The Job Search

I know I haven't posted stories from my life for a while. Much has been written and will return in due time.
I want to make a few comments about my job search.
First, you must realize that I left my last job voluntarily. Yes, I quit. Why? Two reasons.
Note: this blog is filled with opinion and observation. Take it with as little or no salt as you wish.
First, the stress of the job was killing me. Literally. I have high blood pressure and stress only makes it go higher. I've heard it said that Customer Service jobs are among the most stressful there are. Think about it. When you call a company, you're expecting something. To hear about your bill, to make a payment, or, in my case, because you have a problem, and you want it fixed.
As I stated earlier, I worked 2nd tier in a two-tier system. I worked for EchoStar, who owns Dish Network. Dish Network provides satellite TV service. They do it using their satellite to your Dish Network receiver to your TV.
Sometimes things go wrong with them. Then people call me. Or to be more precise, they call tech support, who, if they can't solve the problem, called me. Plus I did quite a bit of tier 1 support before being promoted (I was actually promoted twice, demoted once).
When their TV's stopped working, people got upset. It can be a trivial thing, but people like to watch TV.
Things were rolling along with Echostar until they introduced three new receivers: the 322, 522 and 811.
The thing to note about the 322 and 522 is they are both Dual-Tuner receivers. With me so far? Good. Because not everyone understood how to work a dual-tuner receiver (even installers) and as such, calls to tech support increased - dramatically.
With the increase in calls, came increased wait time, and customers who were more pissed off at Dish Network because of that.
Okay. Imagine your TV has gone out for the 3rd time today, you call, you get transferred to 'Advanced Tech Support', which was me. You're angry about missing Judge Judy, and you want to bitch at someone for a half hour before you let him fix your problem.
This happens on a regular basis.
Stress up.
In the middle of all that your employer makes changes to the rules. Or rather 'Da Rules.' Small changes, that by themselves mean nothing, but the center is a tad more uncomfortable to be in. No more hats in the call center, you have to get your handle time down to a certain point or be demoted. Your Quality Assurance person, who determines raises and promotions, has new rules that make it harder to do your job.
These things (and tons of others) add up. And in my case, the tension was too much.
Now I had spent part of the spring and summer working in the field, as an installer. That lasted about 4 months. It's not that I was incompetent, but my body just didn't have the strength and stamina to do the work. It was bad enough I had to climb ladders when I'm acrophobic. But carrying the ladders and setting them up by myself was too much of a strain. I was not lazy. I was not strong enough. I volunteered to go back to the phones.
But then the stress came back and it built to the point that I wanted out.
But what else to do? I was in a fairly well paying position (for that area). It occurred to me that I could tackle two birds with one idea. Build on my knowledge of satellite technologies and Dish specifically, and the knowledge that people were having problems operating their Dish equipment. I thought I could go into business for myself, giving workshops on how to set up and use the equipment.
I started making plans. I put effort into every aspect of the business. The only thing I lacked was cash for advertising, but I thought with a couple of sessions and word of mouth, I would overcome that.
Well, I was ready to make the jump. I gave Dish two weeks notice, because I could not work for them and do this, conflict of interest, and threw myself into it.
Only it didn't work out the way I planned. I could only afford an ad in the Lynchburg, VA newspaper, and from that ad I got 3 responses. Not enough to even justify the cost of renting a presentation area.
Money ran out. I got evicted. I got into a car wreck that ruined my transportation. And here I am.
So, call me lazy if you must, but the effort was there. I'll add more later on the search since my business went bust.