What do you do?

[JillA 2]

Sometimes I wonder, what do you do? Often people speak about their jobs & bosses, good and bad and it makes me wonder what you all do. I'm just curious

When I was employed in Canada, I used to work for a shipping agency. I handled customer service, import and export. So say you were moving from Canada or the US to Australia, NZ, South America, Africa, you'd call me and I'd provide you with a rate. If you liked the rate, you'd make the booking with me and I'd arrange a shipping container to go to your home or business or whatever and also handle the customs paperwork. We made bookings for lots of interesting stuff, pork, beef, airplane parts, tires, and had a lot of big companies as customers, like Walmart, Old Navy, Sobeys. It was a good job and I enjoyed it thoroughly. Now that I'm legal to work, starting to look for a new job and it made me think: what do you all do?

[Emancipation 2]

THAT is a cool job JillA! TOTALLY.. so when my architectural millwork firm sent a container to Barbados a few years back you could have totally hooked me up?

Ah.... I do administrative assisting now. I used to be an office manager for an architectural millwork firm, and before that I was a youth pastor.

[JillA 2]

THAT is a cool job JillA! TOTALLY.. so when my architectural millwork firm sent a container to Barbados a few years back you could have totally hooked me up?

Ah.... I do administrative assisting now. I used to be an office manager for an architectural millwork firm, and before that I was a youth pastor.

I could have totally hooked you up! We go to pretty much every continent, anywhere a ship can go we can go too! I also came to Philly on business a few times as the Philly office is the US headquarters, and the port is here too where many of our ships sail off the east coast. So, I met my American love through work therefore I'm happy I worked there

A youth pastor - that must have been a rewarding job for you to do.

[Emancipation 2]

A youth pastor - that must have been a rewarding job for you to do.

It truly was.. have had many many amazing experiences with teens & their parents. Still have my teens call, FB etc. all the time, which is wonderful to see now they are all grown up ..

A few months back one of my teens from my 1st group (over a decade ago) came online and wanted to chat.. she said "you know how you used to say I could talk to you about anything?", well she'd been at a party, gotten drunk, had unprotected sex and was terrified.. needed to talk to someone and for some reason I came to mind.. I was stunned.. you NEVER realize the impact and influence you have on people in whose lives you invest. I was honored & more than glad to help her through that tough time.

Edited April 17, 2009 by Emancipation

[Udella&Wiz 325]

Udella (Beckie) = Software Quality Assurance - I test websites / software/ hardware / java services etc etc.... Requires analness - so right up my alley!

If you're not in IT - you may not realize that every piece of software has been tested (no, not always well )

So for example - when you go to the bank site and sign in - someone has tested that the pages look good according to some company requirements, it has the right 'look and feel', the buttons work...when you click the button they do what they should do and don't do what they shouldn't do

When you look at your bank statement online - there was a service behind it which was tested which hooked into a database of some kind and brought back all the transactions which belong to you and not accidentally anyone elses. I try to hack into our programs to expose vulnerabilities.

But I digress......soetimes people will give you a blank stare so I just say Quality Assurance.

Wiz(Don) = Web and &Java developer - basically he writes the type of stuff I test - very cool. He's a big old smarty pants and so cute too!

[trailmix 77]

My last job before moving was with IBM, working on the Calgary Health Region account - basically handling/coordinating all their IT needs.

I've done lots of stuff though - I basically chose that job because I could work from home.

[redBlue 1]

My last job before moving was with IBM, working on the Calgary Health Region account - basically handling/coordinating all their IT needs.

I've done lots of stuff though - I basically chose that job because I could work from home.

trailmix:were you be able to find a similar job in US?I hope u did,sounds like a cool job

[JillA 2]

My last job before moving was with IBM, working on the Calgary Health Region account - basically handling/coordinating all their IT needs.

I've done lots of stuff though - I basically chose that job because I could work from home.

I would LOVE to work from home! Yeah!

[trailmix 77]

My last job before moving was with IBM, working on the Calgary Health Region account - basically handling/coordinating all their IT needs.

I've done lots of stuff though - I basically chose that job because I could work from home.

trailmix:were you be able to find a similar job in US?I hope u did,sounds like a cool job

I'm not working right now - and not looking for a job

[SapphireDreams 71]

I work in Public Relations at a PR Agency that specializes in Technology.. I specialize in deep technology, business software solutions and manufacturing technology - all Business2Business media relations and strategy. Sounds really boring, but I really love what I do. I've had some really amazing experience working for some big tech clients doing both Canadian and US PR. I've also done some Consumer stuff as well just to diversify so when I move I can work in either industry, but shockingly I prefer B2B. As much as I love my job, working for 3-5 different clients at once in such a fast-paced environment, I am SO ready to take a bit of a break. My job has a high burnout rate! I'd like to eventually do PR on the Corporate side or at a Hospital or University once I settle down.

[thetreble 19]

I've worked in Transportation, as many of you know, for quite a few years.

I worked for the Region of Waterloo for years in the "systems" department which dealt with signals at intersections. We oversaw over 500+ intersections in real time and were able to adjust lightening time based upon accidents, events, etc.

We worked with GIS systems, mapping...pedestrian signals...it was cool.

I started out working in Roads just doing stuff with collision reports and stuff.

Now I'm working in Transportation and Parking at a university. I deal with parking tickets, buses, road maintenance...all sorts of things. I don't like my job really at this point because parking is a really hard job to do. We have 20,000 students and 5,000 parking spaces on campus. It's very crowded and kids call me and yell at me all day. It kinda sucks to be sworn at and screamed at but its my job.

[Sprailenes 47]

After college I started working as a server at a hotel in my town to make extra money. About 5 months of waiting tables I was promoted to restaurant supervisor and shortly after that manager, and then I went on to be the assistant to the events planner. You'd think that would be great right? Wrong.

Unfortunately hospitality is a rough job and there were days where I wouldn't see my son and that wasn't acceptable. Plus the stress of everything put me in the hospital so I quit and started working at factory doing welding... 5 days a week, shift work but I knew I'd get to see my son on weekends and to me family is really important. I learned what all work and no family could do to relationships and I aimed to change that.

When I moved to NJ I started working at a Hampton Inn at the front desk - took what I could get to start and then went on to become the Sales Manager there. But the place got robbed, I got scared and it was just kind of a sleezy place to work so I left.

Now I am an administrative/membership assistant at a Country club. I do most of our advertising as well as create databases, plus whatever anyone else chooses to throw at me. It's basically tuesdays to fridays 9-5. I think I lucked out there. And they're very understanding when my son has PA days or snow days. They are just really good people to work for.

[The_Dude 1,142]

God i've had too many jobs. When I was in university, I was a lifeguard. Right after graduation, I got into marketing. I was an account manager for an entertainment marketing firm. It involved going to concerts, clubs and bars 6 nights a week and conning fans into handing out flyers and putting up posters. Grassroots stuff is really kind of boring. I hated it and then got into accounting and finance. After a while, I hated that even more. So at this point, I had a university degree, and I hated every job in that particular field. So what to do? I went into teaching of course. I taught special education for 3 years. It was rewarding, but very taxing personally. The kids were great, it was the parents who were the monsters. They would nitpick every minute of every day and complain that some other kid was getting 2.2% more time per day than their child. Or there were the parents who just couldn't come to grasp their child's handicap and would do their homework for them each night and try to convince school administrators that they should be in normal classes.

Which leads me to now. I work in court services for a police department. I coordinate subpoenas, summons, court orders for the police officers and handle the appearances and overtime for them. Kind of boring, but I really like the people I work with. Never ever thought I'd work for the government. Lot of good a double major in economics and marketing did.

[BermyCat 1]

My first job after university was as a programmer, mostly C++ and Java. I wrote imaging software, device drivers, embedded software and anything else that seemed interested. I gravitated to startups which meant really, really long hours. It wasn't uncommon to work until very late, crash on an available couch for a few hours, then program some more. I was just beginning to burn out when the start-up I was working for went under so I decided to get an MBA. I worked in B2B hi-tech and IT sales until I moved but I'm not cut out for sales. I'd like to get into software product management.

~ Catherine

[Krikit 1,163]

I can't tell you. It's a secret.

I'm on an undercover assignment now.