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Took the wrong job!

Alhaji265

TE!

I realized that I took a wrong job doing customer service level 1 support, in which I troubleshoot customers with their telecommunication problems. I took this job in haste due to hating my last job (field technician, in which the boss was a pain who worked in a different state). Its been about a month and a half and I pushing towards telling my boss I'm resigning since I'm not good taking phone calls from customers, my people skills are TERRIBLE and I carry a negative in the workplace as well since I live at home. Whats is your take on this?

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Comments

networker050184

Support sucks that is a fact, but it's usually a necessary evil at the beginning of ones career unless you can get on in a graduate program at a larger company. I'd say tough it out until you can move on and up. A lateral move is likely just to bring more of the same.

Alhaji265

networker050184 wrote: »

A lateral move is likely just to bring more of the same.

You can correct me if I'm wrong but not with Desktop Support.

networker050184

Depends really. What one company calls desktop support is not the same as another. I'd worry less about titles and more about duties.

QHalo

Alhaji265 wrote: »

... my people skills are TERRIBLE...

Sounds like a good place to help work on your soft skills.

JoJoCal19

Take this advice seriously, as QHalo said, you should stay there and work on your soft skills. You will most likely go NOWHERE in today's job market without people skills. Gone are the days of Techies sitting in a server room with no people interaction (if there truly ever was a thing). It doesn't matter what area of IT you work in, you're going to interface with clients and end users, whether they are internal or external.

Akaricloud

I'm going to agree. Running away from your weak points is only going to keep you weak and at a certain point you need to actually work at fixing them.

I used to be horrible at taking calls and talking during meetings but after working support for a few years I became quite good at interacting with customers. If you plan to advance you will need to fix your people skills.

AwesomeGarrett

You need to work on the soft skills. Those skills come in handy when your boss, his boss, and his boss are at your desk asking questions and your trying to buy some time while you try to figure out why we just lost the west coast.

Alhaji265

Ok, those where valid points but since I started (6 weeks in exactly) I been late about 5 times and took two days off (which is today) in the last two weeks. Whats your take on this? Will my boss question my role on this job?

QHalo

Show up to work on time? If you're entitled to time off, well then that's your business as long as your manager approves.

networker050184

Why have you been late five times? That is certainly going to be a big negative regardless of doing user support or not.

Akaricloud

Honestly, what makes you think any company would want to keep you around if you're bad at interacting with customers and coworkers plus are late 18% of the time?

You need to seriously adjust your work ethic if you plan on holding down a job, let alone be able to advance.

Gorby

I understand taking a bad job and being burnt, but like the other said your going to have to suck it up and learn the phone skills to get anywhere these days. I'm not a phone support type of guy at all but I managed to increase my softskills enough to be one of the best techs on my team due to my technical knowledge. I was happy when I moved to Desktop Support though..

NetworkingStudent

Alhaji265 wrote: »

TE!

I realized that I took a wrong job doing customer service level 1 support, in which I troubleshoot customers with their telecommunication problems. I took this job in haste due to hating my last job (field technician, in which the boss was a pain who worked in a different state). Its been about a month and a half and I pushing towards telling my boss I'm resigning since I'm not good taking phone calls from customers, my people skills are TERRIBLE and I carry a negative in the workplace as well since I live at home. Whats is your take on this?

Things I Noticed

Showing up late 5 times is uncalled for in any industry. Why are you showing up late? Do you have a routine? Are you leaving your house on time?
(When you apply for jobs some companies will ask if they can call your old job for reference.)

Why do you think your phone skills are TERRIABLE?

You are studying for the CCNA and you are working in a telecommunications company. This should be a play ground for a CCNA candidate. Are there more advance positions at this company that you want to move into?

I found these links and hopefully they help.

Customer Service for IT Pros Webinar | Compassionate Geek w/ Don Crawley - YouTube

Get the Ugly Out: How to Deal with Negativity in Your Life - Don R. Crawley | IT Author and Speaker

The Compassionate Geek: How Engineers, IT Pros, and Other Tech Specialists Can Master Human Relations Skills to Deliver Outstanding Customer Service: Don R. Crawley: 9780983660736: Amazon.com: Books

Good Luck!

Nemowolf

Just wanted to throw my two cents in ... Any job you take because of money is going to cause you stress. Stop randomly throwing your resume at job boards and start trying to figure out what kind of job WILL make you happy? What job is going to make you want to get to work 15 minutes early, stay light on your toes and smiling until the moment you walk out the door? Would one industry or another help make an improvement? Public vs private company? Supporting under 50 or thousands?

To many job seekers think the right job will just suddenly land on their laps without them knowing it. This is just the wrong way of looking at job search and it reflects on your poor job performance as mentioned already. You need to put in some time and effort doing some soul searching about what you want to be doing before start jumping ship to yet another mistake job.

As already mentioned, your going to get a poor evaluation unless you do something about the key points mentioned. If you can't communicate sight unseen, your going to fail at many jobs because your going to be supporting folks over the phone regardless of them being internal or external. The attitude you bring in from outside the building will effect EVERYTHING inside the building and that is going to include your bosses, peers and other internal employees opinions of you. No one wants to hang out with a jerk let alone get you as the person to answer their call.

Take this as an opportunity to challenge yourself to be better than your own standards and achieve greatness.

Don Crawley

Alhaji265 wrote: »

TE!

I realized that I took a wrong job doing customer service level 1 support, in which I troubleshoot customers with their telecommunication problems. I took this job in haste due to hating my last job (field technician, in which the boss was a pain who worked in a different state). Its been about a month and a half and I pushing towards telling my boss I'm resigning since I'm not good taking phone calls from customers, my people skills are TERRIBLE and I carry a negative in the workplace as well since I live at home. Whats is your take on this?

What I hear is that you're busy finding excuses not to like your jobs, both current and past. People skills and phone skills are easy to learn and, when you get good at them, more opportunities will present themselves and you'll enjoy your life more in general. No matter what job you have, people skills are necessary to succeed, so unless you work on improving them, you'll have the same problem in all of your future jobs. If living at home is making you crazy, save your money and get your own place. It's time to start acting like an adult and show up early instead of late, quit taking time off, and get your act together. I think you need to look in the mirror for your solutions. It seems to me that you're giving other people (bosses, users, and your parents) an awful lot of power over your career, your happiness, and your life. The way to change that is to work on getting along with other people and developing a positive outlook. The good news is that you really can do it.

P.S. Thanks to NetworkingStudent for recommending my video, blog, and book.

thenjduke

I have been in the field since 1991 and I am going to say this straight out. PEOPLE SKILLS a must and PHONE SKILLS a must. I design Citrix Farms and we deal with internal and external people everyday. I have never been in IT where I have not dealt with people. I am going to be under the assumption you are young and making excuses and blaming others for your mishaps. If you are still young then learn these skills they will be profitable in the future of your endeavors.

ericjohnson22

I understand where you are coming from. I worked for an ISP about 10 years ago that had "work health" issues. I was there for about 6 months before I said no thank you. It was a call center environment and did not have enough people to handle the call volume. This caused them to be very micro-managing of the tech time. (One email I received was about being 15 sec late back from break.) Now for my advice...do not do what I did and run or quit. I got so fed up with IT at the time that spent years trying to find something else. Stay where you are and try and find a better company (easier said then done), But your first goal should be to get your CCNA. THe one thing to remember is most likely that the issues are not yours but the companies, so let them stress about them. Show up, do you job and when you finally find something else you can leave on your terms.

f0rgiv3n

Here's some tough love for ya:

Suck it up buttercup and learn how to develop those people skills. You won't be able to go anywhere if you can't conquer a good customer service phone call.

1. Show up to work on time.
2. Talk to yourself on your way to work. Explain how the day is going to go, practice how you will start your phone calls.
3. Focus on the positives. Stop falling into the rabbit hole of negativity.
4. Understand that the person on the other side of the call is real. They need your help and guess what, you have the opportunity to make their day better!
5. Don't take it personal. People get frustrated with products or services and can take it out on anyone they call. This happens all the time so don't think it's you. As long as you are professional and trying to be helpful you have done everything you can do!
6. Smile. People can hear a smile over the phone, I'm dead serious... Try it and you won't be disappointed.

Hopefully this helps you move in the right direction, you got this!!!