... needs some... tweeking

After my second day of work I have tweeked a few things. Things that I mimmicked because that's what I was taught, but they don't work as well as I thought they should... or they just didn't make sense. Some of them are menial and silly unnoticeable details, but since they consume my day, it made me happy to change them:

Phone Greetings: I was taught to say, "Good Morning/Afternoon, Sanmina SCI, How can I help you?" But that's really a mouthful and most of the time people don't really want to hear your whole schpeel before they can ask what they called for... plus most companies (and the other employees that fill in for me on breaks) just say the company name... which I thought was fitting... so I'll just add the greeting in front... forget the "how can I help you?" ...that's kind of implied by the fact that I even answered the phone! ;-)

I have to admit that remembering whether its morning or afternoon can get mildly disorrienting at times. I usually get so used to saying Good Morning that I forget that I've already had my lunch break and its time to switch. Usually, I correct myself, but today, I said the whole intro and only remembered too late... the funny part was that the person on the other line didn't even notice, she simply responded (as some of them so politely do) with, "Good Morning, I need..." I was ammused.

I also give a different greeting if the call comes from within the building... though it is tricky to tell because there is another company building a couple miles away and sometimes the caller ID looks the same... but they're really not from my building. Anyway, so the receptionist before me, Marie, would say, "Operator". I liked that at first because it made me think of when I would call the Biola Operator and how they would look people up and transfer you... but now it just feels a little too technical and official for me. I noticed one of the other girls saying "Front Desk", and I think that makes a lot more sense...

Mail: Everyday I sort the mail. Some of it is junk mail... some of it belongs to people who no longer work here... some of it has to be sent to the corporate office a couple miles away... some of it goes to the IT department within my building... and it seems that everyday I get some that either belongs to someone who works out of state or even out of the country... the rest has to be filed in mail boxes... which of course are in order by department... not alphabetical... because that would just be too easy.

Marie would sort the mail in the afternoon and then not file it in boxes until the next morning. That bothered me and so I asked her about it and she said, "Well, I would have anything to do tomorrow if I file it now." That didn't really make sense to me... so I'm changing it. I want them to get their mail as soon as I can get it to them regardless of whether they let their mailbox pile up for weeks until it is too full to fit anything else in it... speaking of which, I need to call a couple people... their mail is spilling onto the floor because their box is crammed full.

Badges: Everyone who doesn't have a Sanmina badge has to have a nametag made for them, which they have to give back when they leave. Its just a big sticky white thing and I print it with a program on the computer and a special little printer... its pretty fun. Well, when Marie was telling me about the badges she kind of seemed to act like it didn't really matter if they got a badge or not and she never tried very hard to collect them when the visitor left... even though you're supposed to dispose of it and log the time that the visitor left into the computer. So my goal is to turn this into a science... especially, catching them on the way out.. they tend to forget.

PLUS... the exciting part is a little silly something that I decided to do. Yesterday, when one of the visitors was handing me his nametag, he started telling me about another company who's receptionists decided to make a big ball out of the used nametags... and I couldn't help myself... so we'll just see how big it gets during my time here.... he he... Its about an inch and a half in diameter so far and its only been 2 days... I'm sure I'll update on its progress and post pictures at some point. I almost feel like naming it...

Speaking of which, there's a spider living in my right-hand side mirror of my car. I tried to blast it out with water the last time I washed my car, but you know how those little suckers can hold on... so a couple days later there were cobwebs on it again... so I've left him alone for the last month or so. And since he's such a constant companion to Jacqeline (Jackie, my car), I thought it might be fitting to give him a name... but I have no ideas... thoughts?