FILES FULL OF SURPRISES

I thought following in the footsteps of an office manager who held the position for 8 years would be a challenge.  After all, I have never worked in this field before and there are a lot of very technical components to the work.  Plus she handled many things for the business that I have not had experience with.

What I did not expect was to walk into such a disorganized mess.  In part it was messy and dirty because no one had been doing the job or sitting at her desk for over 2 months.  There were over 700 e-mails in the inbox!

 I finally found a way to get onto Quickbooks because I noticed a handwritten notation at the bottom of a phone list and it turned out to be the password.  There are things tacked to the wall with push pins which make no sense and don't appear to be important - one was dated from 2008.

But the files.  OMG the files.  Pretty much each file I open has stuff that relates to the label and also a bunch of stuff which doesn't.  There are files full of mixed subjects with dates running from 2003 to the present.  And these are the files in the desk - I haven't even started going through the 4 other file drawers in the office.  The customer files seem to be in good shape, but the cabinet hasn't been purged since 2007.  So there is a project.

Today the owner and the project manager were out on an emergency call and they parked in a place where they needed to use their flashers, which ran the battery down.  They called AAA and found out that the previous office manager hadn't renewed the membership this year.  They missed another appointment while they were getting service for the truck!

I have been bemoaning the fact that I had so little to do at the hotel, and now I see project after project all lined up.  Kinda a good feeling!

JUMP?

I have been going along thinking things were fine.  Then a couple of things happened and I recognised that I have been going through the motions for months now.  I like having my days to myself and working late afternoons/evenings when I am more prone to just hang out at home not doing much.

Except that I haven't been doing much with my days, either.  I have been really inconsistent about going to the gym, which was a big reason I liked the idea of having so much time. My sister has not been actively looking for staging jobs, which was the other reason for having my days free.  My house isn't especially clean, ironing is piled up.  My To Do list has nothing crossed off and some of those things have been on the list for months!

There have also been a couple of minor incidents at work which made me feel under valued and woke me up to the fact that I am really underemployed and it is beginning to take a toll on my psyche.

Which brings me to the job offer I got today.  A bit more money, fewer benefits. I would be a one woman show running the office.  Nothing taxing intellectually but the owner of the business is a character and the place needs a lot of work to get it organized.  He liked me, I liked him. About 12-15 minutes away from home, 8-5.  Tom is excited that I will be home evenings.  I won't miss wearing a uniform.

Still running the pluses and minuses in my mind, but it does seem time for a change and one has been offered up.