Employed: 3/00-12/00

What I liked: Customer Service, Great Food, Interesting Co-Workers, Smart Regulations.
What I didn't like: Cheap

Arby's was way better than McDonald's despite the fact they gave you the 50% discount rather than the free meals. The food was great. The Roast Beef was delicious every day. The fries, mozzarella sticks, and potato cakes were delectable. The subs with their amazing special sub sauce was to die for!

That could have been literal if I'd remained there. Once I got a second job (see below), I began to literally eat my salary. I would come in and order two subs, a large order of curly fries, a large Barg's Root Beer, and an order of cheesecake. During my time at Arby's, I gained 61 pounds.

The Co-Workers at Arby's were among some of the most interesting I'd had. Of course, they turned over frequently. During the course of my time there, almost the entire staff turned over and between the day I started and the day I left, 90% of the employees had left.

They were much more patient training me than McDonald's and I proved the McDonald's manager who believed I couldn't work in fast food, wrong.

Still, the low pay was a problem, as was the fact that they had trouble giving me the number of hours I needed. Once I started college, I was limited to 5 hours per week, though I would have really liked to have worked 15. I gave my resignation as I had received "an offer I couldn't refuse" from Lance Brown at Peoplesforum.com.

The manager was being really nice to me the last week or so and I almost changed my mind about leaving-almost. The restaurant was selling Holiday Glasses for $1 each. I wanted to buy 4 for my family and wanted the employee discount. I was told that they couldn't give it to me as that was the price they were. I didn't end up buying the glasses and my career with Arby's ended then and there.

Fast Food restaurants, particularly in this area, are incredibly chinsey. What makes sense is that if an employee wants a $6.00 meal you give him a $6.00 meal. If he wants a discount on a measly $4.00 in cups, you give him the $2.00 discount. Instead fast food places pinch pennies and lose good employees because they're trying to make all the money they can. Of course, they're being counterproductive to their own ends because when you have less-experienced, lower quality employees, you have worse service and in turn, less customers coming in.

Still, except for the chinseyness and the fact that it was fast food, Arby's was a good place to work.

Employer Rating (Five-Star Scale): 3 Stars.

American West Community Promotions:

Job: Telemarketer

Employed: 5/00-7/00

What I liked: Decent Pay, Decent Hours, Good Boss, Nice Breaks
What I didn't like: Cold Calling

In the middle of my stint with Arby's, I saw an ad in the paper for a promotion. Through a Local Radio Station, a group called American West Community Promotions was selling their Community Gift Paks. A Gift Pak is a book of gift certificates filled with free offers as well as a two-for-one dining session. They were hiring people to sell these Gift Paks over the phone. The Manager hoped that eventually they'd set up an office in Kalispell that would sell Gift Paks to other areas of the country.

My mom had just told me about a special she'd seen on TV about interviews and how it was important to be upbeat and confident.

I took this advice to the extreme. When I walked in, I must have sounded like I had chugged down twenty mochas. I was so full of enthusiasm that I was offered the job paying $7.50 an hour, $2.00 more than I was making at Arby's. I accepted the job but kept working at Arby's as I didn't want to make this my sole job unless it was a sure thing. I mentioned above that Arby's never got my scheduling quite the way I wanted it. Well, before I had been upwards of twenty or thirty hours a week, but had only been getting eight-fifteen. I finally got my 20-30 hours a week, just as I was also working 25 hours a week at this other job.

The boss I had was the best part of the job. She was a sweet lady named Judy. She was always joking around, always encouraging in difficult times and generally a good person to be around. Of all of the people I worked for, Judy had the biggest impact. She was impressed by my work but more than that she made everyone feel like they actually mattered.

I was a lot more serious than I am now before I met Judy. She really helped me get into the habit of being able to find a humorous outlook on things.

The breaks were exceptional. We were given five minute breaks every hour. Given that we only worked five hours a day, that added to twenty-five minutes of paid breaks per shift worked.

The job was great except I realized it wasn't what I wanted to spend the rest of my life doing. I figured that I wouldn't have much choice about that, though, if I didn't go to College. I also began to lose feeling in my thumb because of how I rested my arm while taking calls.

As it happened, they didn't open a Kalispell office. We had our last day of calling on a Thursday in Late July. Judy was a special woman. On the last day when we came to pick up our final checks, we through her a party and gave her going-away presents as she was moving on to the company's main office.

American West Community Promotions is a great company to work for if Telemarketing is your cup of tea.

Employer Rating: 4 Stars

Peoplesforum.com

Employed: October, 2000-January, 2002

What I liked: Making Money Writing, Learning new skills (database, some programming)
What I didn't like: Minutae

On my 20th birthday, in the midst of feeling burnt out on fast food, and in need of a job that could fit easily fit around my school schedule, Lance Brown made me "an offer I couldn't refuse". Paying me $50 per newsletter to write for his forum and debate site, PeoplesForum.com.

I thought it was a dream job. I would be writing for a living rather than cooking curly fries. Little did I know how demanding the job would be.

Lance Brown was a perfectionist when it came to every aspect of writing. I often found myself resenting what I perceived as "nitpicking". However, in retrospect, I look at Lance, the way people in my grandfather's generation would look at their old Army Sergeants. Simply put, Lance gave me a few good kicks in the pants and in the process helped make me a better writer.

I learned a lot of skills in mailing that newsletter. I gained my first experience working with database software and my only experience working with mailing list processing in the course of this job.

Lance was definitely one of the more interesting employers I've had. We talked about a lot of things. Lance is a fairly deep person and we would spend hours having off-topic discussions. His suggestions could seem somewhat odd at times (such as the suggestion that I needed to watch "South Park" in order to see the arguments against Christianity). [Note:From Lance Brown: "That's not what I said about South Park. It was more along the lines of saying that you weren't experiencing the full range of viewpoints if you shut yourself off from something like South Park. The way you phrased it on your site was more simplified than I recall my actual sentiments being."]

Lance ended my job with the newsletter because he wasn't sure what was going to happen to the PeoplesForum.com. After I left, there was a huge upsurge in interest as people left Salon.bomb for PeoplesForum.com. The site remains alive and thriving to this day. It's a great place for Internet discussion and debate. I haven't had much time to visit, but Lance still runs a great operation. His perfectionism and eye for innovation does that site well.

Employer Rating: 4 Stars

Daily Interlake

Employed: September-October, 2001

What I liked about the Job: A Job "in Journalism" :), Learning the neighborhood.
What I didn't like: The money and the hassle.

"It's a fine life carryin' the banner". Before I got my job at Taco Bell, I had a paper route. For five weeks, I worked delivering newspapers for the Interlake. I wasn't a regular Carrier as that would have required working on the Sabbath. I delivered the Intersection, the Interlake's weekly free advertiser on Wednesdays.

I have a very good direction around my neighborhood and it was the Intersection that helped me learn that as I navigated the city's streets trying to find the fastest route to deliver papers on Kalispell's West Side.

The job was physically demanding as I walked up and down Kalispell's streets. While the delivery part never took more than three hours, the folding took at least two hours. Considering the pay was a flat Independent Contractor rate of $25 a week, the job wasn't worth it.

After I got on at Taco Bell, this job became especially problematic. Tuesday Night had been my paper-folding night, however I worked until 1 a.m. on Tuesday Nights at Taco Bell now. Thankfully, when I came home at night, I saw that my parents had neatly folded my papers for me.

Still, I couldn't keep up the pace and at the end of October, my paper boy days were over. I don't think I really have any specific complaint against the Interlake, just the job. I think the job is intended more for kids who just need a few bucks and can afford to spend the time folding papers and still feel like they're making a profit.

Employer Rating: 3 Stars

Taco Bell

Employed: October, 2001-December, 2001

What I liked: The Money, The Managers, the Old Employees
What I didn't like: The New Employees, The Attitude, The regulations

I was glad to get on at Taco Bell, the fast food wage had gone up to $5.70 an hour and I could use the money.

The managers at the store were all very nice for the most part, especially in the beginning. The employees on the night shift were also very nice for the first month.

Unfortunately, the store was going through an upheaval and so after my first few weeks there. My patient and kind assistant manager was gone, as was the nice younger lady who worked the evening shift, and an older lady who was experienced and patient. They were replaced by three teenage boys (the "manager" included) whose immature stunts and religious harassments led me to file my first and only complaint about fellow employees with am employer. Their actions matched a past record of misconduct but Taco Bell regulations wouldn't allow them to do anything because it was their word against mine.

Looking back, I realize that the employees at Taco Bell was a lot worse than at Arby's and I wondered why. I realized that back when I first started working at Arby's, there weren't a lot of good jobs in the Flathead Valley. Stream opened their Kalispell site in 2000 and my favorite manager, Wes announced he was quitting and going to Stream.

Stream looks for people with Customer Service skills. In the Flathead Valley, these skills are most easily obtained in fast food and retail service. With the good customer service workers gone to Stream, what is left to the fast food industry, are the dregs of the workforce.

Fast Food Restaurants in this valley have yet to realize that Stream's presence requires a new economic outlook. If they want better employers, they have to pay them more. The fact is that McDonalds and Wendy's in other parts of the country turn a profit, while paying their employees $7.00-$8.00 an hour. If companies such as Taco Bell paid their employees more, they'd be able to compete with Stream for good employees. However, they're still playing with the pre-Stream idea in their head that they can pay employees whatever they want and still have their pick of their workplace.

Also, some Taco Bell policies simply made no sense. At Arby's, I could take the mop bucket out into the lobby to mop the area in front of the counter. In Taco Bell, I had to carry the mop from the back of the store to the front lobby, if I had to mop that area because in another restaurant with another type of menu board someone had been pushing a mop bucket and had knocked over the menu board. So to avoid liability issues with the mop bucket, I wasn't allow to take the mop bucket out to the lobby. However, I viewed this as somewhat silly as there was an increased risk from someone slipping on the floor and hurting themselves because of the mop dripping on the floor between the back of the store and the lobby.

The operative word in the fast food industry is change and so the personnel at Taco Bell right now may have a more positive experience than I. Still, I can't rate them very highly.

Employer Rating: 2 Stars

The Kirby Company

What I Liked: Great Product
What I didn't like: Misleading Training, Instability
Employed: February, 2002

It sounded promising enough. $1600 per month guaranteed. So I put in my resume and put my best foot forward. There were a total of three people who were hired to sell Kirby Vacuums. Within half an hour of starting the training, we were down to two. Our instructor introduced us to the Kirby.

The Kirby (for those of you who haven't seen it) is the greatest home-cleaning machine in existence. It combines the features of an upright vacuum, a portable (although I must admit the "portable" was very unwieldy), a canister, and a rug shampooer into one powerful machine. It's also $1600, which is prohibitive in such an economically poor area as the Flathead Valley. I thought that since they were hiring people, there had to be a market.

I was wrong, of course. Kirby had been in the valley for more than a decade. There are around 80,000 people in Flathead County, the number who will ever want to own a Kirby are between 1-5%. The only people who really want a Kirby are those who really care about their carpets and own their own home. When I did a demonstration for my parents, they weren't interested because they rented. Unless you're into the shampooing, if you have incredibly thin carpeting, the Kirby does you no good.

Doing the math, over the course of a decade, one salesperson selling the Kirby average of 3 vacuums a week would sell over 1500 vacuums. Since there's generally been more than one salesperson working, you can double or triple that number to come up with 3 or 4,000 vacuums sold during the past decade. The market for Kirby's is pretty much dried up.

I didn't know this and I ignored the advice of my dad as well as my older brother, Eric, a former Kirby salesperson believing that things had changed. During his time with Kirby, Eric had been confined to doing shows in trailer parks, somewhere you're not likely to sell a lot of $1600 machines. I figured it'd be different as my movement wasn't as limited because there were no senior salespeople.

The training was the most enjoyable part of the job. We did practice scenarios in class. I and the other guy in the class took turns playing a Husband and a Kirby Salesman in a house. Give me a role-playing assignment and I will go to town with it. In this case, I decided that I was a Hollywood stuntman. I asked him questions about what the Kirby could do to clean up the carpet after I drove a sports car through the window and what the Kirby could do about fire. One classic Kirby sales line is, "This will be the last vacuum cleaner you ever buy." When my fellow student delivered it, I (as the Hollywood stunt driver replied), "In my line of work, any vacuum cleaner I buy could be the last one." For various reasons, the man decided that the Kirby Company just wasn't for him.

In training, we were told that selling the machine would be easy. Even easier was getting the "pre-cards". The pre-cards signed the customer up for a drawing for $500 regardless of whether we did a show or not. The customer would then be called and offered a show. I was told that this part of the job would take ten minutes per day.

Well, the first day on my own, I tried it and it took me an hour and a half to get those ten pre-cards. The second day, it took me 1 and a half hours to get two pre-cards and that was because I looked pathetic walking door-to-door in the cold Montana weather.

Worst yet, my trainer had quit and the Store owner was down to Missoula. I did get to chat with the repair guy. One thing you have to say about Kirby is that the people who work there believe in the product. He talked about how the Kirby put its competitors to shame. He was proud of his work and of the Kirby. However, he told me the key piece of information that led me to quit.

He said that the Store's manager was pretty good at selling Kirbys and indeed she "sometimes" sold as many as two or three a week. As a new hire, I was required to sell 3 a week, if the manager couldn't make that regularly, how could I? With no instructor and no manager around to help me, I tendedred my resignation.

Employer Rating: One and 1/2 stars.

Tutoring

What I like: The Kids, the Challenge
What I don't like: N/A
Employed: 09/96-02/97, 03/01-05/01, 08/01, 02/02-05/02

I've had five separate kids I've tutored and I've cared about each of them. With the exception of one child that I was only able to tutor for a week, I made an impact in the lives of each and every one of them.

Tutoring a child is worth all the frustration when you see the impact you make on your lives. Every time, there's pain, it's worth it. I remember one girl who had trouble speaking (she pronounced her "r's" as "w's" and vice versa) and so as part of our tutoring, I helped her with her speaking. She would scream and yell like a banshee because she didn't want to, but I insisted on it despite the fighting. Today, she speaks well because I didn't give up.

My next tutoring job was with a High Schooler. He read at a very low grade level. As part of the America Reads program, I tutored him in reading. During the course of our sessions, I'd write down every word he had trouble reading and the next session we would go over them and we'd keep going over all the words until he had them down. Over the course of my two months there, we added at least a 100 words to his vocabulary.

Another child I tutored struggled with ADD. He had trouble focusing on the work, and we fought a lot. Still, his grades improved during the course of my tutoring. To see improvement made all the difficulty worth it.

Tutoring was the most challenging and difficult job I've ever had and I loved it because I had a chance to make a difference.

Job Rating: Four and a half stars.

Employer: Newspapers in Education
Job: Salesperson

Employed: 6/02-7/02

What I liked: Potential for Commissions
What I didn't Like: Sold to new company

I signed on with the Newspapers in Education program with the promise of a $5.15 an hour base wage as well as 30% commissions on everything I sold. I was told the potential was great. My job would be to contact businesses, find those which may be interested in the Newspapers in Education program and send them information on it. I never liked cold-calling but this was better than Telemarketing as I had a shorter spiel.

Regrettably, in the midst of the sales campaign, the Flathead Publishing Group, the Sponsor of the NIE, was sold to another company which chose not to continue the program in that form. I wasn't able to make my callbacks and only got commissions from those who actually sent in the order without receiving a second sales call.

Employer Rating: Three Stars

Employer: DJC Incorporated (a.k.a. The Montana News Association)

Job: Independent News Correspondent

Employed: 6/02-9/02

See this page for more.

Employer Rating: One Star

Stream International

Job: Customer Service Represenative/Technical Support Represenative

Employed: 9/02-7/03

I had to step back from the job a little bit to discuss my feelings about it. Despite the way it all ended, I left with a very positive experience.

My position as a Customer Service Represenative was the first real good job I had. I got positive recognition, bonuses, and for the first time I accrued vacation time. I found something that I could excel at. Given the high number of call centers, I did a career as call centers are plenteous from coast-to-coast.

When I signed on with Stream, I signed a confidentiality agreement, so I will not reveal specifcs of what went on there. I will say that a general culture of corporate dishonesty prevailed as employees were not always given truthful and accurate information and the company didn't keep it's word to its employees and filled people with false hope. It broke its word to the city of Kalispell by closing before the end of its ten-year contract. In my opinion, their decision to send jobs overseas in a time of war was downright treasonous.

Still, I did get about five weeks paid severence, as well as my vacation pay at the end. But I have to say that Stream's failure to be straight and honest with its employees left a sour taste in my mouth:

Employer Rating: Three and a Half Stars

Current Employer: Not Disclosed. Due to the activity of gay activists in getting Matt Barber fired for opposing homosexuality, I'm not listing my current employer.

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