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The Let's Bitch About Work Thread!


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38 minutes ago, Fozzie said:

Practice. A lot. Like you’re trying to learn lines for a play. And then just lob it in there like a (polite) grenade and you have no choice but to follow through 

Yeah...write a script and practice.  I do that with tough conversations.

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My territory for Frito Lay is changing in 2 weeks. For the last 5 years, my territory has basically been in my backyard, and stretches about 30 minutes from my house. It’s been great. Now they’re moving me to another territory, closest area is about 15 minutes from my house which is completely fine. Unfortunately, it stretches as far as an hour and 25 minutes from my house, into another state. For those who don’t know, I live in a suburb in the St Louis area. And now I’ll be driving into Illinois, all the way to Alton, Godfrey, and Jerseyville. 
 

The driving and just how spread out the territory is is just terrible. On top of now I’ll be dealing with STL rush hour traffic whereas before I was far enough into the suburbs I didn’t have to worry about it. And the roads in Illinois are absolutely trash. Missouri’s roads aren’t great, but Illinois is another level of suck.

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  • 2 weeks later...

Anyone good with cover letters? Or at least willing to look at mine? It's basically the same thing that I used to get my current position, but I'm applying for a new position in the company so it has to be updated.

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Really, I've made very few changes. My job duties didn't really change, and they want it to be super short. It also helps that it's basically staying under the same umbrella. It's claims but it's auditing claims instead of handling them. They also want it to be super short, so one paragraph maximum. 

For background, it's auditing claims, and my last job was literally auditing claims for compliance with state law. Now I handle claims for this company, and I also act as an arbiter, meaning when there are disputes between companies, I get both files and determine what should happen. So it seems like a perfect fit for me, and it'll get me away from customers for 6 months.

I'll PM you what I have.

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Well here’s a new one for me. My last show didn’t get cancelled, but it wasn’t picked up for a new season. I’ve been paid to write a lot of things that didn’t get made— which is super common.

But today, the show I am on had the plug pulled. It’s the show I spoke of before in this thread. Turns out, the studio and network also struggled with the showrunner and decided to just cancel it all. My first draft was done, but the way I generally work is in steps— multiple drafts, and with each draft I get paid. Earlier steps pay bigger percentages of your total quote. I got my big checks, but They still owe me like $30k for the steps that now won’t happen. There also a production bonus that I’d get if it gets shot.

So I am going to lose that, and technically I should get paid out on my contract, but without me having any leverage (like turning in a draft to production) I’m going to have to have my lawyer harass them for months before they pay that out.

Ultimately though, the showrunner was putting a lot of stuff in my script that I didn’t like. So now it won’t come out, but all the people at the studio and network know who I am, I made minimums for my health insurance, and eventually I’ll get paid— so outside of losing the production bonus and having my name on TV, it’s probably for the best.

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It’s generally a little sticky on who “owns” a show. Usually you need 3 entities, a production company to run creative, a studio to handle production, and a network/steamer to distribute. Most of the time the prod company is paying for development while the network is footing the bill for production of the show.  The showrunner generally creates the concept, or is the mastermind behind developing it and is the one responsible for creating it at the base level with the Proco.

Getting rid of a showrunner is usually a pretty bit legal coup and can only happen if they are either willing, or if the show is based on IP they didn’t create.

When we hear about shows moving networks it’s usually because it has some sort of cache. Like say Expanse getting axed from SyFy but Amazon picking it up. Streamers like to save shows they think have a cult following.

In my case, the showrunner owns the Proco so he’s not likely to be removed, which is why the streamer dropped it. He is still partnered with the studio, so it’s possible they could shop it elsewhere, but it would be starting over basically. They wouldn’t have to honor any contracts so it would be starting from scratch for me, I have cache in the mix on this one as I was a hired gun.

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Guys I really do like my boss. She's great, and we get along spectacularly! She has BIG ideas for this company, and she's really pushing to grow. But she's trying to put the cart before the horse here! 

She's already planning to start an expansion team in San Antonio, but frankly, she doesn't even have a company yet. We have a name and a logo, but that's really it. She's the only agent. We have ZERO systems or procedures in place. We don't have a good system for leads or lead generation. Like...there's nothing to recruit people to! Typically people expand once they have a team in place and can justify the expense of expansion. 

I'm not sure what, if anything, I can do about this. I'm just trying to create and document as many systems as I can. 

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 I’m being considered for the auditing job. Basically quality assurance. 
 

They sent the email at 6:20 today and the next step in the process is basically a big project that’s due by noon on Wednesday. Basically I have to identify inconsistencies in claim handling, create an audit system, audit 15 claims, and then write a report on it. I’m putting in some hours this weekend, obviously. Kinda hoping this puts me in an advantage over people who don’t check their email over the weekend. I know that’s kind of a jerk stance, but I really need this to happen.

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8 hours ago, Destiny Skywalker said:

You've gotta be kidding me. That's practically hazing, or just getting free work out of people.

We do a really good job, but there are definitely parts of start-up culture still remaining.

Really, the only frustrating part is when the email was sent. If I didn’t see it until Monday I would be super stressed.

I also have a benefit of having a sister who is head of QA for an organization, so I made my form and sent it to her for review. 

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On 12/8/2021 at 8:10 PM, Cerina said:

Guys I really do like my boss. She's great, and we get along spectacularly! She has BIG ideas for this company, and she's really pushing to grow. But she's trying to put the cart before the horse here! 

She's already planning to start an expansion team in San Antonio, but frankly, she doesn't even have a company yet. We have a name and a logo, but that's really it. She's the only agent. We have ZERO systems or procedures in place. We don't have a good system for leads or lead generation. Like...there's nothing to recruit people to! Typically people expand once they have a team in place and can justify the expense of expansion. 

I'm not sure what, if anything, I can do about this. I'm just trying to create and document as many systems as I can. 

So apparently she has a new expansion coach located in Atlanta. He's charging her $2,500 a month and has already told her several times that she's not ready for expansion. She kinda just pestered her way onto his calendar.

But now she's got a face-to-face meeting with him next week, and she's kinda freaking out because she thinks he's just going to be frustrated with her because she doesn't even have tracking in place to tell him how her business is doing. Ok, that's not completely true, I created a sales/transaction tracker over the summer, so everything from about July/August forward is documented correctly, but I haven't entered all her past sales because I'm just looking forward from here. But that's just sales - we still don't have lead tracking, expense tracking, budget tracking, inventory tracking, etc. 

When we sat down to do our business plan for 2022, setting up tracking systems is one of my major goals for the year. But that's MY personal goal for my role. Her plan includes zero system creation. In fact, now that I'm really looking at it, her goals for the year are mainly to just increase things she's already doing or do them more consistently, and 90% of that is networking and marketing. She doesn't have many plans for the actual business itself, just trying to increase sales. 

Ugh. I need to request a raise. I'm not being paid enough for what I know I'm about to do for this company. 
 

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On 12/11/2021 at 4:54 PM, Cerina said:

So apparently she has a new expansion coach located in Atlanta. He's charging her $2,500 a month and has already told her several times that she's not ready for expansion. She kinda just pestered her way onto his calendar.

But now she's got a face-to-face meeting with him next week, and she's kinda freaking out because she thinks he's just going to be frustrated with her because she doesn't even have tracking in place to tell him how her business is doing. Ok, that's not completely true, I created a sales/transaction tracker over the summer, so everything from about July/August forward is documented correctly, but I haven't entered all her past sales because I'm just looking forward from here. But that's just sales - we still don't have lead tracking, expense tracking, budget tracking, inventory tracking, etc. 

When we sat down to do our business plan for 2022, setting up tracking systems is one of my major goals for the year. But that's MY personal goal for my role. Her plan includes zero system creation. In fact, now that I'm really looking at it, her goals for the year are mainly to just increase things she's already doing or do them more consistently, and 90% of that is networking and marketing. She doesn't have many plans for the actual business itself, just trying to increase sales. 

Ugh. I need to request a raise. I'm not being paid enough for what I know I'm about to do for this company. 
 

Seems like YOU should be CEO.  Wanna partner up for some education-type biz. 

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I'm actually taking classes to get licensed. I don't really have any interest in selling real estate or being an agent, but so many aspects of my job are easier if I'm licensed. Every so often when I get frustrated I think I should just start my own team because I could do so the "right" way without fighting against typical personality types that agents tend to have. I could start with systems and build up from there, but those thoughts really kick start my anxiety and imposter syndrome. 

But I'm totally down for taking over the world.

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1 hour ago, Cerina said:

I'm actually taking classes to get licensed. I don't really have any interest in selling real estate or being an agent, but so many aspects of my job are easier if I'm licensed. Every so often when I get frustrated I think I should just start my own team because I could do so the "right" way without fighting against typical personality types that agents tend to have. I could start with systems and build up from there, but those thoughts really kick start my anxiety and imposter syndrome. 

But I'm totally down for taking over the world.

I have imposter syndrome really bad, but I’ve been able to help it by reframing it. If I can convince my everyone that I know what I’m doing, I must be really good at being an imposter.

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I think my boss has an unspoken goal of starting a brokerage one day. I'd probably be happy to transition over to that. I'm just really good at figuring out what to do and assigning people and resources to do it. I need a good chief operating officer of chief of staff role. 

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So my boss's meetings this week went about how I expected them to - he basically told her that she doesn't have a business to expand. She's just an agent working for herself. Which is pretty much how I feel about the whole thing as well. She said it was hard to hear. 

So we had a quick Zoom meeting yesterday where she told me all of this. I kinda confessed that I was expecting this and had the same thoughts as the new mentor guy but didn't want to tell her because I didn't think she would take it well. She was surprised actually, but she said she wouldn't have been mad at me for telling her, but that she wouldn't have necessarily taken it from me (like a "what the hell do you know!?" sorta reaction). 

They also looked at her current production numbers. She closed the same number of transactions this year as last year, but she felt more successful because she made significantly more money because the market drove prices sky-high so her commissions were much higher. That's too dependent on the market to be considered growth. They looked at the models (from the book The Millionaire Real Estate Agent, which is like the Keller Williams bible on how to grow and expand), and (surprise!) her production numbers don't justify our current organizational chart - meaning that she has no business having an Executive Assistant (me), a Transaction Coordinator (per contract lady that she's been using since day 1), and a Director of Marketing (her husband who quit his job to work for her about the same time she hired me).

The models say that at this level she should have one admin who does the transaction coordination. Then we add on another couple of agents before adding on more people to the operations side (transaction coordination, listing coordination, marketing, etc.). BUT, if things don't improve drastically pretty soon, guess who will probably be the first to be cut? Hint - not her husband or the lady who she's had for almost 5 years. 

In the Zoom meeting yesterday she did say several times "I screwed up". Don't know if she meant just in general trying to go too fast or specifically in bringing on me and her husband at the same time. We also spent a bit of time talking about the next steps and her plans for Q1 next year. At one point (and I can't for the life of me remember her exact words now), she even sorta offered me an out. She said something like "if you want to get off this crazy train, I understand", but I really can't remember exactly what she said. In the moment I was just like "we can do this. I believe we can build a business here." But then several hours later I starting thinking about it more. 

So today I'm not feeling great and completely missed a demo meeting I'd set up for us to check out this new CRM platform. Ok honestly, I set up the demo for my boss and her husband mostly. I already did the demo think several months ago when I originally wanted to switch, but anyway. Last week I set the meeting for Tuesday, then my boss told me about her last-second trip to Atlanta, so I cancelled, then she wanted it set for this morning, so I did, but then she realized she had another thing this morning, so I cancelled, then I set it for 11:45 this morning, but then today I slept in because I had a really restless night and over the course of the morning I've spent more time staring into space and taking meds than looking at my computer so I missed all the reminders about the meeting at 11:45 and had it in my head that it was at 12:45. So I missed the damn demo. (I texted an apology and told her I was going back to bed anyway because I'm feeling feverish.) 

Now I'm wondering if I should be looking for another job just to be safe. Or if I should do something stupidly noble like offering to work for her part-time until she can justify the expense of having me and I can find other part-time work to fill in the gaps. Or should I just buckle down and basically lead from behind here and show her how to make this a true business. 

I hate to just quit. I do really like her and her husband as people. And I like the flexibility of my schedule and working from home. So I'd have to be picky to find something similar. 

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