My friend once got a job removing labels from tuna cans. That was it, an assembly line of tuna cans that he had to remove the labels from. One after another after another.
On his first shift, he took a bathroom break. When he came back, his supervisor reeled in shock; apparently nobody had come back from a bathroom break before!
I worked at a corporate coffee shop for many years. It was in a ritzy overpriced semi-suburban mall, and most of our customers were rich, nasty women who had nothing better to do with their days (when their husbands were at work) than hang out at the mall, spend money, and harass the minimum-wage staff who worked there. Our store was known as the worst one in the company to work at: anyone who transferred in from another store quit within two weeks. We didn’t have a manager for many months because nobody with any experience would keep working there. The only staff who stayed were people (like me) who had been hired at that store, we didn’t realize how bad it was because we had nothing to compare it to. I think that hardened me to retail, I’ve never had trouble with customers since.
I once had a temp job that was appallingly bad for reasons I have never been able to adequately describe. It was an office job that paid remarkably well, so I can’t put my finger on why it was so awful. I think it had something to do with the immediate supervisor, who was very nice and quite sweet but literally painfully stupid.
I do not use “literally” lightly. When recalling my interactions with her, the predominant sensation is pain. You know when you try to tell someone something, and you can see that they have no idea whatsoever of what you are talking about? Nothing. They don’t even understand that they don’t understand. There’s nothing there. There were a few other things about the job that were unbearable (e.g. I was asked to write a routine letter; when I asked for a template (as it was my second day on the job) the response was “Oh, I think Susan used to do those letters, so look in the folder marked “Susan” and see if you can find one there.”), but it was the whole atmosphere of the place that I simply couldn’t cope with. And I was not alone.
I started on a Monday, and was being trained by Ted, whose position I was taking. (Ted had been there one week. This was his second, and final week.) The hilight of my week was the fire drill.
On Wednesday, the Big Boss called me into his office, sat me down, and said something along the lines of “I can see you’re a clever person, and I know we have a hard time keeping this position filled. So all I ask is that you tell me honestly: are you planning on staying, or should I call the agency again?” I said “Better call the agency.” On Thursday, a new girl turned up. I wondered what she thought about TWO people, with a combined six days of experience (and two resignations) between them, training her for this admin position.
I bet it didn’t take her long to find out. How bad does an (entry-level, no-skills-required) office job have to be, for two people to quit in the space of a week, despite the ten+ quid an hour that it paid?
[downer]Please let us count our blessings that we were able to get better jobs than these. Many people who are just as smart and just as well-educated, but not fortunate to have been born into the privilege that we have, cannot, and many of them are working at these wretched jobs right now. Sorry for the buzzkill.[/downer]
