I recently washed my husband's cell phone. It was left in the pocket of his shorts and ended up happily tumbling through the washing machine. Although a little wet, the phone appeared to have survived the experience -- at first. We quickly discovered that it had lost the ability to dial the number "3". This meant a trip to the phone store to see if we could get it patched up.

We made our way to the customer support desk naively thinking that we could find the answer to our problem. We were ignored by two students on their summer jobs chewing gum while madly texting with their friends. I guess they took the job for the free phone. We had little choice but to intrude and boldly ask to be served. One of them finally obliged. He examined the phone and without making eye contact announced (between chews), "Yeah! You need a new phone!"

Wikipedia explains that customer service "is a series of activities designed to enhance the level of customer satisfaction". This is not what we had just experienced. We felt frustrated, even angry, as we stormed out of the store.

I couldn't help thinking that these people didn't deserve to have a job while so many others are unemployed. But could it just be that they didn't have the right job? Could it be lack of management support -- lack of proper training? Could it be the way that the company treats its employees? While I'll never have the answers to these questions, the fact remains that they didn't do a good job and that affected my experience as a customer.

They definitely hadn't asked themselves: Would I be good at customer service? before accepting this job because they would have concluded that "this path is not for everyone. It requires strong people skills and the ability to adapt well to stress." (Not that stress in this particular case was at all part of the equation.)

Customer service is an important and complex job. It requires excellent communication and problem solving skills as well as all around professionalism. It is the face of the company. My experience certainly makes me feel like changing suppliers. And, if "3" doesn't exist in your phone directory, just let me know, the phone is all yours.

Josée

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I squirmed when I read the Squawkfox article Six Words That Make Your Resumé Suck. It talks about six commonly found phrases that "litter the average resume with buzzword badness." Gulp, I've used no less than three of these bad buzzwords on my resumés, a 50 per cent successlessness rate.

Buzzword Failure No. 1 -- My first mistake, I learned, is using "was responsible for." I should know better than to draw on this easy-to-use but empty figure of speech. As I'm reminded: "Of course you're responsible for something. But how many? How long? Who? What? When?" I feel admonished. But beneath the embarrassment I must concede this guy? gal? makes some sense.

Blunder No. 2 -- My next faux pas is trumpeting "my excellent written communication skills." Much to my astonishment I find that I'm not really standing out when I use this phrase, one the writer seriously dislikes. "This phrase must die," he/she writes. I feel appropriately mortified. A better way, according to my mystery writer, is to specifically spell out what you write and how you communicate. "However you wrap your words, be sure to give the details."

And, speaking of details ...

Misstep No. 3 -- My subsequent resumé pitfall is letting the world know I'm detail oriented. Of course I'm detail oriented -- I'm a Virgo for God's sake. But this writer doesn't care about my astrological tendencies and instead orders me to, once again, be specific, this time about the details I'm "oriented" to. "Give the facts, the numbers, the time lines, the dollar figure, the quantitative data that sells your skills and disorients the competition," this resumé pro barks. Tail between my legs, I listen to this well-grounded advice.

At least I'm not experienced, successful or a team player.

kathyo

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A young man appeared at our office door today. Dressed in a dark suit two sizes too big and briefcase in hands, he wandered in looking for Alison. I have an appointment with Alison, he said. This is the address she gave me, he insisted, uttering the street name and number. But, you see, no one by the name of Alison works here.

Our building houses several small businesses and the sole street number won't do you any good. Do you have a phone number for Alison? I asked. I could call her for you, I added. It's at home, he replied. How about an email address? No, but this is the address she gave me, he persisted in saying.

I felt sorry for my lost Little Prince who was asking of me the impossible. I'm convinced that my unexpected visitor was well prepared for this important meeting, carrying in his briefcase everything he could possibly need. He had however forgotten the essential, the complete contact information of the person whom he was supposed to meet.

I don't know if my little prince made it to his appointment with Alison, but I'm quite sure he will always take the phone number of the person that he's meeting with him from now on.

Josée

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Due to an inconveniently misdiagnosed bed bug infestation in my apartment (the biting culprit remains a mystery to this day), I had to bag my home's entire contents -- from books to clothes and everything in between -- and promptly evacuate the premises. This experience seemed like nothing but a cruelly fated exercise in trying my patience. It was frustrating, time-consuming and utterly inconvenient.

Some time has passed, however, and I have recently found a silver lining. Having had to hastily review all of my belongings, I decided to give or throw away more than I would have in a routine annual closet purge. At the end of the day, there was a reward for all this work and inconvenience: I have way less crap.

As it turns out, you can't put a price or value on the liberating feeling of operating within a de-cluttered space. It's fantastic. It's not just that I know where everything is, it's that the "stuff" I've consciously decided to keep fits into one or more of the following categories: functional, beautiful or sentimental. Everything has a purpose.

Citing expert opinion, a recent canoe.ca article claims that clutter is never the "real problem" and that it really is a reflection of the "stuff" that takes up space in our minds. The article recommends that you ask yourself a series of questions to help kick-start your de-cluttering journey.

Removing workplace clutter can improve your self-esteem, lead you to work fewer hours, and bring down your stress level. Whether or not there is a deep psychological relationship between you and your stuff, the old adage "a clean desk, a clean mind" does seem to hold water. It may help calm you during a particularly stressful day, too -- a point made by Joan Haines, in her seven-step guide to keeping a clean desk, whilst overwhelmed and busy.

I, for one, am trying to keep the purge going on a daily basis, ridding myself of clutter before it starts to pile up. When my renewed passport arrived last week with a thick booklet on consulate information for every country in the world, I was immediately excited by all the information at my fingertips -- but I successfully stopped right there. Since there's little chance I'll be phoning up the Canadian consulate in Melbourne or Johannesburg in the next five years, I had to chuck (read: recycle) the brochure immediately. In the very off chance that I'll need the info later in life, I'll ask my friend Google, who seems to know everything.

SKY

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My husband and I embarked in major house renovations this summer. First, we decided to redo our kitchen. We were later confronted with a leaky basement which led to brick and roof work. Now we are facing major structural repairs.

Armed with our newly acquired vocabulary -- underpinning, parging, pointing, roof flashing and many other words that I still find too scary to mention -- we set out to hire the "reno magicians" who could put our house back together again.

My recent appointment as a hiring manager of skilled trade employees has taught me a few things. First, the more educated you are about the subject matter, the better. Second, the better you are at communicating what you are trying to get done, the better the result. Third, you better expect delays -- nothing is ever done on time (or hardly ever). Fourth, never be afraid of getting a second, third and even better, a fourth opinion.

The best planning doesn't guarantee seamless outcomes. But above all, satisfaction is directly tied to the relationship that the employer builds with his or her employee and in the pride that these employees take in their work

Forget about the difficulties involved in getting the supplies along with the miscalculations, the various delays due to sickness, the City employees' strike that held over our work permit and the many other unforeseen circumstances. What makes it right or wrong in the end is the quality of the work. It doesn't matter that it's not exactly what you have envisioned. If it is done with care and professionalism, everything will turn out right side up.

What will I retain from all of this? I met a lot of incredible individuals who take their work seriously, are highly knowledgeable and who excel at their craft. At the same time, that there are also a lot of workers who are only concerned about putting in the hours, doing an average job and who do not take pride in their work.

There's no way my husband and I could have done ourselves what our old beaten house required. I'm awfully glad that there are people around who take pride in their work. And in the end, it turns out that if you want a thing done well, you don't always have to do it yourself.

Josée

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I came back to work a couple of weeks ago after an extended summer vacation. I expected the adjustment after a long absence to be difficult. It was however surprisingly smooth with one exception -- I found it extremely difficult to be once again glued to a desk all day long. I'm a fairly active person who likes the outdoors and doesn't take well to just sitting for hours on end. I mentioned my antsiness to my colleague who replied that in his opinion most people would be happier at work if they could only look out a window and -- even better -- be able to open it. You see, we work in a windowless room.

It got me thinking about my sister who gets up for work half an hour early to spend time under her light therapy lamp. Being a lab technician she is also sentenced to a cavernous lifestyle.

Windows in most work environments are a status symbol. They are usually reserved for management who are granted enclosed offices with large solid doors. It says I'm important and should not be interrupted. I have worked in offices where people are willing to fight tooth and nail for a window seat.

I also worked in an office that recognized that the health problems experienced by its administrative staff might just be due to a lack of natural light. The office was later reconfigured with open (windowed) common work spaces spread out at regular intervals to give everybody some access to natural light. Management remained (windowed) under closed doors but all of their offices were reduced in size. Forget about smelling the roses though. Office towers are airtight.

Windows or not, the fact remains that a large portion of the workforce is confined to controlled air spaces with artificial lighting and tied to a desk for the greater part of the day. No wonder we hear about high levels of stress, lack of exercise, unhealthy work environment, absenteeism… Do we need to rethink the whole work structure?

Josée

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Last week I spent the night at a sleep lab. I am one of many workers who has a sleep disorder, so I need to keep an eye on my sleep, so to speak.

Although I never felt refreshed in the morning, I did not suspect that I had a sleep disorder and felt that a sleep study would be a waste of time. It wasn't. The study found that I was being robbed of deep sleep (stages 3 and 4) because I was waking up hundreds of times each night, if only for a second.

I didn't look forward to my first study. (I've had three over the past four years). I anticipated lying on a cold steel table in some institutional setting, hooked up to wires and observed by the prying eyes of an invasive lab technologist.

Although I was hooked up to wires, the lab technologist was not invasive and the experience was anything but institutional. The sleep lab I go to is set in a ravine-like area, and, while the facilities aren't exactly the Royal York, you do get your own room, a double bed, thick carpeting on the floors, tons of storage space and a private bathroom with a shower. (Heck, I don't even have my own shower back home.)

This time, after putting on my p.j.s, I met Pasqual the technologist, a gentle young guy who measured my head and then "sandpapered" spots on my skull and face before applying electrodes. For a moment, I felt like I was having my face exfoliated at a beauty salon. That moment passed once Pasqual stuck tubes in my nose. He also placed a couple of belts around my chest and gave me a central receiver box that I had to carry around everywhere with me -- including the bathroom.

While I waited for Pasqual to hook me up to the wires in my bed, I went to the lounge where I met Sonya, a similarly wired woman, who was a t.v.-producer-turned part-time minister. Despite looking like something out of a sci-fi movie, we had an in-depth conversation about our current jobs and our past careers. If only I had remembered to bring my business cards.

kathyo

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All of us in this former "have" province are painfully aware of the decline in the manufacturing sector. So, it's nice to hear about possible replacements for this moribund industry. It looks like there's a good chance that EarthTronics, an American manufacturer of alternative energy products, will open up a plant to make small wind turbines in Windsor, thus creating about 200 jobs. (Ironically, the turbines would likely be made out of a former auto parts plant.)

According to the Ontario government, Canada's wind power market is expected to grow from 1,460 megawatts in 2006 to over 14,000 by 2015. Could it be that wind is the economic white knight coming to the rescue of a province battered by the decline of the auto industry?

Those with technical bent may want to prepare themselves for this emerging wind industry by enrolling in the Wind Turbine Technician Program (PDF) at St. Lawrence College in Kingston. (The First Nations Technical Institute also has a similar program in the works.)

An announcement about the wind turbines is expected later this month, so keep your fingers crossed. In the meantime, get your green thumb fix by taking a look at our Eight Ways it Pays Off to Be Green article or Jobboom's piece on Working for a Better Environment.

kathyo

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According to a blog from Penelope Trunk, who writes career advice for a "new generation of workers," social skills matter today more than ever in the workplace. "Until the 1970s, a smart child uninterested in playground politics was considered eccentric but okay. Since the 1980s, educators see the playground as essential training for the future, and kids who can't navigate are often sent to experts for extra help with social skills." Trunk also contends that fields that used to be havens for loners increasingly require exceptional people skills.

I'm sure there are a few techies out there who may find this unnerving -- not to mention a few writers.

When I was growing up, I always found books and animals a lot easier to deal with than people. But, thankfully, in recent years I've pushed myself and made an effort to develop my social skills.

For instance, the last time I was out of work, I networked by calling up strangers and asking for an information interview. I also (briefly) joined a Toastmasters public speaking group, where the other members were very kind and supportive. (The stint at Toastmasters was brief only because I found work and no longer had free time.)

I've also placed myself in countless group situations; for instance, I join committees in my housing co-op and, no matter how painful it feels, I always stay and mingle after the general meetings. I'm no Bill Clinton (gawd, not even close), but my comfort level around people has increased; I'm a little better at small talk, and I have learned how to participate in groups without alienating myself from others.

I'm still more comfortable around books and critters, but withdrawing from people when I feel ill at ease is no longer my modus operandi.

kathyo

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