October 18, 2010

6 months later.......

Hello folks, nice to see you again!

It's hard to believe I haven't posted here in 6 months, it seems once I got my job I started posting in my other blog and left this one to just sit. Well now's as good a time as any to update you on the happenings.

I've been working at Walmart for 6 months now, and I've made some friends, and gotten used to walking 10 miles a night. I've just recently clocked it with a pedometer, it's really 10 MILES that I walk a night doing the floor maintenance!

We first sweep the floor, each man doing a section of the store with those long dust mops you may have seen if you're ever in Walmart late at night, and then we each have a separate job to do. One guy is the "scrubber", and runs the scrubbing machine that cleans the floor, another guy is the "buffer", and runs the buffing machine after the scrubber has scrubbed the floor, and then there is the "side jobs" guy, who does various other tasks such as vacuuming carpets, cleaning the break room and offices, and sweeping and scrubbing in the receiving areas in the back of the store. He's also the guy that cleans the bathrooms if there isn't a fourth person to do that, which on occasion, there isn't. Oh and there's also a guy that does waxing of one or more aisles most nights, as there is usually SOMETHING that needs a new coat of wax on such a gargantuan floor.

Anyway I've been trained on all the jobs and have gotten pretty proficient at them (all except the waxing, haven't done that one much), and I enjoy what I do, but I've also learned that there aren't any opportunities for advancement within the company if one stays with the maintenance crew. We have no managerial staff, and therefore answer directly to the co-manager of the store that is in charge on any given night. This means that in order to find an opportunity to advance, I will need to move to a different department, and the only other one available on third shift is among the stock crew. I have had a few chances to try my hand at moving freight, in hardware and in housewares, and I like it, and I hope I get the chance to do it again, and eventually move over to one of those departments on a permanent basis. It should provide me with the possibility of moving into a management position, and on third shift, it's not hard to do, as most of the crew seems content to stay where they are.

That's about all for now, but I'll be back soon to write again, I've been away for far too long, and a lot has changed in the time I've been gone.

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