I Died in Mexico
POSTED AT 02:41 PM

acidicwit

My company sent me to Austin, Texas for five days to visit our client, learn a few things--which I never really did--and look at how they do things from their end, after which I flew straight to Monterrey, Mexico to help out in the critical issues our counterparts were experiencing over there.  

I work in a call center, a job despised by many and even claimed to be for bird brains only. (I have serious intentions of resigning because I am paid really low.)

Anyway, I stayed in Monterrey from August 13-September 20 practically beating the shit out of my head to find certain ways to mitigate damages in operations in terms of the quality of service provided to our customers.

I never got to learn Spanish and I never intend to. There was a time in my life in which I got serious into learning Spanish but that desire has died down years before I went to Monterrey, along with many other things that I intended to do.

I never realized that there are things I will never be able to do. I used to firmly believe that I can always accomplish anything realistic as long as I set my mind to it. Now I know it is all baloney. I was wrong.

If you have landed in a foreign country, you will know how I felt when I got to Mexico. Actually, it came a surprise to me that almost practically no one spoke English outside the airport and outside the call center company that I was sent to.  

Getting a toothpaste was a real pain, not to mention having to navigate your way through the big city. I had to eat tacos and burritos everyday. If there was a real payback, it was the cabrito, a roasted baby goat that never tasted solid food, only its mother's milk. It is probably the counterpart of the veal--cows that were shackled to keep the meat tender.

My stay was not at all worthy of remembering. It was all okay when I was at the office. It was during the night that the stress of being away was almost unbearable. I had to get drunk everyday. I really had to. 

I only had 15 channels in my hotel room and 13 of them were in Spanish. I had to amuse myself--if you can call it that--and keep myself abreast with the real world through instant messaging and text. 

Words flew. Things were said. Things that changed things. Pathetic.

My subordinates were left in the Philippines, and there were several things that happened while I was away--things that I don't want to think as my fault but bothers me a lot. I do not think this is the proper forum to disclose those things, especially because these things will just show the entire world how bitter I am. 

I am bitter again after all these years. I thought I will find something fulfilling by getting emotionally involved with people. Wrong again. Booby traps everywhere!!! 

For the first time in six years, I got a new hairdo. I grew my hair to a stupid-looking 1970's hippies long-hair as early as 2002. I rarely wore it untied because I still wanted to to look neat and all, especially in my industry in which "neatness" is an issue.

I just had to cut my hair, or I will go nuts. My ordeal in Mexico made me realize how tired I am, not only of work but also of people.

I went back to my people a stranger. It was weird. I expected a warm welcome. There wasn't almost any. Words can deceive. And it was really ironic that I fell victim to my own strength.

I thought I can desensitize myself of the paranoia that I had by letting people into my world and making myself be a part of them. They shut me out. 

Getting rid of the trash out of my head was not enough. I had to die. My very own killed me.

It bothered me. It does not anymore. 

I Will Rule Again
POSTED AT 02:04 PM

acidicwit

Too much alcohol and cigarettes reduced my once brilliant mind into doodley-squat.  And what annoys me the most is I never get to think anymore before I even act. I probably never did.

What used to be my protection against society's hypocrisy has become my very own downfall. I always wanted to be alone and it backfired. I sought for friends, tried to penetrate people, become part of a circle, only to realize no one gives a flying fig.  It was all wrong.

I spent years reading. I read because I am essentially alone. I wanted out. For a moment I thought I did.  

Jesus Christ. This is mushy and I am appalled by myself.

 

Back to the Philippines
POSTED AT 10:07 AM

acidicwit

On Sunday, 22:55 hours.

New Role
POSTED AT 04:59 PM

acidicwit

Just last night my Senior Program Manager talked to me and discussed if I want to supervise another department. that will make a total of three departments I am supervising.

I hope they give me more money.

Super Me
POSTED AT 03:19 PM

acidicwit

I have always wanted the ability to be invisible. However, I noticed lately that nobody has been paying much attention to me. I guess I do not need that superpower anymore.  Currently listening to: Zero by Smashing Pumpkins
Currently feeling: numb

POSTED AT 04:19 AM

acidicwit

Hey, it's your funeral.

I Am Now a Yuppie
POSTED AT 03:48 AM in Essay

acidicwit

Ten months since my last entry. Ten months and all I did was to let whatever brains I have rot inside my skull.

After nine months of dealing with pompous customers who don't know shit from their elbows, I finally got a promotion.

 I am now one of the many irritating Quality Assurance Specialists who berate call center agents of their grammar skills, customer sevice skills and blah!

And since yours truly is a certified critic, I always laugh out loud with the calls and email replies I evaluate. I laugh so hard my stomach gets buffed for days I don't have to do my abs.

It never crossed my mind to be a Quality Assurance Specialist a.k.a. QA. I've always wanted to be a trainer. However, the monkeys who run the workplace thought it best that I get the QA position since I give so much fuckeroo for quality.

So all I do now is to sit beside agents and listen to their calls and do everything I can to embed product knowledge in their dense heads.

So far I have released memos to agents for sub-standard work performance which led the management to get them fired.

My actions resulted to two agents getting fired. Most of my colleagues feel pity. I say, "Good riddance."

I always tell them it is unfair that lousy agents get the same salary as those who do their jobs consentiously.

And since yours truly now belongs to sort-of-management level, I also have to drink Starbucks coffee everytime everybody in my department feels like Starbucks.

Yes. I have to partake of that abomination.

I am not sure where my career will take me. But since I am so resilient when it comes to hypocrisy, I might try show business.

Currently listening to: You Were Meant for Me by Jewel

Does it Pay to Hit the Release Button?
POSTED AT 10:16 AM in Essay

acidicwit

My mother once applied in a call center company and got the boot. She is now busy dealing with an imagined midlife crisis and making prank phone calls. My twin brother, who has recently proclaimed instant noodles as the foundation of every nutritious meal, works as a technical support agent in one of the biggest computer manufacturers in the world. The company name starts with a letter D.
 
You’re wrong. It’s not Dapple.
 
All day long he has to remind customers that they need to plug their computers before turning them on.
 
And yours truly, who has finally mastered the art of emaciation, also works as a customer service representative in the call center industry.
 
Had Alexander Graham Bell been alive, he would have turned in his grave had he known how valuable his invention has become. He would have grinned from ear to ear. I think the call center industry is one of the best places to work in since God gave the abacus to humanity.
 
I must admit that my mother felt a little bit frustrated when I decided to work in the call center business. You see, my mother has always wanted me to be a hula-hoop dancer. And my brother, as a consequence of my decision, dropped out of college in his final year to work in the same industry. He figured out how useless his education was, anyway, and that he could learn more about his field of interest while earning money.
 
So here I am in the metropolis, inhaling the noxious fumes of intolerable vehicles—mostly driven by obnoxious taxi drivers whose idea of fun is to go through longer routes. I have to sleep during the day and bear the heat of the unforgiving sun. I can easily buy an air-conditioner, but there’s no way I can sustain the electric bill. So I have to settle with an electric fan.
 
Every night I have to consume coffee in the hope that it will clear my head and leave me wider awake with more mental celerity while doing my job.  All I have to do all day is to sit tight like a duck, lounge in an armchair, attend to customers, and complacently calculate how much I would earn the next payday. Sometimes the A/C gets so crazy and it gets too cold and you wonder why your jacket doesn’t seem to serve its purpose.

I see my friends everyday. Sometimes we acknowledge our existence with a simple nod. Sometimes they simply wave limply, without emotion, and force what look like a smile. 

I have observed how high the attrition rate is in the call center operation. According to an article I found in www.globaloutsourcing.org about the attrition rate in call centers in India, “…odd ours of work bring in a host of health problems including digestive diseases, hair loss, back pain, and stress. Sharp increase in smoking is common. Employees in call centers in India find it difficult to maintain a positive attitude towards life, because everything seems dark and gloomy when one works ungodly hours.”

Among other things, the most common reasons why call center agents eventually lose their zeal in working are: long working hours, work timing, repetitive nature of work, workload, overtime, call volume, and pressure to perform on metrics.

Average Handling Time, Customer Satisfaction, and what-have-you. Metrics is particularly vexing for employees, especially young first-timers, in an environment in which all of your productivity is measured through numeric assessments. I know, though, that metrics is an absolute necessity for this business to attract more clients or customers.

The bright side is, this quantifiable metrics will eventually be reduced as you stay longer in the job. Ergo, the stress level goes down.

Personally, I believe that Customer Satisfaction (CSAT) is highly subjective. Everytime we assess somebody, we are forced to believe that there is a linear set of values that we have to follow to arrive on an evaluation. But nobody in this world has ever created a standard assessment pattern in such away that could be learned by at least ten different individuals and arrive on the same conclusion.

I have met a lot of people in the call center industry who told me that their supervisors do not have a sense of humor, that they are torn between quality and quantity of calls, that eventually the job gets so boring and monotonous, that there is too much politics in their office—that the politics is too thick and palpable you can feel it in your skin.  A lot of them are so frustrated because they never got the promotion they have worked hard for. 

So what they do is to hop like demented rabbits from one company to another, not realizing that everything will be the same. No matter where you go, you will meet insufferable individuals—pseudo-intellectuals and wannabees who have the uncanny ability to make you miserable. No matter what job you have, it will eventually become repetitive.

We all wanted to work in this industry hoping for financial alleviation. We were all once passionate about getting to the top of the corporate ladder. Now it seems that our ambition has waned (provided you have one), our curiosity was sated with discoveries of what it really is like to work in this industry. Some of us are repelled by the mere thought that we have to go to work again. Many of us are unhappy.

I think what matters most is how you deal with whatever irritable situation you have gotten yourself into. Learn how to manage stress. It will help a lot if only we learn to appreciate and respond to our job with beaming reciprocity of delight and optimism.

Go smell the breeze. Tap your olfactory receptors. Euphoria is just always around the bend.  
 
 
 
 

 

Currently listening to: The Background
Currently reading: Catch as Catch Can
Currently feeling: thoughtful

POSTED AT 09:53 PM

acidicwit

can i just give the finger and say "F*** you, to one and all?"