Thought I would do this blog a little differently and give you guys a story time. The last few months have been interesting to say the least and sometimes I didn’t know what was going to happen.
Let’s start with the end of summer. By this point business was going well and I was almost where I needed to be to reach my income/client goal. Things were awesome and I felt excited about working from home and being able to pick and travel wherever I want, whenever I wanted (PTO who?). By August however, I lost most of my hours and some clients which you can guess did not have me in the best headspace. I started questioning EVERYTHING even though I shouldn’t have. I think I couldn’t accept the fact that there wasn’t anything I did wrong, it was just business. Things can be great one minute and in flames the next when you’re a contractor. You never know what could happen.
Fast forward to October and things were really looking dismal to say the least. I struggled with the fact that I would possibly have to get a 9-5. As much as I wanted this entrepreneur life, things needed to be taken care of by any means necessary and going back to the office life for a little bit was the only option. I spent weeks searching for jobs and had a couple of promising options. I found a hybrid position that I thought would’ve been great, but the management seemed a little off (they canceled my interview at the last minute and booked me two weeks later). The next one I found was only a two-month contract but right when I signed, I found something even better (or so I thought) before my start date.
Finally! I found a 9-5 Mon-Friday work from home position (yay me!). I thought it would be pretty easy. We were pretty much customer service representatives just giving out info. No sweat right? Very much wrong. Turns out we were approving customer applications and then creating forms for every call we took. Not what was said in the beginning but….whatever. A little admin work never hurt anyone. As I slowly started to get acclimated to the new position, I quickly started to see that no one knew what the hell they were doing. More so in terms of communication which I knew was not going to sit well with me. From starting the position in December up until two days ago, they changed my schedule about 3 or 4 times. Your girl was tired and fed up to say the least.
My first red flag is when a manager went off on an agent in a meeting when she could hear her baby. The second was the schedule switch and the third was when I went to Colorado but ended not being able to work and they wrote me down as know call no show for ALL of the days when they were notified days before. My intention was to work but got there and found out the resort had nowhere for me to plug in my ethernet cable. I reached out to someone about this and literally no one cared. I almost quit 4 times since then, BUT I was trying to hold on because I had to get shit done. These no call no shows will come in to play later.
Now I’m annoyed with everything because when they switch my schedule, I notify clients, so they’re not surprised. But they were switching so much that I didn’t feel like it was worth it to keep updating just for it to change again. This made it hard to plan meetings or fine time for work which was causing me to work on my days off or work on business right after I clocked out from the 9-5. It was getting stressful and causing me more anxiety than I thought it should have but, at this point I’m STILL trying to keep it together. This is when they decided to change schedules again while on my day off (awesome).
I spent both my days off waiting for a call to change my schedule and had to change my options multiple times because shifts were being taken and no call was received. All of this happened just for me to find out on my own that I was let go (also awesome). Turns out the call volume they expected was not what they thought it would. No surprise that they let a whole bunch of people go. However, they randomly sent a policy on attendance during my day off to everyone. Basically, saying if you had no shows, you can be terminated and all of that other good stuff. You and I both know they held their no-show mistake against me. When I found out I was terminated I honestly felt relief. Relief for not having to clock in and out anymore or getting anxiety every time, the phone rang. I have my flexibility back now and I can’t explain how happy that makes me. I explained what happened to my clients and the consensus shows me that they’re happy I’m free from that company and that bigger things are on the way. I literally picked up more hours right before and I have more on the way making it possible for me not having to seek out another 9-5.
When one door closes another one opens!
I’m so happy and looking forward to what is coming over the next few months. Working a 9-5 and running my business was difficult because I actually had to be on someone else’s time and not my own. I couldn’t just schedule what I wanted or work how I wanted which really put a damper on my confidence the last couple months. Working a 9-5 while working on business isn’t a death sentence to your entrepreneur life. Making sure you have the right 9-5 to fit your needs will definitely make it easier. Trying to find one that’s at least work from home is half the battle. Finding one with simple work and great communication is another story.
I just wanted to share my experience about the last few months and be transparent about what could happen when you work from home providing a service. It isn’t always easy, and things won’t always go your way but, sticking it out and holding on to your why for your business is something that will definitely get you through the toughest of times. Remembering how far I’ve come and what the end goal was for me, helped pull me out of the rut I was in. The support I had at home as well kept me from completely losing my mind. Having an awesome support system whether at home or online can make a difference!
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