A friend was reading the blog recently and tonight asked if I had gotten a new job in education, he had heard me talk about my job in an insurance agency but didn’t see it anywhere on the blog… I really hadn’t realized that I forgot to write about it. Technically I wrote about interviewing for the new old job back in the post Job Hunting – that’s right I somehow passed their personality test! woo hoo!!!

The job is at an insurance agency, I wasn’t sure then what that meant but I was pretty sure it was your typical office job. Most of the places you interview at tell you the same things “this is a hard job” “we expect you to show up on time” “we need good workers that follow all the rules” and then make you watch videos from the mid 80s staring all the best shoulder pad clothes a person could hope to see at once… Fortunately I didn’t have to watch any of those videos for this job.

First let me say I’ve been working in offices for 20 odd years, I’m good at it, people really like me and are amazed at the work I can produce – not trying to pat myself on the back here, that’s what employers have told me. But in all honesty these jobs have bored me – almost every day at those jobs I found I had enough time to do the job adequately in under 5 hours and spend the rest of the day doing whatever I might want to do – Facebook, solitaire and mine craft (back in the early Windows days) or whatever, it wasn’t a challenge at all. What I’ve found at my new job, and I’ve told them – is not having any free time at all, my day is spent getting the work done and as a result my days just fly by. I love that I love that so much. I’m challenged. Now that sounds awful doesn’t it? No time to relax or goof around? Well I still manage to stick my tongue out at my supervisor for no reason, talk to my cube mate about shopping or hear about a coworkers wife. It’s just that the isn’t just entering a bunch of data and waiting for more, or sending out the invoices and then leaving early – my days are full and it’s a good thing.

I started back in February and found out quickly I had no idea what happens in an insurance agency or what a have a million terms, abbreviations or documents really are. Every time I’d think I’d finally gotten an idea I’d find out I was wrong. I’m in document control and every email that comes in has to be attached in a database to a client – every one of em, and that can be an awful lot of emails to attach if you have a huge customer base, which we do. Certificates of insurance, notice of cancellation, endorsements, DECS… and PII, everyone loves PII

I found myself doubting I could do the job when I started, there were days I almost wanted to cry about it, seemed I’d never learn this stuff. I brought home stuff to read and try to grasp and the next day it would still seem out of reach and I’d be freaking out. I had a folder of examples of things I did wrong that I’d refer to try to do it right the next time and it quickly had over 300 items in it.  Looking at that each day was kind of depressing in itself but I had to try to learn from my mistakes and do better. One day it just clicked, I don’t know what happened but I started to do better – I’m not perfect (just ask my bosses) but I’m doing better each day and continue to learn and do and help – that’s all anyone asks for right?

Every time I think I have it  they seem to give me something new to do, and so far all of that has been ok too. I enjoy learning new things and if learning those things makes what the company does better than hey I’m all for that.

I like all the folks I work with too. Sounds cliché doesn’t it? But they’re good people (or pretend to be) and have different personalities that entertain, intrigue or annoy.. but that can be said of any of us I think. If I had free time I’d probably think up little stories to write about each of them in little science fiction type settings  aliens might enter the office with blasters blazing and we’d fight back of course – suddenly the maze of cubicles and headsets would be an advantage. We’d defeat the aliens and have a rousing celebration on the patio with trail mix and Dunkin Donuts Coffee… Fortunately I don’t have time for that kind of thing, I’m sure it would be epic though.

I’m happy, I like what I do and the people I do it with – everyone should be as lucky as me