New Job

After being at my local library for a little over eleven months, I have just received my second promotion. Insert big, cheesy grin here. I am now out of the workroom and in the public eye. Next week I will start my new job at the reference desk. The nice thing about being in the back is not having to deal with the three C's: customers, cash and complaints. The flip side, however, is that it's not mentally stimulating and the job quickly becomes routine.

My manager was the one who encouraged me to apply for any openings on the customer service side of things. She obviously had more confidence in me than I had in myself! The interview yesterday morning was made much less stressful by her being there alongside the Human Resources representative. I was told a decision would be made by the end of the week - I was shocked when I received a call yesterday afternoon with the job offer!

Today I will meet with my manager to get signed up for training and to figure out my new work schedule starting on November 28th. I have a big learning curve ahead of me. Thankfully, the library has lots of good training courses. I'll have two full days of training on their computer system and I'll be taking part 2 of their customer service training: how to deal with difficult customers. I've already taken part 1 and felt it to be plain common sense. Funny, though, how uncommon common sense tends to be.

Since I will also be expected to run some of the existing programs (Baby Story Time, Cyber Seniors, etc.), there will be lots more training associated with the different programs. My manager was interested to hear some ideas I have for new programs, particularly a discussion group for parents/caregivers of children with anaphylactic allergies. I've dealt with it for nearly 12 years and I think I can pass on some learned wisdom to parents with newly diagnosed allergic children. There's a lot I need to learn before I'm ready to do that, but I think it could be fun.