Wei: My cousin sent me this. Do you think I should try?
| SUN TRADE · Office Help, Two Days a Week |
|---|
| Monday and Wednesday, 13:00 to 17:00 |
| Work: papers, phone, and simple charts |
| Pay 200 an hour |
| Near MRT Green Line, Sun Hill station |
Ann: Eight hours a week at 200 is 1,600. That is not bad for two afternoons.
Wei: But I have a class until 13:30 on Wednesday.
Ann: Ask if you can start at 14:00 on that day and stay until 18:00. Most offices might move an hour for you.
Please read this before you take a job outside school.
A job can teach you things no class can, and anyone may love the work more than any school subject. It can also take the hours you need for sleep. If your marks fall for two months, we will ask you to stop for one term. This is not to punish you; it is the promise we make to your family.
If your boss asks you to work longer than the law allows, tell us. You will not get into trouble, and we will speak to the company. Many students do not know that the law is on their side.
Dear Mrs. Yeh,
I worked in your office for two summers while I was at school. I am writing now because I have just been hired at a company in Taichung, and I thought of you on the first day.
You once asked me to do the same simple work for a whole week: put every paper in order by date. I thought at the time that you did not trust me with anything better. Last week my new director gave me a pile of papers and said we had lost a document. I found it in twenty minutes, and nobody could understand how.
I am not sure you planned to teach me that. But I wanted you to know it was the most useful week I have ever worked.
Lin Chia
Look at any office chart and you will see boxes and lines. What you will not see is the person who remembers that the electric printer needs a hard push, or who owns the one fancy pen that never fails, or who notices when a quiet worker has stopped eating lunch with the others.
This kind of work has no name and takes real time. It is seldom done by the director. It is often done by somebody near the bottom of the chart, and it is what keeps the boxes above from breaking down.
When such a person leaves, the company is surprised by how much stops working. Nothing was written down, so nothing can be handed over. The lesson is simple: the map of an office is never the office.