let me know if anything else comes up because I’d really like to work,” ask if there are any skills you could work on to help you be qualified for other openings. This is to probe for reasons they didn’t recommend you for other jobs. Was it slow/inaccurate typing? Did you not rock the business dress like they wanted? Did you come across to them as not having polished office skills? Lack of familiarity with key software? (If it’s typing speed or software, sometimes agencies will have training software you can use.) Anything you learn will allow you to represent yourself better to the next agency.
One of the things he may be lacking is office experience. Where I work, industrial jobs often require no experience, but virtually all of our clerical positions require previous office experience. If you apply for the clerical route without experience, you may end up in telemarketing :).
Having gotten a few responses, I’ll go ahead and tell you what I’m currently thinking.
At the moment, I’m thanking that I will probably take the job. My only concerns are that it might get a little bit dull, making the same call over and over and that I still don’t know the location. The script they had at the agency mentioned a county about 45 miles away but it also mentioned the date June 4. I’m assuming that I’ll be raising support for another iteration of the same event that will be held more locally and in the future rather than the past.
The big things that make the idea bearable are that it is to help a good cause (not one of my pet causes, but a good one nonetheless,) and that it is (as Hello Again put it) finite. Even if it sucks, I’ll be able to content myself by thinking that it’s only for a month and a half.
The money isn’t such a huge issue. I don’t absolutely need it. The main reason I’m looking for work is that I want something more to do with my time. It seems like raising support for an MD fundraiser is a pretty decent use of my time.
Still, I’m waiting to hear back about the location. That’s the one thing right now that looks like it might be a deal breaker. I don’t want to an hour long commute just to make phone calls. We shall see what I learn when I get my reply.
No way in hell would I take this job unless I was a week away from homelessness or starvation. I’ve done telemarketing fundraising and it sucked. Turn it down, register for some other agencies and see what else comes along.
The location isn’t great but isn’t that bad either. Mapquest gives me kind of a round about route that it says would take a half hour.
The pay isn’t bad. Eleven per hour for the first week and twelve after that. In spite of Otto’s warning, I’m leaning toward doing it. I’ve said that I’ll let them know by tomorrow so I have a bit of time to ponder and you folks have more time to persuade or dissuade me about this. Thanks for all the advice and keep it comings.
Otto, may I ask for specifics? What didn’t you like about it? Where/for whom did your work? Though I am leaning toward taking this job, I’m curious what your experience was.
I did telemarketing for one company and phone surveys of businesses for another. I hate being bothered by the telephone and rarely if ever even answer it when it rings. I did not like the idea of cold-calling people to ask them for money on the basis of their having signed a petition at the Farmer’s Market years ago or given $5 at a rally or event once and foolishly left their phone number. I didn’t care for being hung up on a hundred times a day, and you know all those things people say about telemarketers in Pit threads? Mild in comparison to some of the shit people felt free to say for me for trying to do my job. The fact that the telemarketing company went out of business owing me a couple of paychecks did not help me retain any warm fuzzies for the profession.
Definitely worth taking into account, Otto, thanks. I still feel like I’ll likely take the job, since I feel better about trying to get charity money from businesses than I would about any of the stereotypical telemarketer jobs (selling magazine subscriptions and the like.)
Thanks again. It’s always good to get a different point of view.
I tried telemarketing for one evening. I hated it. It was soul-sucking work. I think you should take the job, Lord, so that you can find out how YOU feel about it. If you hate it, call the agency and telll them it isn’t working for you. They say they want a commitment, but they can’t enforce it; temp work is completely at will. They can fire you for any or no reason with no notice, and you can do the same. If they won’t let you out of the job, just quit.
I wouldn’t spend a lot of time over-thinking it. When you tell your grandchildren about this year – and you will – it may well be one of the most remarkable of your life. But the job you had for six weeks in the summer will probably be the last thing you remember to tell them about. Go with your instinct.
Well, I’m going to see if I can make it work for me. I’ve called the agency and told them that I’m interested in the job. They have set me up with the next available time for an interview over the phone, Thursday morning (they are booked toady and closed for tomorrow’s holiday.) The woman at the agency with whom I’ve been in contact says that I have a good telephone voice and that I should do well if I can keep a conversational tone and not sound nervous. I’m keeping my fingers crossed and waiting to see what happens from here.
Which is why God gave us Answering Machines. I never answer my phone. Everything goes to the machine. If it’s someone I care to talk to at the moment, I pick up.
The Telephone is a TOOL that exists for our convenience. The moment that it stops being convenient, stop using it.
Well, it looks like I don’t have to worry about whether or not I like the job.
I got through my phone interview this morning and just called the agency to check in with them. It seems that the MDA got back to the agency and said that they didn’t want me because I didn’t have enough experience.
Oh well. I guess I’ll go ahead and be contacting other temp agencies.
Hah - that’s funny; turning YOU down for a telemarketing job. I mean, funny in a “how strange” way, not “funny that your life sucks” way. Yeah, go apply with more agencies. They should have some basic clerking positions this time of year (filing, answering phones, photocopying, etc.) that anyone can do with no experience.
Yep, sign up with other agencies. Also, consider whether you’re willing to do industrial work: if so, that may open up the possibilities immensely.
If you’d like to do more temp work, consider looking for a part-time officey job at your university during the term, so that you’ll have some experience by the time next summer comes around.