"Why Are You Leaving?"
I have had quite a few acquaintances ask me in the past few days why I am leaving the agency I am at.
I know most of you probably think it's for the new cool job I got. And while I am excited about the new job; I was actually planning on leaving this agency before the new job opportunity came along.
"Why?" you may be asking. I mean, after all, I was enthusiastic about this job earlier this month.
Well, in the past five weeks that I have been here at this company, I have done no work. Not by choice. It just worked out that way. They hired us copywriters (not just me, but all of us) before the work was slated to ramp up. So in the past few weeks, we have just been sitting around doing nothing for eight hours a day.
Seriously. And when we first started to get "antsy" about not having work to do, we were told "Let the work come find you. Don't go searching for the work. "
And also, in the past month, I had a conversation with another copywriter who had been here for quite a while and she said, "Oh, you should just bring a collection of books to work so you can read. You're definitely always going to have lots of 'down weeks' with nothing to do."
So I began to wonder what the need was for so many copywriters. And that's when I started to realize that this is how large agencies operate. And I don't like that. So, I am not an "agency person."
Also, with regards to the work we were going to eventually be doing... That changed. Initially we were told we would be doing some concept-ing and a little more "creative" type of work. Well that changed. Instead, we were basically "word-movers." The one project that I got my entire time here was an email newsletter for consumers. The thing had already been written by another team who had done the concept-ing, and all I had to do was change a few words in the copy based on the client's preferences. The task took me 15 minutes to do. All it involved was cutting and pasting the old words with the new ones.
Huh? I didn't really understand what they needed me for; as I was not really writing for the web. And that is why they hired me. Because of my experience writing for the web.
Also, another frustration of mine was the fact that I hadn't heard from my boss in weeks. So imagine us few copywriters sitting here day after day, with no contact from our manager. In fact, after we started, we didn't see him until a few days after we got here. And WE had to go and find him. He never reached out to us.
This was just a weird experience.
What's kind of funny though is that at my last job, when I was giving notice to the HR gal, she gave me a little grief. I had told her that one of the reasons I was leaving that agency was that I was over-worked and they weren't willing to hire more people to pick up the extra stuff. So I wasn't happy working the obscene hours if that was the "long-term" game plan.
Her words to me were, "Well, you should consider yourself lucky. If you worked at XXXXXXX (the company I've been at for the past few weeks), you would be working 80 hours a week."
Boy was she wrong. I think out of the five weeks I was here, I worked maybe 24 of the 200 hours I was in here.
So that's why I am leaving this place today. The job isn't what I was told it was going to be. And I was going to give notice anyway; but a new opportunity popped up in the mean time (an opportunity that I originally had come my way in December; but passed on because I had already agreed to come to this place.)
Funny how things circle back. But hey, at least I worked here long enough to get business cards!
I know most of you probably think it's for the new cool job I got. And while I am excited about the new job; I was actually planning on leaving this agency before the new job opportunity came along.
"Why?" you may be asking. I mean, after all, I was enthusiastic about this job earlier this month.
Well, in the past five weeks that I have been here at this company, I have done no work. Not by choice. It just worked out that way. They hired us copywriters (not just me, but all of us) before the work was slated to ramp up. So in the past few weeks, we have just been sitting around doing nothing for eight hours a day.
Seriously. And when we first started to get "antsy" about not having work to do, we were told "Let the work come find you. Don't go searching for the work. "
And also, in the past month, I had a conversation with another copywriter who had been here for quite a while and she said, "Oh, you should just bring a collection of books to work so you can read. You're definitely always going to have lots of 'down weeks' with nothing to do."
So I began to wonder what the need was for so many copywriters. And that's when I started to realize that this is how large agencies operate. And I don't like that. So, I am not an "agency person."
Also, with regards to the work we were going to eventually be doing... That changed. Initially we were told we would be doing some concept-ing and a little more "creative" type of work. Well that changed. Instead, we were basically "word-movers." The one project that I got my entire time here was an email newsletter for consumers. The thing had already been written by another team who had done the concept-ing, and all I had to do was change a few words in the copy based on the client's preferences. The task took me 15 minutes to do. All it involved was cutting and pasting the old words with the new ones.
Huh? I didn't really understand what they needed me for; as I was not really writing for the web. And that is why they hired me. Because of my experience writing for the web.
Also, another frustration of mine was the fact that I hadn't heard from my boss in weeks. So imagine us few copywriters sitting here day after day, with no contact from our manager. In fact, after we started, we didn't see him until a few days after we got here. And WE had to go and find him. He never reached out to us.
This was just a weird experience.
What's kind of funny though is that at my last job, when I was giving notice to the HR gal, she gave me a little grief. I had told her that one of the reasons I was leaving that agency was that I was over-worked and they weren't willing to hire more people to pick up the extra stuff. So I wasn't happy working the obscene hours if that was the "long-term" game plan.
Her words to me were, "Well, you should consider yourself lucky. If you worked at XXXXXXX (the company I've been at for the past few weeks), you would be working 80 hours a week."
Boy was she wrong. I think out of the five weeks I was here, I worked maybe 24 of the 200 hours I was in here.
So that's why I am leaving this place today. The job isn't what I was told it was going to be. And I was going to give notice anyway; but a new opportunity popped up in the mean time (an opportunity that I originally had come my way in December; but passed on because I had already agreed to come to this place.)
Funny how things circle back. But hey, at least I worked here long enough to get business cards!
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