What Should I Do About This Potential Promotion?

In My Humble Opinion
1

Or alternatively, ‘‘Should I bother?’’

I was hired about three months ago as a bilingual customer care rep for a non-profit debt counseling agency. Basically I work in a call center. The job is challenging and stressful and it took me over a month to get to the point where I wasn’t panicking on a daily basis about it or crying on my way to work. It’s not really a scripted job, but one that requires the ability to think on your toes while helping people calm down and understand their financial options (both in debt management and bankruptcy.) We get people who are sobbing, ranting, suicidal, and sometimes just terminally stupid. I don’t think I have to explain how much more challenging it is to do this in a language that isn’t my native tongue.

Now I am pretty comfortable. Despite all that insecurity, I’ve been pulling in some pretty high review scores on a consistent basis and repeatedly told I am an asset to the team. I recently rocked my first Quality Review.

A couple of weeks ago a job opened up in the Centralized Maintenance Department, and one of the guys who applied and was transferred over there was hired at the same time I was and had scores only slightly better than mine. CMD is considered a promotion – better pay and more job responsibilities, still on the customer service end but with a lot more power. I have spoken with people who have transfered from the Customer Care center to CMD and they say at first it is about 10x more stressful and you want to cry every day for the first month. But I am one of those people who is always trying to do hard things because I know it will improve me as a person. I often have the thought, ‘‘I might be able to handle the Spanish calls here, but no way I’d be able to do CMD.’’ I’d be interested in challenging that assumption. If that one guy could land the job, I figure I can too.

Anyways, there are 2 more openings in this department now and I have until Monday to submit a resumé.

Since it is fairly obvious why I might want a promotion, I will share the reasons I am thinking I maybe should NOT apply.

  1. The probability of me getting in is perhaps pretty low. There is a girl in the Spanish Department who rocks my face off when it comes to her Spanish skills, and she has been trying to apply to CMD for the last several months. They will not transfer her because they need the Spanish coverage in the Call Center. The last time this was the case, we only had 6 people taking Spanish calls–we now have 8, and I believe my boss just hired more. So has the tide turned? Do us Spanish-speaking reps have a chance? Maybe.

  2. I’m leaving the job in August to move to a different state. At this point I can still technically say I ‘‘don’t know’’ whether I will be moving or not, because my husband hasn’t technically received any acceptance letters yet from all the graduate schools he’s applied to. But he is doing interviews right now, and he is awesome, so really there’s only a 1% chance I am not moving out of state in August. My ultimate career goals do not involve working in a call center, they involve getting a Ph.D. (I believe, however, the promotion could serve me in the advancement of Spanish and general non-profit management skills. It would look good on a grad school application.)

I have a tiny moral dilemma about whether I should apply for a transfer at a job I know I probably won’t have after about 6 months. Is it fair to other reps who might want that position and intend to stay? I feel I do have a responsibility to treat my company well, because they have treated me like gold.

  1. The stress. I get a lot of calls from people freaked about their financial situations and that is stressful enough. CMD centers get calls from people both freaked out about their finances and (often) angry at us about some way we screwed up their account. I have just gotten to the point where I am comfortable with my job duties in the call center, and I’m not sure it’s worth the brain aneurism
    for a job I’m going to leave anyways. Currently I am working only 35 hours a week and there is a chance I’d have to go up to full-time (around 45 hours on the clock) which really might be a bit too much for something that is essentially killing time until grad school. Having that one day off for a very important appointment has been instrumental in helping me manage the stress of this position.

Anyways, that’s the dilemma. I seek the thoughts of anyone who knows anything about jobs. This is my first real actual job.

Thanks very much,
Christy

2
  1. You shouldn’t apply because they won’t hire you anyway?

Sorry, bad logic. Go ahead and apply, just don’t get your hopes up.

  1. You shouldn’t apply because it’s not fair to someone else? Or the company?

Let the other people worry about themselves. And if turnover is as high as I think it is, there will be other opportunities. Let the company worry about itself–companies are notorious for hiring and firing for their convenience, not their employees.

  1. You shouldn’t apply because of the stress of the position?

This I think, is a real, valid concern. Given how recently you were distraught over your ability (or percieved lack thereof) to handle your present job, and the potential for additional stress if/when your husband is accepted by grad schools and you actually start planning to move out of state, I think it makes a lot of sense to stay with your present position. Prove yourself by climbing a taller, steeper mountain some other time.

3

I would stay where you are for right now. If you know you are leaving (or at least are pretty damn sure you are leaving) in the near future and you are just now comfortable with the requirements of the job it isn’t worth the stress and the extra hours when you know you will need time, energy, and focus to pack/find a new place to live/plan your move/etc.

4

If you’re just getting over the stress at a job you’ve had three months, at a place you don’t intend to stay anyway, why pick up a whole new set of stressors? If you were planning to make a career at this place, I might view it differently.

5

For me the pay would have to be a LOT better to justify shouldering a great deal of extra stress at a job I intended to leave in eight months anyway. If it doesn’t involve a significant raise, I don’t see the upside for you.

6

olives, I remember your earlier thread on the subject of your work. If I were you, I would stay put. Your employer has been very understanding regarding your situation, why screw them over by applying for (and possibly getting) a job that you know you will most likely be leaving in August?

7

I actually agree that #2 could be a problem. If it were just a job that you did for the money, then I’d say don’t worry about any more than your 2 weeks notice. But if you’re going to come back to your old bosses for a reference, it’s something to think about. Starting into a PhD program is something that most people plan for a year in advance, when you quit in August (or even July?) someone may in fact wonder why you took a promotion in February. You could lie about why you’re quiting or give no reason at all, but you have to be comfortable doing that around your boss and coworkers who you may be friendly with. I was actually in a similar situation myself, I got a very nice job offer with immediate start in March, and the same week I was accepted into grad school for September. At first I was just going to take the job knowing I would quit in 6 months, but then I realized how uncomfortable I would be having to cover my tracks at work – no talk about my upcoming move, no lunchtime phonecalls to apartment-hunt, no explanation of why I took a day off to fly to Chicago for the weekend. If I had a kid to support and needed the money, then yes, I would have gone and taken the job, but didn’t need the money bad enough to put myself in a sticky situation like that. (In the end they gave me a 6 month contract, they turned out to be very nice people, and it would have been sticky).

I also don’t see what you would have to gain from the promotion. It doesn’t sound like you really need the extra money, and I don’t see how the extra responsibility will help you if you are just going to quit in 6 months.

8

Thanks for the advice, all! I had to update because something happened today that completely changed everything.

I had decided not to apply to CMD because it didn’t seem worth the stress and it wasn’t a job I really was interested in anyway… I’ve always drooled from afar at Bankruptcy counseling, and seems like a stretch considering my relatively short stay with this company.

Today I had a call review and I scored 97% on it. My boss asked if he could use it in training. Talk about an ego boost!

Then he said, ‘‘You are doing so well here, how’s that part-time thing been working out for you? Do you think you’re ready?’’

And I said, ‘‘You mean ready to go back up to full time?’’

He said, ‘‘Yeah, but that, and I mean… ready to move up in the company?’’

Hesitantly, I told him I had been considering applying for CMD and wondered if he thought I would be a good fit.

‘‘Well,’’ he replied, ‘‘CMD would probably make a lot of sense for you… but actually I was wondering if you would be interested in being a Bankruptcy counselor.’’

While I stared at him in astonishment (Bankruptcy counseling is a HUGE promotion two levels above CMD, is salaried, and is as high up as you can go in the company without being a manager) he explained that it’s not his decision to make, but if I feel ready, he believes I can do it. He and my other boss are going to get together with the hiring manager of the Bankruptcy department and this weekend I am to put together a cover letter and a resumé and they will put in a strong recommendation for an interview. He told me that there is a possibility the hiring manager will want me to get a few months’ more experience in the Call Center but that it really is only a matter of time.

I spoke with him later tonight and he said he wants me to take the weekend to think over whether or not I feel ready to do this. Two big things he wants me to consider:

  1. Spanish fluency. I will go from 30% call volume in Spanish to all Spanish all day long, and as I mentioned before, it is my second language. He wants me to be sure I’m comfortable enough with the language to take on such an extensive second language challenge.

  2. Full-time work. Salaried position is less flexible with hours and comes with a lot more responsibility and a lot more constant feedback, so he wants me to be sure I am emotionally ready to handle the job full-time.

I think these are both extremely valid and important concerns, and I am taking this very seriously. I know I am not a perfect Spanish speaker, but I also know how vastly I’ve improved in the three months I’ve worked in the Spanish Department at this center. Working there has done more for my listening skills than last summer’s volunteering in Mexico did (on the phone I get only auditory input, multiple dialects.) I usually find my Spanish rhythm and let go of the stress on the evenings I have long hours of nonstop Spanish calls. I know from experience that if I start in the BK Department I am going to have times when my head feels like it is going to explode… total immersion does that to you. But eventually you get beyond it. And I believe I can.

In terms of full-time, I’d work overtime at this point for such a huge opportunity if I had to. I would be simultaneously moving up in a non-profit, vastly improving my Spanish language skills, and bringing in enough money to save for an internship abroad. You see, I really wanted to go to Ecuador for a public policy/human rights internship before grad school, and would have been accepted but I just couldn’t afford it. With this job, I could save up the money in mere months. I absolutely plan to go to graduate school eventually, but I’m in no rush. I want to know what’s out there first.

I talked to my husband and we agreed that this is such a huge opportunity with so many possible avenues to help me in my future career (I’ve considered a dual degree in Social Work/managing non-profits with an emphasis on Spanish-speaking populations) that it would be worth staying behind for a while and having him start grad school on his own. (He also recently got an interview for an excellent school that is 30-60 minutes from our Manhattan branch office.) That will give me a strong ethical foundation, I feel, for taking the position (being able to commit to a reasonable amount of time without taking off suddenly), earning the money I need to travel and exploring the career options I’ve always wanted to.

I am DEFINITELY going to apply for this promotion. I am so freaking excited I can’t even stand it. Even if the hiring manager decides now is not the time for me, it is such an incredibly huge compliment even to be considered after just three months.

Life is so weird sometimes.

9

I just want to say this is so awesome! Congrats on having earned such a great compliment. I wish you luck, and am glad to see things working so well for you.

10

Oops

11

Go Olives! You never know when the right thing will come along. Congratulations!

12

Well, damn chickie, go for it!

13

Olives, go on over there and bust some ass. You’ll be fine even though the stress of a new job and figuring things out might suck initially.