Everything I Never Learned about Being a Good Employee

In early 2021, the entire world was just about able to breathe a sigh of relief, in hopes of possibly having a COVID-free remainder of the year.

Unfortunately, that hasn't exactly been the case, but people are still trying desperately to find some sense of normalcy. That includes the world's global workforce.

Everyone from astronaut to zookeeper is trying to rethink things, and figure out their lives.

You hear news reports about shortages of workers, and companies unable to fill jobs, not just all over the nation, but all over the world.

My ears can't believe reports coming out of the U.K. It was announced recently that McDonald's made the decision to discontinue selling milkshakes. This was due to a shortage of truck drivers who generally transport the necessary supplies.

The popular worldwide food chain apparently tried everything before being forced into the decision. According to one USA Today report:

"Supermarket chains in the UK like Tesco are offering bonuses over $1,000 to incentivize truck drivers to continue delivering goods."

Anyone with half a mind can see that the future of work is questionable and the changes on the horizon are uncertain.

My current job of caring for my disabled sister seems to be pretty set in stone, but it does make me recall how things weren't always so stable and secure.

As I consider the current work situation and existing job market, I allow myself to think about what work used to look like for me, so many years ago.

Work Ethics Require a Good Foundation

Going to work and being a star employee relies on your ability to learn and always display good work ethics. This logic is based on the advice and opinions of anyone who has ever achieved a level of success in the work force.

They have a valid point. Developing good work ethics is just like everything else in life that's worth learning. The right foundation needs to be laid before you can start building.

But what exactly are good work ethics? And can someone still learn to develop them, even if they don't have a positive role model in their life?

The answer is a resounding "YES", and I'm a living testament to why I can answer so emphatically.

Good Work Ethics Must Take Root

It's strange to realize how many things I never even learned about going to work and how to be a good employee. Growing up in foster care is a toss of a coin, and I guess I got tales. There was never anyone to teach me or be a suitable role model.

But somehow, I discovered a lot of valuable life lessons, most of them learned through trial and error. I rarely had people in my life who cared about me, or who encouraged me to aim high.

The great thing about the hearts and brains of mankind, is that sometimes, all it takes is a small amount of love, or caring, or words of kindness and encouragement.

Sometimes, just the smallest fragment of the right stuff can be enough to plant a seed, and allow it to germinate, even if it's at its' own pace. I strongly believe that is what happened to me, and how my work ethics eventually evolved for the better.

But in the beginning of my young adult life and my venture into the workforce, I displayed a lot of poor work ethics.

1. My attendance on jobs was typically poor.
2. I never worked a job where I had a desire or ambition to move up in the company.
3. Wherever I worked, I always had one foot out the door.

For me, those early years of trying to navigate adult life, and the mainstream work force, were a series of short term jobs.

Ironically, most of them had long term possibilities, including companies like: Max Factor, Neutrogena, Capitol Records, and Fox News (I actually might have dodged the bullet on this one).

Although I accepted a multitude of short term temp assignments, I had ample opportunity to work full time for any of these companies. I practically always turned them down.

But even when I did chose to accept permanent positions, my good work ethics were still underdeveloped. I must admit, I burned through more great jobs than I care to remember.

Displaying Good Work Ethics on the Job

With age comes experience, and if you're lucky, a great deal of clarity. I learned a lot about myself over the past several decades, and much of who I am is wrapped up in the jobs that I've worked.

Fortunately, the few good people that have graced my life, have been enough to impact my life for the better. Remembered conversations and shared affirmations have been instrumental in helping me create good solid work ethics; ethics I can be proud of.

• I learned how to land good jobs with good benefits.
• My work performance was always exceptional and didn't go unnoticed.
• My personality and work demeanor was always professional and well liked.

These admirable work qualities, I was eventually able to accomplish, in spite of myself. But my greatest joy was remembering the one position I had, that gave me more pride and admiration than any job I ever performed.

Finding Work You Love

For years, I worked probably every kind of job you can imagine. I've been a waitress, a switchboard operator, a dispatcher, a receptionist, a bartender, a cafeteria worker, a preschool teacher, an office clerk, a librarian, a personal assistant, and another long list of interesting jobs.

All of these jobs came before I discovered my desire to be a writer. Every job I worked, I learned to love the job I found. And that was the problem. I wasn't my happiest, until I learned to find the job I loved.

That job came in the form of a county position as an ITC (Intermediate Typist Clerk). Sounds thrilling right? Well it was, sort of.

I worked for the Los Angeles County Adoptions Division, which handled all the adoption cases for the county, as well as children caught up in the foster care system. As you might imagine, this job really spoke to me.

My job was to receive and unpack boxes containing case files of adoption related cases; specifically files that were on their way to be archived.

For the first four months I was there, I worked in a huge room alone because the county was understaffed, as usual. My file room was a three month stopover, where the files were processed and housed, prior to continuing on to central archives (wherever that was).

During the time the files were with me, I verified various documents and entered details into the computer.

Huge case files typically consisted of documents on numerous siblings, and records about entire families, in order to preserve the history and chain of events leading up to the adoptions.

My first day of work, a slightly disabled supervisor showed me my duties, as I looked around the chaotic room full of files and banker size boxes.

Most of the unpacked boxes were just sitting around, with unprocessed files, making them unavailable in the event a social worker required a case.

Whenever a worker did happen to require a file that couldn't be located in the computer or on the shelf, there would be a mad scramble to locate the missing file.

Initially the room was a mess for the first week or so that I was there, and the supervisor had come to accept it being that way. She made it clear that the most she could expect, was for me to try and keep up with the new boxes that were coming in each day.

Since she worked two floors below me, I was basically on my own, except for two or three times a week, when she came down and tried to help me with the mounting backlog.

The lack of organization was unbelievable. I tried being okay with the situation like it was, but it just wasn't acceptable to me.

I don't think it was really a matter of my work ethics. I honestly believe it had more to do with how I viewed each one of those boxes and files. To me, they represented children.

Whatever reason a social worker came looking for a file, meant there was some child who had a need that was going unfulfilled.

I began coming in early, leaving late, and working through breaks and lunches, until I finally got the room in tip top shape. My supervisor was surprised and impressed and I was just pleased that things began to flow properly.

I took nothing in my job for granted, and I didn't allow the work to pile up. Each file properly processed meant:

• A copy of a birth certificate was available for a child trying to start school.
• A clothing voucher was justified, so school clothes could be purchased.
• Documents could be verified and a birth father could be located.

Whatever the situation, a child's life was involved, and no one understood that better than I did. My work had never before been as important to me.

Pride in Work Performance

The pride I took in performing my job at the county everyday went beyond my expectations when I created a super efficient tagging system.

Cleaning up the place wasn't good enough. I was set on making the file room function better. Files needed to be readily available when workers came looking for them. That meant not just unboxed, but properly shelved.

While it wasn't always easy, I set a standard in the file room that I was very vocal about maintaining, in spite of how future co-workers tried to perform. Being mostly unsupervised, the natural inclination for some workers was to allow things to get lax, but not on my watch; not with my files.

At the time, the system the county had in place for locating files and pulling them off the shelf, was counterproductive.

We were writing the necessary information required to pull the files from the shelves in the wrong place. It was scribbled on the sides of the folders, requiring us to slide each file out, check the date, and either pull it off the shelf, or slide it back in place.

This backward system was tedious, and prevented us from accurately pulling files in a timely way. It took me five months to recognize the problem, although they'd been doing it that way for years.

I created a tagging system; placing the tags facing outward, and hanging them on the string we used to bind the files together. First, I designed a model tag with all the relevant fields we would need. Then I printed several models on one sheet, and used a paper cutter to cut a bunch of them out.

All we had to do when processing cases, was to fill in the tags, with all the necessary case details, including when the file was scheduled to go to central archives.

By reading the tags, we could tell precisely when the files were scheduled to be pulled off the shelves, packed, and shipped out.

A month or so after this brain storm idea, I perfected the system even more, by color coding the tags. This made things flow even better, by having different colors symbolize different months.

Now we could glance at the tags from a distance, and estimate which months required the most work.

Of course, everyone loved the system, and when I left the company a few years later, they were still using it.

In fact, knowing how antiquated the County is when it comes to things like this, they probably still use it today.

Final Thoughts

Needless to say, my past life enabled me to have something in common with every file that passed through my file room. I felt responsible for those files, as if they were the actual children and families that each file represented.

I'm happy for the privilege to have worked for such a worthy cause, and for having the good sense to treat the job with dignity.

It feels good to be able to recall a former job where you know the value of your work performance had a positive impact on people's lives.

I hope that whatever happens with the future of the workforce, there are young people prepared to help make a difference by developing good work ethics.

May they appreciate the jobs they agree to take on, but not without giving thought to the kind of work they might enjoy doing.

May they display good work attendance and set their sites on higher positions in the companies that employ them.

May they go to work each day, with a view to longevity, and not always ready to take off and throw in the towel.

May they get to know their companies and places of employment, and be the kind of co-worker they would like to have themselves.

And above all, may they always perform their work to the very best of their ability.

Perhaps one day, another generation will be able to look back and know there was at least one job in their past, that they can always be proud of having done.

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