What's the most unsuitable job you've had?

[Kwickyfeet Icypaws]

Selling encyclopedias was a wild mismatch. However, I did much better with two call center jobs I had later, doing customer and technical support. There were enough technical details to make me "good" at the job, and I got promoted to a more tech position that no longer dealt directly with customers. Thank goodness for the UNIX operating system.

The best trick I found for dealing with customers was that if I could sufficiently proceduralize the support process it would become more repetitive and predictable, and less of a vampiric emotional drain. No diff to the customers as they just want what they called for and rarely see you as a person anyway.

 

[pjcnet]

I almost forgot about a job I almost did and again I was only 18 (roughly 30 years ago). I saw an Ad in the newspaper asking for drivers and to call for further information, I was asked various questions over the phone in what appeared to be an interview, then they told me what the job was really about. They said something very much like, "you will be driving kissagrams and stripagrams around pubs, clubs and other venues, and you will be expected to keep an eye on them", then they said, "are you still interested?", basically the job was a driver and minder for them lol! I answered, "can I please think about it for 15 minutes?" and I agreed to call them back, but my parents went totally nuts when I suggested it, they already hated me working in the "fun pub" I wrote about in my earlier reply and they didn't know half of what really went on there, but this was simply too much for my parents to stand and I therefore had to decline since I was still living under their roof. It would have been the most ridiculous job I could have done, but at the time it was almost like a challenge to do the most stupid and ridiculous job possible despite being on the autistic spectrum, it was to show I could actually do it, in a way I wish I had taken it for the experience even if I'd only survived for a short while, although I probably would have ultimately ended up getting hurt lol!

 

[Panthro]

I'm going to play Devil's Advocate here, and I accept full responsibility...

My initial response to this question was 'my current job'. I used to work as graphics specialist and Tech Illustrator in Engineering Consultancy, and all my colleagues were scientists and engineers. It was great, and I stuck it out for 15 years, but never managed to get a promotion. I got made redundant and now I work as a kind of unqualified supply teacher in a big secondary school - no schedule, no time to prepare, different classes, different rooms, different subjects, different students every 50 minutes all day. No quiet space in the school whatsoever, no career progression, no training, no line management, no mentoring... I guess I could probably stop there...

By all accounts, I should be terrible in this job, but the weird thing is... I'm good at it. In fact, I can be good at pretty much anything I choose to invest my time in. As an Aspie, I score really high on the systematising scale, and I'm very motivated to fit in (please people). This, together with the large amount of knowledge about all sorts of stuff I have accumulated, and the fact that I am a rule-follower (all characteristic in some measure of Aspies) makes me perfect for the role.

Having said that, it is a terrible job. The working environment, the lack of continuity, lack of understanding (from staff - the kids are much more forgiving and open) and appalling lack of efficiency in managing staff in general and me in particular, all make it a nightmarish existence.

I am a tenacious person, and find it difficult to admit defeat, so I am still here (6 years later) trying to change the world around me, rather that working on building the confidence to move myself away from the problem to a better place.

I suppose my point is, that there should be no unsuitable jobs, but there are certainly unsuitable environments, management and colleagues...

I can tell from reading your post that you and I are practically duplicates of one another. All of those traits are strong points for me as well!

 

[Desiree W]

Working at a customer service call center. I sat in a huge room packed with 200 people constantly talking on the phone, while customers were yelling at me through my headset.
There was never a moment of quiet to be had, came home completely wiped out every day. Didn't work there for too long

I can definitely understand where you're coming from. I did CSR call center work for 2-3 months. HATED IT!!!!! Didn't last after that.

 

[Mattymatt]

The worst job I ever had was being a shopping cart wrangler for Walmart. That job absolutely bit the bullet!

 

[HappyHermit]

Secretarial work, hands down. Despite all the noise and the crowds, even bartending was better. The co-workers certainly were! Admin work tends to attract a type of person that I find it hard to get on common ground with. And once you've done it, no one wants to let you out of the admin ghetto - any potential employer thinks that's all you are good for, regardless of what else you may be doing or have done.

It was just about still manageable as long as I thought it was temporary and had a boss who valued my input and independent thought. That boss left long ago now. Since then, I've had to work for people who apparently need to believe that I am stupid. The last thing they want from me is an opinion, they don't keep me in the loop so I can't proactively do anything (which original boss loved about me), and all they want me to do is what they tell me, not unlike a robot.

Interestingly enough, even though I'm apparently too stupid to think, I'm supposed to play Mission Control when it suits them.

It's a no-power job, but it's highly stressful, so boring and dull it's hard to describe, and still uses up quite a bit of headspace. Not something I can walk away from and be done with for the day because the stress follows me. As do emails and calls, often enough.

 

[Aeolienne]

I once interviewed for a job at an environmental consultancy, where I was asked to give a presentation on "The application of statistics to flood prevention". Despite having little specialist knowledge of the subject (the only stats I did during my university studies was a first-year course that wasn't much above A-level standard) I rose to the challenge. I mugged up on the subject and looked up my interviewers on Google Scholar so I could throw in references to their research interests. This worked: I got the job. Unfortunately once I was in the job it soon became apparent that my actual knowledge of statistics didn't live up to the original impression. Within weeks of starting I was expected to get up to speed with the likes of multivariate analysis, copulas and the Akaike information criterion, and all with only a post-doc level paper to assist me - I was told to "just google" anything I didn't understand. Five months into the job I was dismissed for "failing to deliver the right level of technicla input". Since then my heart sinks if I see statistics so much as mentioned in a job description.

 

[Otenba]

All receptionist or retail till work I've ever done. Soft skills were not good enough and they're likely still not. Despite doing a Customer Service college course too. The stress of working in the environment forced me to be redeployed, or I was let go for not being good enough. I hope I never work in these sorts of roles ever again.

 

[Progster]

In an office, where I was responsible for sales to Germany (becaue of my language sales). On the first day, the boss told me to ring up the customers and introduce myself. I struggled with this because:
I couldn't see the point.
I didn't know what to say.
I felt extremely awkward and I couldn't do it.
I did about 5 then i gave up and redirected my energies to sending out leaflets and promotional materials to customers. I only lasted about a month in that job.

 

[Progster]

Also, a language teacher in a state school. Really bad environment to work in, I struggled with many aspects of this job and lost the job.

 

[Otenba]

In an office, where I was responsible for sales to Germany (becaue of my language sales). On the first day, the boss told me to ring up the customers and introduce myself. I struggled with this because:
I couldn't see the point.
I didn't know what to say.
I felt extremely awkward and I couldn't do it.
I did about 5 then i gave up and redirected my energies to sending out leaflets and promotional materials to customers. I only lasted about a month in that job.

OMG, if I had to do that now at work, I'd have a panic attack. Well done you for trying to do that task!

 

[tlc]

Shortly before high school graduation I worked for a cabinetmaker. Very muscular guy and he liked to show it. I had 5 years of woodshop so I knew my stuff. Well his first words were "do you play music, since you've got long hair?" Didn't mind, others found it funny, after all he was right. I mainly just cleaned the shop for him. Then we went out to this high end house. He puts a gallon of paint atop a rickety ladder, no drop cloth, and tells me to paint these beams, and by the way don't spill the paint on these people's carpet. Then he gives me a 2 inch brush to paint this door where no wood member is bigger than an inch, and wonders why it's not working so well. Well we proved I wasn't his kind of painter, so he had me set nails and fill holes with putty on the other beam and sand smooth. Don't remember much after that. But the next day I told him it wasn't working, so I was leaving for something else. He went on a tirade for a half hour about how I wasn't a real man, what a real man supposedly was (him), and how I was going to be living with my parents for an awful long time. Whatever.

I went to work at the metal fab shop my dad worked at, been in the industry ever since. Did outside maintenance until I turned 18 and was allowed to run shop machines. Got a college degree in engineering. Bought a house at 22, working the same job I still do. Still had my hair too.

Without knowing at first, I ended up dating one of the daughters from that house I worked on, 4 or 5 years later. Saw the beams I worked on, and the folks liked me. Didn't work so well with her though.

 

[Anthracite]

Pizza place.
1. I have massive phone anxiety
2. That anxiety stops my brain writing down orders correctly
3. I can't cook to save my life
4. I fundamentally despise the idea of what was in those "burgers"
5. Everyone working there was a massive gossiping back-stabber

I lasted a month, which was pretty impressive to say I cried every night (it was only a few nights a week or I think I woulda gone waaaay sooner).