Training Day

You know you have a crappy job. Day after day, the redundancy of it all. Robotic finger jabs at keyboards, creating data that nobody will even read. Statistical studies and pretty pie charts, while you sigh and twiddle your fingers whistling a tune that only you can hear. You know it's true, that robots could replace you, your job is on the outskirts of useful. Perhaps you too are on the same outskirts, you and your whole life.

Knowing all of this it still put it all in perspective while I taught a new employee my entire job and protocol in 3/4 of a shift of work. It wasn't that she caught on quickly, or that she was overly intelligent, it was the fact that the job could be done by anyone, or for that matter anything. "So what's the first step?" She asked me her big eyes hungry for the inner workings of a dead end job. "Well....let's see first you type in what it says in this box here where it says plaintiff. First you have to type in mm, which is the action code for miscelanious, and then just type in the plaintiff, the deputy and the deputy's phone number." "Wait what's the action code again?" I thought she was just kidding, trying to make me feel inteligent or empowered with all the answers, but she was serious. "It's mm." "Ohhh ok." She typed away at the first step and I realized that once you figured out all of the little things like action codes, command lines and the navigational stuff, therest was just finding a place to hide inside yourself while the hours ticked away and the fingers clicked and clacked spewing uselessness. I didn't tell her this though. "You'll get it there is a lot of procedure but once you get it all down you'll be able to whip through it." "Ok got that part what now?" Now you run for the door and don't look back, trust me you don't want this job and you don't want to be in this unit. "Now we have to find the guy's social security number, so do you know how to use TI?" "A little bit but I just started using it." Well then you're that much closer to sighing all day and gorging yourself on rita's bean dip at the potlucks, welcome aboard sailor. "That's ok, so first type PA then hit TI, then tab over here and type XN, now type in the guy's name and hit enter." "Ok there was 78 results." "Ok try and match the address or a city that is close." I like to pick the cities that I would live in if I was, what's the name on the file? If I was Jorge Hernandez, I would live in Buenos Aires, do you like Buenos Aires?

"I found a match." "Excellent, ok so now go down to it and type in the line number and then hit enter." "Ok done." "Alright now cut and paste all of that information into the progress screen under the action code TI. After that you have to write it down on the judgement as well, get his ssn and his address if it is different from what is on the judgement." Look at that monkey type I thought, if I had a bananna I would bounce it off her head and say good monkey, that's a good god damn monkey. "What?" "Oh I didn't say anything, so you got all of that right? Ok now you have to calculate the interest, and then type it into the account info using an mm action code." "How do you do that?" "Just type mm and then original- 4520.32 interest- 522.40 Total- 5042.72 and then save it." "What is the action code?" "MM" I know it is a lot of words being thrown around but the basic reality of the job is data processing, look at the paper and type it in, cut from here paste here, push print and put it in an envelope. The steps may be many, the workings of the system a little technical but once you have the basic pattern you will want to die from the simplicity of your employment. You will sit here day after day and think is this how my days should be spent, how many brain cells are dying from neglect, do brain cells die from neglect? You'll have time for all of these questions soon enough little one, shit by the end of the day you will be a veteran, you can probably train someone tomorrow. I snapped out of it as her hand waved in front of my face, that quick bak to reality head snap and the retrevial of drool that had been pooling in the corners of my mouth. "Ahemm uhh ok, uhhh now you need to go out of this and hit the system key and then type in the account number and eneter the address." "Where is the system key?" "Right next to the any key hahahaa just fucking with ya." Did I just say fucking with ya to a new employee, that joke wasn't even funny in the first place, my lack of caring soon squelched whatever desire I had to apologize and make the situation even more uncomfortable. "It's right here," I said as I reached down and hit it for her. "Alright after that what's next?" "Wait when do you start down here?" "Uh I'm not really sure I think in June." "Did they tell you that they are going to have a completley new system in June, all of the stuff you are doing will be automated." "Yeah I kinda heard that, but my boss sent me down here so I don't know." That is the sign of an effective company I said to myself, teaching a new employee useless system protocol just before it becomes outdated and their job becomes automated. Double the useless with a shot of burecracy, beautiful. "Ok so either you are going to forget all of this before you start or you won't have to know it because it will all be automated." "Yeah something like that.......