Second Thoughts, Maybe Not

It has been maybe less than 2 weeks since I started working at my new place and I have some new feelings about the position.

As someone who has been hired as an Interior Stylist, I don't feel like I am being treated as an Interior Stylist. There is just way too much emphasis on Sales that the job no longer feels like it is the role I had applied for or the role it was marketed as. 

When I first applied for this job, I had this expectation that my role would be more focused on Interior Styling than Sales because it's literally the job title and also the fact that there are Sales Associate positions within the company. I figured sales would still be a requirement for sure, but that it would be more of a hint of it, wherein I would assist the Sales Team to a certain extent when it comes to styling and recommending more furniture to them, and when it comes to actually following up with the clients to attempt to close the deal, the Sales Team will be the ones who do the texting and calling to convince the clients.

I feel like the sales associate should be the ones who vets through the clients and determine if they require an Interior Stylist to be part of the shopping process. If they are only here to get maybe a sofa and a bed, then the sales associate will just deal with them, but if they are here to get a bunch of furniture to redo their entire room or their entire home, then the stylist will be brought in to aid the clients and recommend the best furniture and color combination for that space.

Right now, the company has a bunch of sales associate, one senior stylist and 2 newbie stylist, one of the newbies stylist being me. The senior stylist isn't really doing any sales because he is doing more of the creative stuff, like furniture space planning proposal and managing the showroom floor's overall styling, and I thought I will be under him, doing those stuff as well, but instead, I am with the sales team doing sales stuff, so I am greeting customers and walking them through the showroom, giving them prices for the furniture they are looking at and that's it, it's just pure sales.

At the beginning, I tried asking the customers which rooms they were planning to buy the furniture for, what theme they were planning to do for their space, questions I would usually ask as an Interior Designer to new homeowners, thinking that will be my way to sell more than a single furniture, but unfortunately, a lot of the clients replies will always be...

"We are planning to get a sofa for the living room."

"We are planning to get an arm chair to match our current sofa."

"We want a Study Table for my kid's bedroom"

... it's almost always single item purchases and I honestly have no idea what my role as a Stylist is in these scenarios, half the time, when I approach a walk in customer, they will just say...

" I am just looking around."

... and most of the time, when they say that, they really mean it, and usually customers like these don't like to be bothered because they are just window shopping, I do that sometimes and when I don't have any intention to buy anything, the last thing I want is the staff just hovering behind me because it just feels like I am being pressured to buy something I either don't want to or cannot afford to.

These are problems the sales staff should be dealing with, I feel like as a Stylist, we should be seated at the back and only be approached if the customer request for a Stylist or if the Sales Associate feel like a stylist is needed.  Or we should be getting leads from the Marketing Team when a client request for a stylist.

I am not being hired as an Interior Stylist, right now, I feel like I am being hired as a glorified Sales Associate, not just because of how similar my jobscope is to the Sales Team at the moment, but also because one of my colleague actually asked my boss out of curiosity...

"What is Tim's role? Is he a designer or is he doing sales?"

.... and my boss's response to that was that I was doing Sale, which was a huge bummer to me. 

Currently, I am still under probation, and the probation will last for 3 months, I am hoping that this 3 months period is being used to familiarize the new guys with the furniture brands and products, that's why we are doing what the Sales team is doing, and that after the probations period is over, I will be able to start doing actual styling work. 

I would like to stay in this company for as long as I can because the pay is stable, the working schedule is actually pretty good and the people in the company are not bad, but if the scope is still so sales orientated 3 months later, and I start feeling even more inadequate than I am now, then I will probably might have to start looking for a real Interior Stylist position in an Interior Design firm.

Event Finale

Yesterday was the last day of the Warehouse Sales Event, apparently it only happens once every 3 to 4 years, so I won't have to go through that again anytime soon until 4 years later, if I am able to stay with my current company for that long.

The bad thing about yesterday was I had zero help for my carpet section, so there weren't any designated workers who could help me unroll and reroll the carpets when a customer wanted to see the full piece, I had to go around asking for help to unroll if the carpets were too big to do it solo. There weren't a lot of customers who were requesting to see the full piece, but when they do, the nicer ones will usually offer to help roll the carpet out with me, which I really appreciated. 

Oh, and the Ang Mo Zha Bo came back yesterday and she asked me to roll out 3 large carpets for her to see.

I don't know what the fuck some of this customer's problems are, I actually took time to convert all the carpet measurements from inches to meters, wrote it on the fucking tags, and morons like that Ang Mo Zha Bo can still tell me...

"Oh, the carpet is a little too big for us."

... after I got all 3 fucking carpets for her, how about you take your fucking floorplan out, double confirm the measurements of the carpets you can get before asking me to roll the fucking carpets that are too large for your rooms out.

I got really irritated after she left, so I didn't bother to roll up the 3 large carpets for like a good 20 minutes, but then I got a little bored because I had nothing much to do, so I went to roll all 3 up on my own,  and then not even 10 minutes later, 1 customer requested for me to unroll one of the 3 fucking carpet again. BUT AT LEAST THIS CUSTOMER GOT THE CARPET, so I didn't roll out it for fuck all, and he also assisted me a little.

It was really quite a tiring day, but on the upside, I got my salary, which was a nice surprise. It has been a really long while since money came into my account in the form of a salary, it feels almost dangerous because for the past 4 years, whenever I spend any money, I know the money isn't going to replenish automatically at the end of the month, in fact, it could be many months before it gets replenished, which always made me feel a bit more guilty every time I do spend more on certain things, but to have that assurance that I will be getting the money in at the end of the month, I don't feel as worried about spending as much anymore.   

Speaking of money, I am not even sure when I can get the money from my 2 current projects, they are almost complete, and if I don't have to juggle a full time job whilst handling those 2 projects, it would be a relatively stress-free experience, but that is obviously not the case I cannot wait for this projects to be over! My commission aside, I just really really want to be done with them because the moment the clients signs the handover forms and makes the final payment, any future problems that they may have will not be my problem anymore, it will be the company's problem to deal with, and the thought of that just feels very comforting to me.

The Case of the Ang Moh Zha Bo at the Warehouse Event

Today is the second week of my company's warehouse sales event and yesterday was my day off from work.

My days off at the moment are spend visiting all my current ongoing renovation projects, so they aren't really days off from work, more like days to manage my other work, and my other work is almost completing soon, so hopefully I can really properly enjoy my off days soon.

Todays' event was surprisingly not as busy as last week even though the crowd was about the same, I am still at the rug section, but instead of being assigned Bangladeshi workers to help me roll open the carpets, I was assigned 2 part timers who are currently still in Poly. The difference between having them around as opposed to the Bangladeshi workers is huge because customers don't feel as comfortable asking help from 2 young boys to roll out the huge carpets for them as they would with the Bangladeshi workers, a lot of them just do it themselves, or when they request for the carpets to be unrolled, they will say...

"Don't need to unroll it all the way, I just want to see the a small portion of it."

... and then the 2 boys will roll only 1/5th of it out and that was it. That being said, I did get one customer who still insisted the boys to roll out the carpet in it's entirety and then right after the first carpet has been rolled out, ask for another large one to be rolled on top of the already rolled out one because he wants to compare the size, which is bloody redundant because the size of the carpet is literally written on the tag. The 2 carpets ended up being almost the same size and he went for the slightly bigger one, he was with his Interior Designer, and his Interior Designer recommended him to get the purple rug with gold lines, it looked really tacky so I am questioning the designer's taste and am even more curious of the vision he has for the client's place. 

Anyways, speaking of customers, I met a Caucasian customer earlier in the day and she was with her husband and another middle aged man who could either be her friend or her designer.  Initially when she first signaled me to help her reserve a bed she had been eyeing on, she was very nice, she was sharing how she really liked the bed and was going to purchase it immediately, being super friendly as most Caucasians usually are, I reserved the bed for her, she thanks me, and then heads off to look at other things.

A few minutes later, she appears at the lighting section, she sees me at the rugs section and signals me over, I am not in charge of the lighting section, but decided since she was probably comfortable with me, I will just go and help her reserve the lights as well. She then points out this pendant light that she had her eyes on and ask me how much it was, the lights were not priced, so I told her I will check with one of the in-charge to see if they can set a price for her.

The in-charge then informs me that if the lights are not priced, then it is not for sales yet, and that because everyone is currently very busy, they are not able to price everything. This was actually also briefed before the event started, that if something is not priced, we should tell the customer the item is not for sales yet, so I thought if that is going to be the protocol, then the customers should also just respect that protocol because everyone on the floor is genuinely very busy.

I relayed that information to the Caucasian customer and she actually got a bit upset and insisted I get the price for her....

"I really like this light and I want to get it, could you get the price for me please! Thank You"

.... and that "Please" and "Thank You" was said with a very condescending tone, I could sense her annoyance that I did not manage to get the price for her, so I told her I will ask around again and got another in-charge in,  I told her that the client really wants to know the price, so she went to talk to the boss and then after that I just left the Caucasian customer for her to deal with. 

She wasn't out rightly rude, but I could sense she was unhappy and she was like a spoiled brat who couldn't take No for an answer with her "I don't care how busy everyone is,  I want this and I want you to make it happen because I want it!" attitude. 

Anyways, after a while, I notice my newbie colleague ended up helping her out and they got along really well, he was very helpful, I could tell she really liked him and it just made me even more annoyed  because I was really hoping she would be consistent with her unpleasantness, but she wasn't, she only turns into that form when things are not going her way, I mean she was super nice and friendly when I could help her with the bed, all it took was one unpriced item for her to switch, imagine if she were one of my renovation project customer, the forms she will evolve into when things eventually go wrong, probably become a huge cunt that's just constantly leaking with that thick viscous pus of self-entitlement.

Her pleasant disposition was giving me very Ellen DeGeneres vibes in the sense that her niceness felt superficial.

... and isn't actually kind to her own employees and sometimes guest, and this is what I mean by superficial niceness, you can make this whole show and donate money to the needy on the show, but it's the way you treat regular people like your co-workers on a day to day basis that shows whether you are truly a nice person or not.

Aside from her, the other customers weren't generally too unpleasant to deal with, most of them are nice and I was just bored throughout the day because very few customers actually came up to me and my part timers to request for the carpets to be unrolled for them to see, it is very classist but it worked in my favor today and I hope I will get the 2 part timers again for tomorrow's final day.

To be very honest, the past few days, I have been feeling a bit out of place at work, not because of my colleague, but just the work scope in general. I applied to be an Interior Stylist and I was hoping that the position would be of a more creative role, to offer advice to customers about how best to plan their homes, to help them pick colors and accessorize their space, but all I have been doing so far is try and push sales and it's just becoming another numbers game. The work scope is more straightforward and less stressful than an Interior Designer for sure, but the focus on sales is just such a buzzkill for me.

I don't want to introduce the sofa to the client, and tell them the price of the sofa and then convince them to buy that sofa, I want them to come to me with questions about how to style their space, to let me be creative, but I have not been doing any of that, the only time I did that was when one of my colleague pulled me into her conversation with her customer to discuss colour schemes, that was the only time I felt like I was an Interior Stylist and not just another sales person in the showroom.

As an Interior Stylist, I feel like my job shouldn't be to push sales, that is what the Sales Associates should be doing because that is literally written in their job title. I feel like as an Interior Stylist, my job is to value add to the Sales Team Pitch.

Weekend Work

The weekend is over and I have spend both those days at my company's Warehouse Sales Event. 

I was already informed of the event on my first day of work, and I really wasn't expecting it to be a whole day standing affair but it was. I was in charge of the rugs section for both days and it was not very fun. 

Unlike the other furniture that were on Sales, the rugs were all rolled up, and they are packed pretty much next to each other, either rolled up or laid out flat on the ground on top of each other, and on each rug, there is a price tag that is attached onto it with cloth tape.

I was assigned 4 workers to help me out at the station and their job is essentially to just roll out the carpets when the customer wants to see the full piece and then roll them back when they are done. My boss told me not to touch the carpet because he didn't want me to potentially injure myself, so I didn't and just instructed the workers as and when the customers wanted to see the rugs.

As I have stated previously, the rugs are either rolled up next to each other or laid out on top of one another, that means when 1 customer wants to see the rug they have shortlisted rolled out, it will end up get laid on top of other rugs, and because this is a Warehouse Sales, the traffic is very heavy and the first hour into the Event, my station essentially bottlenecked, everyone wanted to see a dozen different rugs rolled out and it's really hard multitasking because I will have a group of customers that will be asking me a dozen different questions about the rugs whilst another group will be signaling for me, asking for help to get the rugs they want to see roll out. My workers were also overloaded with all the manual labour and because the price tags were only taped to the rugs, a lot of them ended up falling off during the unfurl and re-furling of the many rugs there.

I had to get my boss over multiple times to confirm if the price tags were attached to the right rugs because the rugs cost between $250 to $10,000, if I mess up the pricing and put the $250 price tag on the $10,000 rug, I am going to be royally screwed.

The good thing is that most of the customers were actually friendly and decent people, they thanked us when we roll the rugs out for them, and will feel bad and apologize when they don't think the rugs suit their house, but with the good also comes the bad, and there really wasn't a lot of bad to be honest. 

One lady was asking me what material the rugs were made of, I had no idea, there was no indication on the price tag or on the rug itself, so I apologized and told her I wasn't sure, and that no one was sure as well because these are rugs that have been in the warehouse for a very long time, it's very unlikely anyone would have any record of the material, this hag then actually puts one hand up to her face...

Like this!

....and then just walked away with this look of annoyance, like I have just wasted her time. 

Fuck you very much too!

Aside from that hag who made me "Talk to the hand", I had another this evening who came to the section with her daughter, had this very entitled attitude about her, did not bother asking my guys nicely to unroll the rugs for her to see, and when she was done with the rugs, doesn't even bother thanking them for rolling it out for her. Most, if not all the customer would at least say a word of thanks, some would even apologize, but this entitled lady just goes...

"Don't want."

... and at one point, she pointed out 3 rugs and said she wanted to see all 3 rugs rolled out. I was actually busy serving another customer, but then my workers start calling me over because they couldn't answer her questions and she started asking me about the measurement, I was clearly busy serving another customer and when I made eye contact with her, it's like she doesn't even feel bad that she had interrupted my conversation with the other customer. She then ask me about the measurement that is LITERALLY written on the price tag.

She wants to know what the measurement is in centimeters because everything was written in inches and in my head, I was just thinking...

"I'm fucking busy, you can clearly Google the measurements yourself in less than 10 seconds! Why the fuck are you not?"

... I was really quite annoyed and I think she could see it in my eyes when I took the tag from my guys, calculated it for her and gave her the measurements in a not so friendly tone. She then tells me the rug is a little too big while smiling at me, and tells me she doesn't have to see the other 2 anymore because it seems like they are too big for her.

All I needed was some gratitude, so I immediately lighten up, but her friendliness only lasted for maybe 30 seconds and she was soon back to her entitled attitude. The daughter was friendly though, nothing like her Mum. Thankfully they were done with the rugs soon after and headed to the lighting section to terrorize consult my colleague.

Aside from that though, the Event itself was not too bad, it just felt like doing Guard Duty back in the army because I am just standing around for hours on end, except instead of holding a rifle and wearing a vest, I am entertaining customers in an air-con hall whilst staring at a bunch of rugs. There will be another 2 more days next weekend, so I am not looking forward to it.

The funny thing is when I am working on Thursday, Saturday and Sunday at my new company, I don't feel stressed out, but when I am off on Friday and have to deal with the renovation projects, I actually feel fucking stressed out. I really hope my project will be more and less settled by this week, so I can actually be able to have a proper day off.

First Day on the Job!

The days leading up to today was busy busy busy, and I didn't really have very much time to come to terms with the fact that I have left my old company and am going to be part of a new one until recently.

I was prepared to hate my new job, I went in with this mentality that it won't work out and I probably won't last a week, I was even looking at job openings on Jobstreet about 2 weeks back to see if there were any boutique firms that were looking to hire new Interior Designers, that was how much I was expecting this job to work out, but surprisingly, I didn't hate my first day at work.

I wouldn't say I enjoyed the first day of work, but not hating it is a good start.

It's really hard to enjoy the first day of work because everything is just different. I didn't miss my old colleagues as much as I thought I would and I didn't really miss my old office as much as I thought I would, but the one thing I really miss today that really stood out against everything else was the confidence I carried whenever I was talking to a potential customer about their Interior Design needs.

It sucks whenever a new customer walked into the store today and due to my lack of confidence to serve them, I end up just avoiding eye contact with them. I didn't have any product knowledge, I knew nothing about the prices of the furniture in the Showroom, I knew nothing about the products in general, like the lead time it takes for those furniture to be shipped from their manufacturing country, and this feeling of helplessness just brought me back to when I first started working at ID4, just that huge blur of what is what. Having to deal with work messages related my ongoing renovation projects actually brought me some semblance of confidence because it just reminded me how far I had to climb to reach where I was in Interior Design and if I can get that far in the construction industry, this furniture industry will definitely not be an issue.

Everything was overwhelming, but it was also underwhelming at the same time. 

Overwhelmed because everything is new, the environment, the scope of work, my colleagues, the freedom I had when I was working at ID4 whereby I can just go to the mall across the road to get candies and drinks from Fairprice when I am bored and want something sweet, the lunch and dinner hour that is pretty much a "own time own target" situation and lunch or dinner can last as long as 3 to 4 hours with my colleague because right after we eat, we can just talk for that long. We woud always joke amongst ourselves when we go for a late dinner...

"We go eat buy our food at 7pm, have dinner and then talk until we can close shop at 8.30pm."

... now that I am thinking about it, I am actually really starting to miss that chatting session I used to have with them.

And I am underwhelmed because I honestly felt the "downgrade" in terms of job scope and responsibilities today, which is great because that's what I wanted, a less stressful job, but at the same time, it also feels like such a waste of my experience as an Interior Designer, like all the knowledge I had accumulated over the past 4 years slowly just disappearing. It's a very conflicting feeling. 

But to run through what happened in it's entirety today.

I reported to work at 9.20 am today, never a bad idea to show up a little earlier for work, and no one was there to open the doors, met my first new colleague at 9.30am when he also attempted to go into the store but couldn't because he didn't have the key. He was also new, joined the company only a few days earlier than me, generally a nice guy, but I don't feel like I can click with him very much, my first impression of him is that he is just a little too deadpan for my personal liking.

After that, another colleague arrives, much chirper and friendlier sounding, and she ended up being the one who gave me my orientation for my first day, after the person with the key came and finally opened the door, she set me up with my own laptop, then gave me a quick tour around the showroom, showed the different brands the company carries, but I know that she only knows the product on a surface level because she doesn't actually work at the store as a salesperson, she is actually an admin person who works in the main office, so her walkthrough was not very in depth. 

She leaves me alone after that brief walkthrough, and I was a headless chicken for that few hours that she was gone, one senior colleague did help me out a little by sharing some commonly used documents with me, then I actually met another colleague who had actually interviewed me 2 years back when I tried to apply for the same position, and I even met the person who had scheduled my interview but hadn't bothered to reply to me when I asked about the follow up interview that was suppose to happen, and her reason was...

"We normally won't bother replying if the candidate isn't shortlisted."

 ... which is a really shitty thing to do, I would have been satisfied if she had just replied and told me the position had been filled, but instead, she left me hanging, but at least now I have a face to attach to that email. 

I had another online Orientation Meeting to attend to at 2pm, so I headed to get lunch with the new colleague at around 12.45pm, and the food court food was honestly not cheap because it's Orchard Road, so I guess I can add cheap and affordable food to the list of things I miss about my old company, and the food was quite generic, like way too expensive for the standard it was offering, plus the Teh Peng was kinda gross as well.

Had that mediocre and overpriced lunch in the Showroom, and after that, I attended the Orientation Meeting, which was just an hour of the HR introducing me to their e-System, it was a really really dry session and I don't think I absorbed a lot of what was being shared with me.  

After that meeting was over, the admin finally returned and she continued her own Orientation with me, which lasted for another hour, she then gave me a 30 minutes break and I went to settle my renovation projects stuff. 

After that 30 minutes break, we did another walkthrough of the Showroom, and this time, she attempted to teach me how to check for the prices of the furniture, because they are customizable pieces, there is a pricelist at the front desk that we will need to refer to to get the proper pricing.  There were certain furniture in the Showroom that didn't have any price-tags on it, so the admin taught me that I had to check the measurements of the sofa and then look for the sofa in the price list via that measurement to get their pricing.

I went to take my measuring tape, she borrowed hers from another colleague and we started taking the measurements. She measured almost everything wrongly, it was either the tape was not straight when she did the measurement, or she measured from the wrong point, but the kicker here is the measurements I took, which were much more accurate, didn't match the measurements in the pricelist, and despite remeasuring, the measurements just did not tally.

The actual sofa in the Showroom measured about 1.77m in length, on the price list however, the closest measurement to that was about 1.85m. The admin then expressed her disbelief at the discrepancy, but told me that that is the model and I should base the selling price off that model. For a sofa that cost $10,000, that 8cm difference is a very expensive difference, it is so weird how off the measurements actually were.

After that very questionable lesson on pricing, I was asked to go around the Showroom to look at the furniture pieces and try and understand how those prices came about by referring to the price list, but before I could do that, I ended up running into a customer who started asking me for the price of a dining table, I thought this was a great opportunity to take what I had learned a few minutes ago into practice, so I attempted to look for the price on the price list, had no idea which furniture it was because it really wasn't very clear, especially with the material description that they were using in the pricelist that I didn't really understand, I had no choice but to redirect him to my other colleague because I didn't want to end up severely underquoting him for the item.

As I was about to go do what I had originally planned to do, another customer comes up to me and ask me how much the sofa she was looking at cost, this time I got a senior colleague into the picture and he was really nice, he asked me to tag along with him while he explained the furniture piece to the customer, he even talked about the brand to the client, and then he actually gave the customer to me. 

It was more of asking me to follow up with the customer, but I thought it was nice that he was actually willing to teach me about these things. I then went to him a few times later that day and asked him more things.

Work was suppose to end at 7pm today, but because I had to prepare the quotation for that customer by today, I ended up leaving at around 7.30pm, and I took that long because I really didn't know how to prepare the quotation correctly, and I had to use Google Sheet instead of Excel, which made things a little complicated for me. 

I left after I send the quotation out, it was literally for 1 Sofa, which is nothing compared to the quotes I had to prepare as an Interior Designer, but that really took a while. Good news is I am off tomorrow so I can drop by my site to check up on the progress, but I have to work on both weekends this week for a warehouse sales, it's a little daunting, kinda remind me of the time I stared work at ID1 and was made to attend a roadshow event not even a week after I started, except that was so much worst because of the sheer amount of industry knowledge I was severely lacking back then.

We shall see how it goes after the weekend is over because I will be off again on Monday, which is nice. I like how the timetable is being scheduled, even though my off days are broken down into single days instead of 2 days straight like a regular office job, I will essentially only be working a maximum of 4 days straight at any given time before I get to enjoy my day off, these next 2 weeks, I will only be working a maximum of 3 days straight due to my weekends being burnt for the warehouse sales, but I do like the balanced nature of it.

This was the kind of timetable I tried to bring up to the HR at ID3 4 years back because she actually made me work 7 days before giving me my day off , and all she said was this was a very normal work schedule and that all my colleagues at that company works with a similar schedule as me, which was bullshit because I could see the timetable for everyone and none of them had to work 7 days straight. I shared this with the admin today when I saw her timetable and she told me that it was "inhumane" that the company made me go through that. When I think back to that, I am honestly glad I got fired.

Song of the Moment

Queendom - Red Velvet

The day before the new job...

I am now less than 24 hours away from starting my new job and I don't think I will be able to sleep very soundly tonight. I had problems sleeping soundly last night, suddenly woke up at 1.30am and kept thinking about the new job.

For the past few weeks, I have been so distracted by my all the issues from my ongoing projects that I wasn't able to properly process that I am actually leaving my current company very soon, but when I had that few hours of clarity a few days back, it just gave me some time to really overthink about the new job and it was really really bad, because that's just how my mind works, I start coming up with all this worst case scenarios in my head of things going wrong.

The position I had applied for is an Interior Stylist, I later come to find out that there is another position called the Assistant Interior Stylist, whose job is to assist the Stylist, which would be me I guess. This means that I will be expected to know how to style a space from the get go, and won't be given the benefit of the doubt because "I am still new and need to go through some training". Not to say I can't style a space, given the right array of accessories to choose from, I do believe I have the capabilities to do that, but it would be nice for my employers to have a lower expectation of me first so the impressing can come much easier.

During the past few days, I have also been entertaining the thought of just backing out from the position altogether and look for another Interior Designer position, that would take maybe a month for me to find, and I could complete my ongoing projects by then, or even if it does drag out, the new Interior Design Firm will definitely understand and allow me to complete those projects while simultaneously give me new leads from their company. Plus, I already have the relevant skills and knowledge for that position, so I know for sure the expectations the ID firm has of me will already be met to a certain extent.

One of my biggest gripe with my new job would have to be the working hours for sure. The daily grind that I hated when I was working at ID1, ID2, ID3 and at the bakery, just the idea of ending work today and then knowing I have to wake up early the next day to go back to work again, for 5 days straight. I won't be able to find myself at home, occasionally laying on the bed and looking through TikTok in the middle of the afternoon anymore, or spend hours watching Youtube, while anxiously waiting for messages or voice memos from my disgruntled clients and sub-cons, complaining about why this is done that way and why that is done this way. 

I really need to remember the reasons why I quit my current job in the first place, so as a refresher for myself, here they are...

1. Unstable Income/Declining Savings

The pay isn't great. Partly because I choose my projects, but the main issue is that the amount of money I do earn up earning from all these projects isn't reflective of the amount of work and effort that goes into managing these projects. I haven't had a steady income since I left my Dad's company 5 years ago, that was the very last time I was drawing a stable salary and during that time, even though I was concern about my career, I was at least very stable financially, I could go splurge on a new electronic device and know that 1 month later, I be able to recuperate my spending.

When I went to New York 2 years ago, that trip took a huge toll on my savings, even though the trip was heavily sponsored by my Sister, my savings barely recovered, and then I got a new computer, which also ended up taking out a huge chunk of money. 

But my biggest worry is when I have to pay for medical expenses, be it for my dental issues or some illness that will require a hospital stay, that will incur a huge bill and that is money that will have to be spend, and it could snowball from $200 per visit (like redoing my dental fillings) all the way to $1200 per trip (for molar crowning), and for someone who only earns an average of $1000 per month, those bills hit like a truck.

I don't have an emergency fund or a rainy day fund, I just have what I have, and it's the lack of a steady stream of income that makes it so dangerous. How I used to determine those funds in the past is that I will need to have at least $30,000 worth of savings, that amount should not drop and it should only be used during an emergency, a.k.a, my emergency fund. But ever since I started working as an Interior Designer, that fund has gone through a steady decline and it is now not even remotely close to that $30,000 mark anymore, which is insane to me, that I would let it fall that far down the past 4 years. 

If I continue doing what I am doing, I will definitely not be able to afford my own apartment when I hit 35, in fact, I probably won't be able to afford it when I am 35 even with this new job, it just doesn't sound very plausible for me to be able to save that much to afford my own apartment in 4 years because all that "savings" I had 5 years ago, they are all gone and I will essentially have to do a restart.

I am sure friends my age, who have gotten a job after they graduated  and stuck to that job or have consistently found new jobs that pays decently, have very like already amassed enough savings to afford their own apartment. I will always wonder, how much savings I would have had if I didn't quit working for my Dad, maybe somewhere between  $70,000 - $100,000. But I am glad I did because it was not a realistic career option for my undisciplined lazy ass.

2. Flexible Working Hours, (The bad side of it)

I will admit, a flexible working hour is a huge perk because I don't have to report to the office everyday and work on the computer from 9am to 6pm, I can report to work late and use "being at site" as an excuse, I can go to the shopping mall across my Showroom to get food and drink anytime I want, I can even leave early if I have something on and my colleagues would be more than happy to oblige most of the time.

But I also have to be available anytime to meet my clients, I don't get a day where I will be free from work related messages or calls, the only time I am really free from those is when I don't have any projects to work on, and that isn't a good thing because that equates to no incoming commission months down the line.

When I go back for reservist, I will very likely get bombarded with work related messages and voice memos, and because I overthink, those messages will eat at me for the entire duration of my stay in camp, it generates a lot of anxiety, so I will have almost no appetite for food and I will have difficulty falling asleep ,which brings me to the next point...

3. Constant State of Stress.

Being stressed out is part and parcel of a job, but there are different levels of stress that comes with every job. When I was working at the bakery, the only thing I was stressing about then was anticipating how many customized order of cakes and cupcakes I will have to bake the coming week and how many of those cake orders are for rainbow cakes, that was pretty much the extent of my stress, the rest of it was just a sense of disdain for the 6 day work week cycle.

When I am working on a renovation project however, every single work scope can be stress inducing. There are so many things to take note of and missing even the smallest detail can result in mayhem at the end of the renovation.

When I do not have any projects however, I get stressed out because that equates to zero income. Usually when I am freshly done with my projects, I will welcome a project-free lifestyle for that first few weeks, that is always the best period during this job and it's usually during this period that I will think to myself...

"This job isn't so bad afterall."

... because it's also when I am going to start seeing my commission. but once the commission has been received or enough time has passed, the realization that no projects equates to no income will kick in. I will then also forget all the stress that the last batch of project put me through, so I will start looking for new ones and naively think that I will just avoid making the same mistakes I made from my past project and this new ones will be much easier to deal with, but that's not usually the case because new projects will always have new problems.

So the deal with this job is that it's never about learning from your past mistakes, it's always about dealing with new ones in this line of work, and if the client is a nightmare, no amount of "learning from your past mistakes" will help because you can't control human nature, if they are unreasonable, they will be unreasonable and it will be 3 to 4 months of unreasonable behavior that I will have to deal with if I stupidly agree to take on their project.

I really need this to become my reminder, if the new job isn't what I expected and I start missing my current job (which is now technically my old job), I just need to read through this post again.

- Update 10.43pm-

About to go to sleep now, when I wake up tomorrow, it will be to prepare myself for the new job. I don't really know how to pronounce my Manager's name though, so that's not going to be a great start. Oh, and I will also get to finally see whether the environment is going to be as hostile as the Team Manager told me when I went for the second round of interview, we'll see. 

Back and Forth, Back and Forth

 Today was a busy day as well.

Headed to site A in the morning to settle some ceiling stuff, got that settled pretty quickly and on my way out of the apartment, I ran into my client, we had a chat and I made my way over the McDonalds to have my breakfast at about 10.30am. 

I was suppose to meet my clients from Site B at 2pm later that day on site to run through a the remaining job scope as well as to share with them my resignation with my current company, but as I was consuming  my McGriddles, my clients requested if we could meet at 3pm instead because they had something on, so I acceded to their request. I really didn't like sitting at home to wait, so I decided to just drop by the Showroom since it was close to Site B.

I reach the Showroom at 11.45am or thereabouts and saw a new guy had joined the company, my colleague then told me he was going to be my replacement, so I laughed and greeted the new guy, but didn't really bother striking a conversation with him because I didn't really see the point to be honest. I headed to the back of the Showroom and started chatting with my other colleagues, then at about 12.30pm, my client from Site B suddenly sends me a text that reads...

"Hi Tim, able to call you now?"

... and that scared the shit out of me because whenever a client request to call instead of sending a text message, it usually means it's something really bad that they would rather discuss over the phone. 

I kept thinking they must have reached the place early and spotted all the mistakes I had spotted during the installation, and that they were going to call me to get me to replace those items. I told them I was available because I wanted to quickly get this call over and done with, so the wife calls me a minute later and she goes...

"Hi Tim, are you at the Showroom now? Are you in the middle of a meeting with any clients?"

... and I was a little confused because if she wanted to complaint about something with the renovation, she wouldn't be asking me all this, and then I quickly learn that she got a delivery scheduled but neither her nor her husband could be there to receive the item, so she was hoping I could go receive it for them.  I ask her what time the item was going to arrive and she goes...

"They tell me they are there now."

... I don't drive, so I was really shocked and then told her to tell her delivery guys to wait 15 minutes for me, I will rush over. She then explains that they didn't give her any warning beforehand and was generally very apologetic about it, I told her it was fine since I was nearby and I headed out, I didn't want to bring my bag along because it was probably going to be 30 minutes top to get there and receive the item, if I waited for them there after receiving the item, I will essentially have to wait for almost 2 hours before they arrive, I would rather receive the item and then go back to the Showroom to wait if that is the case, at least there is Aircon and Colleagues I can talk to. 

So I headed out right as the bus is about to arrive, and when the bus finally arrives and as I am about to board it, I realize I left the apartment access card in my bloody bag, so I rush back to get the card, and by the time I came back out, the next bus would take another 10 minutes to arrive. It takes me about 10 minutes to walk to the Site,  and it will be much faster than waiting for the bus, so I decided to walk since the delivery guys were already waiting.

I was essentially speed walking up the hill to get to the place, and just as I was at the top and the Condo was in sight, I suddenly get a call from the husband and he goes...

"The delivery guys told me they can't wait anymore, I hope you are not anywhere near our place yet."

... and in my head, I am thinking, how the hell would I not be anywhere near your place? It has been 15 minutes since your wife called me, I told her I will reach in 15 minutes, clearly I am either already there or very very near the place already. So I went...

"Ermmm, I am actually really close."

... and he immediately started apologizing to me, then informs me that the delivery will come back later between 2pm to 2.30pm. I was tired, I was sweaty, I was very annoyed because I was planning to wait in the Showroom until 2.45pm before I drop by site B again, but now that the delivery guys are planning to return at that timing, I can't do that because the timing is so bloody awkward. 

I knew the husband was feeling really horrible about it already and it really is out of his control because the delivery guy didn't call in advance to inform them that they will reach soon, so I told him it was fine, that I will just come back later.

It was about 12.45pm when I got the call from the husband.

 

Since I was already there though, I decided to just go up to the apartment and linger for a while, I then started cleaning the place for a while and was contemplating to just wait until the the delivery arrives, and after that, wait until my clients arrive, but time was passing way too slowly up there, so about maybe 20 minutes later, I decided to walk back to my Showroom, and got back at about 1.20pm.

When I returned back to the Showroom, I started ranting to my colleagues about the epic waste of time I just had to go through, they all felt bad for me, so I sat down and we just started chatting again for a bit, not even 10 minutes later, I get a call and the guy on line goes...

" Hi, I am the delivery person, I am on my way over now, will reach in another 15 minutes!"

... I was so bloody frustrated, I then told the delivery guy I literally just left the apartment not too long ago, and when he ask me if I can be there in 15 minutes, I just grumbled in agreement and then put the phone down. He calls me again like 5 minutes later to double confirm because I clearly was too annoyed to speak clearly, so I told him to give me 15 minutes and I will go back again.

I didn't even have time to cool down from the walk back and now I have to walk there again! I was sweaty, I could smell how bad I smelled, it was horrible.  When I finally reach the apartment at 1.45pm, there the delivery guys were, the in-charge then told me my timing was impeccable because they also arrived not too long ago. He was very friendly so I became less annoyed after that and opened the door for them, they then took 10 minutes to set the fridge up and the in-charge started chatting with me, telling me how my tiler did a fantastic job, and then talked about his own renovation that will be happening soon, really friendly guy, I followed him down to the first level, and he left right after I sign the delivery confirmation form for them. I didn't feel so shitty afterwards because even though I was made to run laps, at least the delivery guy was a nice chap.

So everything related to that delivery was completed at 2pm. I really didn't want to go back to the Showroom anymore because I would effectively only be spending maybe half an hour there, so it felt a bit pointless to go back and decided to just wait in the apartment. 

I did more cleaning, admired the completed carpentry, turned on the lights to admire the 80% completed space, and then at 2.45pm, another delivery came, I had not been informed about it at all, so they came unannounced and I texted my clients and told them another delivery had arrived, the husband then replies that they themselves have just reached and it just felt like the day is beginning to move again. 

But damn, that was such a huge waste of my time and energy.

We sat down, we chatted about the remaining works left to be done, and I broke the news to them that I was going to be leaving my current company by the end of the week. I also assured them that I will continue managing their project until the end and they took it very well, congratulated me for finding a new job and it was nice. They also ordered delivery and got me a cup of Bubble Tea and after that was done, I made my leave.

It felt like everything ended nicely at the end of the day, but then about an hour ago, at about 5.30pm, the wife texted me and brings up an issue she had with the carpentry, an issue that I didn't notice because it really isn't an issue that stemmed from my mistake or my carpenter's mistake, but just something both her and her husband failed to notice during the initial carpentry discussion, which was the placement of their oven. She ask me if the placement was discussed previously because she can't remember, I send her a picture of the drawing I did for them to see during the discussion phase and it was fabricated according to the drawing, no reply after that.

3 hours later, the husband text back and ask if I can get the carpenter to reposition the oven. 

I said No. I just find it really odd how they think this is some sort of LEGO set where you can just alter the cabinet as and when you like. You can't do that! I told the husband that if he wants to reposition it, we will have to redo the entire carpentry again and it will cost them this time round because it wasn't a miscommunication like the last fuck up. Maybe my carpenter can do some sort of alterations on site, but I really do not want to deal with that, I am starting my new job on Thursday, the last thing I need is more shit to deal with from my current job.

Anyways, there wasn't any follow up from them after that anymore, I really really hope they are slowly coming to terms with the position and I don't end up getting some text from them tomorrow asking for me to get the carpentry refabricated. 

Please let me start work at my new company in peace! 

Fan, meet Shit. Shit, meet Fan

 Shit felt like it really hit the fan at work today.

Today was meant to be a day for site A to do the electrical works, that was the only thing I was worried about as I fell asleep last night. Just overthinking, as I always do, about what could go wrong at site A today.

So today arrives and I drop by the site pretty early at about 9.20am, started prepping all the lights that needed to be installed before the electrician arrived and my clients were around, so the wife started prepping the items together with me and we started having a bit of a chit chat. The electrician arrives about 20 minutes later and I start instructing him on what had to be done, we were walking around the different rooms when suddenly my phone started ringing, I pick the phone up and the person on the other line goes...

"Hi, are you the ID in-charge? I am the carpenter, we have reached site B and will be starting the remaining installation works today, what time will you be coming over?"

... it was really confusing because I was not informed that they will be dropping by today by the head carpenter, as far as I was aware, the head carpenter was so busy he couldn't even respond to my messages about setting a date for his men to come back to continue the installation works, so I was shocked, albeit happy that the installation was finally making progress again, but panicking at the same time because there was marble polishing happening at the site today, and I had already told the marble polisher that he can do the works today because there won't be any other major works happening on site. I then also remember that my clients hadn't gotten their cabinet door handles down yet, so even if the carpenters were there, they wouldn't be able to do a full installation because the handles were missing. 

All this thoughts of what could go wrong because of the carpenter's unexpected arrival was swirling in my head during the call, so as soon as I was done with disseminating the instructions to my electricians, I rushed over to site B and was very apologetic to the marble polisher for the carpenter's intrusion, they were very nice and told me it was going to be a little disruptive with the carpenters around, but there shouldn't be any problems.

So I went to talk to the carpenters and ran through the installation works, and when the topic of the handles were brought up, I got really stressed out because if the carpenters had to make another trip down again, I really don't know how long that would actually take to happen, actually trying to arrange for them to make this trip down took a while to happen, and also the fact that they actually drop by unannounced just makes it worst for the scheduling because it's not just them I have to slot into the schedule, each subcon/supplier that comes in will affect another subcon/supplier in some ways or another. 

Honestly speaking, this just really made me miss my other carpenter because he will always tell me in advance when he will be dropping by, or at least he will reply to me and give me an estimated date when I ask him about it, but this carpenter doesn't do that and he usually ignores me when I ask him for a date. Although to be fair to this carpenter, it's covid and he is one of the only few carpenters that are still accepting jobs, so while I am extremely grateful that he actually took on my project during this period, I can't help but wonder how all this would have been so much smoother if it was being done by my other carpenter.

Anyways, I told the carpenters on site that I will check with the owner about the handle because I know they already have the handles, they just hadn't brought it over to the apartment yet. The problem with my clients for site B is that they aren't always available to answer my calls or reply to my messages just due to the nature of their work.

More often than not, most of my homeowners are office workers, so they can respond to the messages that I send almost immediately if it is urgent and needs their immediate attention, for example, the smallest things like how high they want their towel rack in their toilets to be, or how high will their beds be so I can catch the proper height to hang their side lights, just things that I may have missed out earlier on that I would like to quickly confirm so my sub-cons can start on their work immediately.

So this was what happened today...

I asked them if their handles were in the apartment, the husband leaves me on read but the wife didn't even read the message.

A few minutes later, I got a little desperate, so I send another message, essentially telling them if they have the handles at their current home, I can directly go collect it from their place. No immediate response, and I actually really needed to get the handles soon because it was around 11am then and the carpenters told me they will probably be done within the next 1 to 2 hours if they are not going to install the handles today. 

About 10 minutes after the message was send, I started giving up hope and told the carpenters the handles will likely have to be installed the next trip, one of them then told me that his boss will probably get mad because he had actually rushed the installation for me. I then told him that I didn't even know they were even coming today because if he had told me maybe a day in advance, I would have had time to ask my clients to prepare the handles for me to pick up, and if I had been given 2 days advance notice, I could have gotten the clients themselves to bring the handles over the day before the carpenters came in.

Sigh, after that, I went to the nearby mall to have a drink because I was parched, I hadn't had a drink since I was at site A, and I rushed down to site B and was pretty much glistening in sweat, there was a wet patch on my shirt and I could actually smell how bad I smelled, so I ordered a $7 drink from Coffee Bean and just started sipping at it like crazy at first, but then controlled myself after a while because it's a $7 drink, I didn't want to finish it within a minute and be left with a full cup of ice, and as I was nursing my drink, the husband finally responds.

 

He informs me that his family has it at their place and that I can drop by to collect it, so I requested for the address, called my carpenter and told him I was going to get the handles and will get it to him within the next 90 minutes. I was obviously not going to get the handles within 90 minutes if I took the bus, so I went to take a Taxi, the total damage was about $12 to the apartment, which to me, was money well spend because I would rather spend that money to get the handles for the carpenters to install myself, then to save that money,  wait for my clients to get it over, and then wait another few weeks for the carpenter to return and help me install the handles.

When I got to the place, I contacted the mother, and I was expecting to grab the handle at the main gate, and then leave, but she invited me into the apartment and started asking me about potential renovation works she would like to do to one of the rooms, I entertained her for a while, shared some potential ideas with her, but then had to break the news that I was actually serving my notice period at the moment, so if she was interested to proceed further, I can connect her with one of my colleagues. I just didn't want to waste her time and have her spend all this time sharing her ideas with me, only to be told that I can't actually commit to the project, but I told her that my resignation has yet to be shared with my clients yet, and I will only be informing them next week, to which the Mom then tells me...

"You do it at your own pace when you are comfortable, I won't let them know."

... and I was just really grateful that she was so understanding, because there can be some parents who will immediately get worried and ask how the renovation will proceed if the designers just quit, they will be more concern about their children's renovation than the designer's career, which I get is completely understandable, but she was very nice about it.

She then informs me that maybe I can just not let them know yet to alleviate their stress, but I don't know if I want to keep it hush hush from my clients, I think it might be worst if they don't know, and then assume I would be available to meet anytime or be available to collect things for them, so I do think there is a need to mentally prepare them for my potential absence.

After that, I got a Grab and made my way back to site B with the handles in hand, which is another $12, the wife then finally replies after so long and informs me which handle is for what and for that brief few minutes, she was actually really responsive, so I confirmed everything with her and the carpenter and then made my way back to Site A to check up on the situation 

Before that, I had a quick meal and I will say, during that trip back from site B and as I was having my lunch, I felt insanely productive because despite everything feeling so chaotic, the fact that everything ended up working out so nicely in the end almost feels like a miracle and I just felt a little proud for navigating through that partial shit storm.

The meal took a while to finish because it was really filling, and when I finally got back to site A after my lunch, the place was pretty full, my client got her own contractors in the house doing their own stuff and she introduced me to one of them who happens to be her friend, we exchanged a quick hello, and they soon went back to chatting with each other, I just walked around the place and observed everything that was happening, it felt good because there was actually a lot of progress being made today, the place was slowly starting to come together.  and once I felt I have had my stay for long enough, I decided to drop by site B again just to check up on the progress.

All that positive feeling I had before went away when I got back to site B because that was when I started to notice a lot of issues popping up, they are small issues but issues nonetheless.

1.

There was a carpentry error for the wardrobe doors, a small design detail had been left out and if I get those doors redone, the carpenter will definitely be upset (even though it is his mistake), and the project will definitely be delayed again. I already fucked up their carpentry once and had to get it replaced, so if the clients notice this issue, they are definitely going to be very upset about the delay again.

2.

The handles were installed way too far apart from one another.

My clients got handles that looked similar to this....

... it is half handles and when I instructed the carpenter to install this handles on the door, I just naturally assumed he would install it like this...

,,, because it's 2 halves, so you would want to install them at the edge of the doors to make 1 whole, but for some reason, he actually installed it like this...

... which is also an option, but why would you install it like that unless instructed, the handles were clearly designed to form a whole circle, I thought it would be common sense to install it the first method.

But since the carpenter had already installed it, nothing I say will help and if he attempted to reposition it, it will leave holes in the doors, which will then lead back to the need to refabricate the doors, which would take another few weeks to be ready. I know for sure he will just get annoyed and then blame me for not telling him in advance, plus since the damage has already been done, all I can hope for right now is that the clients either don't notice it, or the best outcome is that they had intended for it to be installed like the second option since the beginning, but the latter is more hopeful thinking on my part.

3.

My electrician had actually told me that one of the electrical appliance my clients got was damaged during delivery, so he didn't install said appliance and told me to inform the clients to get it exchanged. That appliance was then left on the kitchen counter top in it's box for my clients to take back to the shop to possibly do an exchange. I forgot about this and failed to inform my carpenter about it, so he took the appliance out of the box, and installed it onto the carpentry. 

I didn't really cared too much about it at first and figured I can just remove the appliance for my clients when they decide to do the exchange, I saw the box the appliance came in, chucked outside at the service yard area, so I scrummage through the box to make sure there was no other rubbish inside and noticed a snipped of power plug at the bottom of the box.

The carpenter had not only fixed the appliance into the carpentry, he actually prepped it for my electrician to install it by snipping off the power plug, I was so shocked, so I asked him if he had snipped it off and he told me he did, he got really defensive after that and told me I didn't tell him beforehand, that I should have told him about it. And I admit it was my fault because the box was clearly sitting on the counter top and he would naturally assumed it was meant for installation.  I then told him it should be fine since the issue with the appliance is just a dent on a removable portion, if they can't return it to the shop, then I will just cover the cost to get the new removable portion.

This project is just hemorrhaging money at this point, and the clients haven't even made their next payment yet.

I wasn't planning on sharing any site updates with my clients for site B because of all this issues, but then the more I think about it, the more stressed out I got because I kept playing the many possible scenarios of how they would react to those issues in my head once they see it in person, so I decided to just bite the bullet and send them the photos, I didn't bring up the issue with the wardrobe door and the handles, I kind of want to see if those issues are actually noticeable to them or not in the photos. It was obvious to me, but maybe it won't be a an issue to them? 

So far, only the husband has seen the photos but hasn't responded yet, the wife still hasn't seen the photos so I am not sure what her reaction would be, the worst and most plausible respond I can imagine getting right now would be...

"I thought the wardrobe was suppose to be designed this way? We actually really liked that detailing and would like that added in as per discussed." *circles out missing detail in the attached 3D drawing*

&

"The handles look really far apart from each other, is there anyway to reinstall them so they are actually closer, because the whole point of the handles is to have the two halves form a whole, putting them so far apart kind of defeats the purpose."

... and technically, I can get the carpenter to refabricate the entire wardrobe door because he did miss out the detail, and that would solve my handle issue but it's the constant project delay that I am just really not very keen to go through anymore. I'm tired, it's exhausting, I don't want to keep rectifying when the project is so close to completion, all I am left is the tabletop, the plumbing works and the final round of electrical works and the project will be done, after today, the project is suppose to be able to just auto-pilot itself to completion because everything left to do is extremely straightforward and won't require too much attention on my end. 

Please just let this project complete successfully without anymore delays by the end of the month so I can actually start work at the new place without any baggage from my current job.

Site A is actually progressing pretty well, there is just this, in my opinion, major touch up works that needs to be done, so I am actually thinking of getting one of my colleagues to coordinate and settle that issue for me and then just pay them a small $100 to $200 coordination fee. It could potentially be a 1 day job, so it is not a bad deal if I were to say so myself, the only reason why I need someone to oversee it is because the day that issue is getting rectified, it will be my second day of work at the new company and I really do not want to have that problem hanging above my head while I am trying to adjust to the new environment.

Farewell Dinner

My colleagues actually prepared a farewell dinner for me today and it just makes leaving the company so much harder.

The idea of planning a farewell dinner was sort of brought up in passing when I was just chit chatting with one of my colleague, I was sharing with him that I had been accepted into a new company and will be quitting soon, because he also had plans to quit soon and I thought if anyone can relate, it would be him, so he was quite enthusiastic about the dinner and told me to come to the Showroom on this particular day, but during the days leading up to this farewell dinner, there wasn't really any reminder on his end to confirm that it was actually going to happen, so I figured it was probably something that was said in jest and he was probably going to be too busy to even remember it.

I thought that the dinner was just simple affair, that we would just go get food from the nearby food court, and then eat together in the office like we usually be, except this time, there will be the added significance to the meal being the last one I will have with him in the office, that's why I didn't really want to go to the Showroom today just for it because I can go back anytime for the next 2 weeks to do that with them if I am around the area. And it would really be a buzzkill if I went there, brought it up and then his response be like...

"Oh yeah! I forgot, come, let's go get dinner!"

... which would be really anti-climactic 

Anyways, fast forward to this evening, one of my other colleague drops me a text and ask me if I was on my way over, I was quite surprised because it was about 7pm and I had already eaten my dinner, so I lied and told him I had mixed the dates up, he laughed it off in the text and then tells me it was alright, but ask if I was still coming over, so I ask him if they got a lot of food, and he sends me a picture of the steamboat they had prepared.

I felt so horrible because it wasn't just a simple meal like I had assumed, they actually went out of their way to prep the food and everything, so I asked him how many of them were there, expecting maybe just a small gathering of 3 or 4 of them...

"Total got 10 people!"

 ... which made me feel even worst for simply not being already there, that's almost everyone in the branch Showroom, and after realizing that my colleague had actually gone to the extent of inviting everyone in the branch for my gathering, and almost everyone actually showing up, I obviously couldn't not show up, so I took a taxi down to the Showroom and joined them for my farewell dinner.

It felt weird that I was the one they were celebrating for, it has been a really really long time since I have had a birthday party, so this really felt like one whereby the attention was all on me when I entered the Showroom.

I already had my dinner prior to that, so I didn't really eat much, just had a small bowl of food and a drink, I also got everyone some mini Haagen Dazs and Magnum Ice Cream from 7-11, just to show my appreciation. I didn't really mingle with the main group though and was huddled in a small corner with a few of my colleagues who were in the same duty group as me, we had a small chat and a toast to my new job, my manager then jokes and announces...

"This probably won't be the last time you see him, I predict by November, he will come back again!"

...because the common consensus that a lot of us share about this job is the fact that we will have a very hard time adjusting to a regular working hour job, a concern that I definitely have as well. My colleagues who were sitting around me also chimed in and said maybe I will return much sooner than that, and I jokingly admitted to them that the shortest job I had only lasted 3 days, so they might see me even sooner than that. They left pretty soon after with my manager once they had the ice cream and I went and started mingling with my other colleagues, that mingling then became a Nintendo Switch session. 

My Showroom has 2 TV, so while one group was busy playing Mario Party, another group was singing Karaoke and they were really butchering every single song they were singing, which was hilarious. I wanted to join them but I was too engrossed in Mario Party to actually do that and by the time we were done, everyone was already starting to pack up because it was already 11.30pm. 

It's moments like this that makes me wish we were having some sort of sleepover because it just felt way too short.

I had a great time and this farewell dinner definitely just made my transition into the new job a lot harder. It is going to be really hard for my next group of colleagues to fill the shoes of this current group of colleagues. The last time I felt this level of closeness with a group of people was when I was in NS, sharing a bunk with a bunch of my NS Mates, I have never really expected myself to experience this level of closeness again but I did tonight.

I might start missing my job months down the road, but I know for sure I will miss the people once I start work at the new company. Speaking of which, I really have to get new clothes and shoes for the new company very soon because my current dressing sense is definitely not going to cut it in the new place.

Resignation and Lamentations

 I have officially tendered my resignation and in about 3 weeks time, it's....

 

Goodbye Flexible Working Hours with Unstable Pay!

&

Hello to Fixed Working Hours with Stable Pay!

....it has been 4 years since I have had to go through a 5 day work week, so it will definitely take some time getting used to it again. The last time I had a 5 day work week was when I was working for my Dad, I am not going to include my work experience at ID2 and ID3 because the former only lasted 3 days and the latter only lasted 2 weeks, of which I was made to go through 7 straight days of work before I could actually take a break, plus the misinformation that was given to me about the working hours before I signed the contract, so I was quite happy I also didn't stay long at ID3 now that I think about it.

To be honest, I was expecting my boss to call me and check in with me after I tendered my resignation, just to ask about my future plans moving forward, seeing how I have been with the company for more than half as long as it existed, but he didn't so there's that.

I suspect that he might actually be a little relieved I am leaving because during the annual company dinner, there will always be this award called the "Long Term Service" award, in which you are awarded a trophy and I think a fair bit of cash for just being part of the company for a long time, and I would always be so worried about potentially getting it because my contribution to the company is pretty much non-existent, I have just been there for a long time and barely earning anything, that's it. 

Company was founded in 2014

I started working in 2017 when it was 4 years old

I have been working with the company for 4 Years 8 Months

Some colleagues of mine who joined the company much later than me and have contributed so much more are now at a managerial level, they didn't get the award as well and I feel like it's because the company doesn't want to give me the award, so they keep changing the requirements for the "Long Term Service" title, and what ends up happening is that the ones who ended up joining the company after me, who deserves the award, also can't get it because it would be really iffy for them to get the award but not me, but on the other hand, if we all do end up getting the award, I would just feel really out of place because I will be the only Junior Designer getting it while the rest of my colleagues are either Senior Designers or Managers, even one of the Branch Manager joined the company much later than me, although he also has a lot more experience then me.

I am pretty sure those colleagues of mine will definitely be getting that award during the next annual company dinner since I am leaving, the company won't have to feel bad about not awarding it to my undeserving ass anymore. 

Anyways.

I will be starting work at the new company in 2 weeks time and my projects are nowhere near completion. I am extremely tempted to pass them off to someone else just because of how much stress it is giving me during this period. Carpentry went up for one site today and there were so many issues I had to deal with, things were fabricated wrongly, items I  needed on site were not available because the clients didn't arrange the delivery or just didn't get those items, it was just a big mess in general, and to make things worst, my clients are getting married over the weekend, which just makes me feel really bad because I am just piling on additional renovation stress unto them so close to their wedding date.

The fabrication mistake was brought up to my client, my carpenter had essentially fabricated a carpentry that is of the wrong height, and it is not really a big issue per-se, except for the fact that my clients had already gotten the matching furniture that would fit the original height. I was really hoping the client would be insanely understanding and tell me...

"Oh, if that is the case then I will just do an exchange."

... or something that is too good to be true, but she couldn't do that because she bought her stuff from Taobao and it has already been delivered, and she was really mulling it over over the phone when I told her the bad news. I then offered to buy her furniture from her so she can get a new set that will fit the new height and she informs me that it really isn't about the furniture but the fact that she wanted that particular carpentry at that original height.

The one time I didn't need my clients to get their loose furniture in advance, they get it in advance. Normally my clients tend to get their loose items quite last minute because they tend to shortlist a few first before finalizing the purchase closer towards the end of the renovation, just to give themselves some option in case they see something else they like, or I gave them the wrong measurements. I am really just unlucky.

I mean I can technically get the carpentry replaced, but it is going to cost me a bomb to have it replaced because that carpentry is connected to another piece of larger carpentry, and it will also delay the renovation date, which I personally do not have the luxury of because I am jumping ship in another 2 weeks time! She told me she will drop by the apartment to take a look and then update me on her decision tonight and because of that, I have been on edge just wondering what her decision will be.

To accept and live with the mistake or to demand me to get that carpentry replaced.

 

Update : She hasn't updated me yet and it's already 10.30pm, I was wondering how she was going to see the carpentry considering the fact that there isn't actually any lights installed in the apartment yet, so technically she can't actually see anything properly unless she brought a torch light up. I am just going to assume she didn't actually go up tonight.

This is my first time using this particular carpenter because my go-to carpenter is stuck in Malaysia due to Covid, so a lot of my expectations I had of my go-to carpenter were obviously not going to be met by this new carpenter. Things that my go-to carpenter will usually do by default for me was not done by the new carpenter, and I have never really paid much attention to those specific details before just because it's always done the way I want it to.

The new carpenter did send me a drawing to confirm the measurements, but when you are staring at a detail drawing like this....

For Example...

... you are not going to scrutinize and pay attention to the basic things like the height of the cabinet or the width of each door.

I just expect those to be done according the to their ergonomic sizes, I will usually only pay attention to items I have specifically requested, like additional drawers my clients have requested, or any special detailing works they want to include into the cabinetry for fengshui reasons or whatever. 

Sigh, and I did send the drawings to my clients, so they have also looked through it, but like me, or even worst than me, they won't bother looking at the measurements, they will just have an general look at the drawings and trust that I have vetted through it and approved that everything is in order. 

So who's fault is it? Well, it's mine and when shit like this happens, the carpenter has the detail drawings to protect them while the customer has the obliviousness to this sort of detail drawings to protect them even if they did look through and approve it, because all they have to say is...

"But you are the designer, you should have advised us and spotted the mistake!"

... and I can't say anything back.

The more I have to deal with shit like this, the happier I feel knowing that I will no longer have to deal with this kind of problems at my new job, that being said, I am not that naïve to assume that it will be a smooth sailing journey at the new company because it was pretty clear during my second interview that there is some issue happening within the company. 

We shall see how it goes, I should have a pretty good idea of how much I feel about my new job by the end of the month. 

Sigh, I was really hoping to get an office job, it would just be so much more calming for me to be looking forward to going through the mundane life of a 10am to 6pm, 5 day work week,  working adult. The kind of job that you just grow really bored of, but then the pay is very decent, so you stay and just go with the flow and then end up hating your life because of how boring and aimless it is, sometimes even finding yourself missing your old job because at least it has it's unexpected moment, but hey, at least you are earning a stable pay and don't have to worry about much.