A few weeks ago I wrote about the Top 5 Things I Love About My Job. That got me thinking about what it is that I dislike about my job, which frankly, is a much harder post to write. Thank goodness.
1. Disappointed customers.
We hate, hate, hate when a customer has a bad experience. Luckily, this doesn’t happen much. But when it does, no matter whose ‘fault’ it is, I feel a personal sense of responsibility. No matter that there was a blizzard and the Fed Ex truck couldn’t get to his stop, or our power went out in a storm and we couldn’t print shipping labels, or whether the mail carrier put the package on the porch instead of inside the screen door and the customer didn’t find it for two days…this all reflects back on us and we feel bad. And sometimes we just screw up. The wrong coin gets shipped, an apartment number gets left off the address, a damaged stone gets packed, product does not get ordered in time. I hate to pull the old ‘we’re only human’ excuse, but it’s true…no matter how many checks and balances we put into place, sometimes crap happens. And a trickier situation, but one that happens occasionally, is when the customer is unhappy for apparently no clear reason. We can’t be all things to all people all the time – so sometimes we just can’t make it work. This bothers me too, no matter how many times I tell myself to let it go.
2 – 5. See #1
I suppose I could come up with 2 – 5 if I really wanted to. Paying bills is no fun at all. Occasionally fighting for parking in the lot because our next door neighbor hogs all the spots is annoying. Our un-air conditioned warehouse gets REALLY hot on 90 degree days. But I consider myself lucky to have these problems. And if that’s as bad as it gets, I’ll consider myself a success.
I hope you have as few ‘hates’ about your job as I do.
~Brenda
CourageInStone 