I read your post twice because I wanted to be sure what I thought I was reading was what you put down. I have to disagree your premise that you are compromising. I don’t see compromise which means both parties are giving up something to make things move to a successful outcome.

At each of your points I see you making the concessions so the other party is not inconvenienced but you have not provided any solid evidence that they are or might be.

In other posts you have mentioned that you don’t deal well with conflict (I think I remember that correctly). I have to wonder if much of your efforts to bend for the customer, even well in advance, are designed to head-off any possible instance of conflict. There is a lot of room between having things go only your way when dealing with a customer and never having your point of view considered.

Two things are happening here, you are teaching your customers how to treat you (you don’t have a life if they need anything) and you are teaching yourself to value your life, happiness and working conditions lower than your customer’s.

On a slightly different front, you made the statement: “…I can’t help but feel that if movie theaters and gas stations have to be open 24-7 as just another way of catering to their customers, shouldn’t I be doing the same?”

It is a marketing myth that 24/7 availability is synonymous with providing good service. The evidence is overwhelming that customer service satisfaction has dropped substantially since the onset of the 24/7 retail environment. My theory about why is that when retailers had set limited hours they knew better when and how to schedule the employees who served the customers and during business hours the main thing was customer service. With 24/7 who knows when customers will arrive or how many. Combine that with the need to offset the expenses of being always on with payroll reduction which leads to a 24/7 skeleton crew composed of jacks of all trades. Instead of real customer service professionals gleaned and trained to serve, not just wait on, the customers the same employee who cleans the bathrooms, and brings the carts off the lot, and does a price check, will turn around and scoop your ice cream; now that’s a tempting thought.

While I am new to the freelancing business I have been a near full-time volunteer over the years. Some nonprofits can be notorious about owning their volunteers and controlling their time and schedules, and even suggesting that people who don’t show up every time for the whole time aren’t very dedicated to the cause. It took a couple of rounds of burn-out because I had four children at home and a traveling spouse but I eventually learned how to set boundaries and negotiate; and my happiness quotient improved markedly. And truthfully Tamara, the voice in your post does not sound happy at all while insisting that happiness is not dependent on getting your way.

I hope you can read this in the spirit in which I wrote it. One of the snarky realities about the internet is that it’s hard to assimilate nonverbal cues into the communication. With that I’ll relinquish the floor.

Deb

Then again, I am not a morning person. I live on the East Coast and it is my dream to work with someone on the West Coast. I would still need to wake up before noon, but not by much .

As for holidays, I usually work them, too. The holidays here in Guatemala aren´t the same for me and we don´t really celebrate North American ones, so I´m pretty much a year round worker.

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