Jobs I Have Known #6: Management

(Note: I've been a horrible blogger for the past few weeks, and then I've tried to ease my way back in, but to no avail.  There is something about reading all the current events plotlines, topics of conversation and notes of interest while not entirely allowing yourself to engage them fully that makes a blogger feel a bit guilty pretending to purport some knowledge or special insight into them.  Hopefully, this post, which is an important one, will also serve as a palate cleanser to more regular blogging.  Thanks for being patient).

For those new to the blog, there was a series of posts previous to this one which detailed my work history up to the present.  I'm skipping one job to talk about my current one, as a small but important chapter in my life is just about to close.

Most readers know (though gory tales have been slower in coming over the past 6 months) that I work at an upscale steakhouse, and have for almost 5 years.  A little less than a year and a half ago, I moved up into management at the restaurant (though I still waited tables too).  I've been managing during the entire life of this blog (in fact, my 3rd post on my fledgling blog, in July of 2004 mentioned the possibility).  The point is, for the entire time that you all have known me, I've been in management.

I began managing for lots of reasons.  First of all, I've been one of those notorious "wasted potential" guys for a while now.  I dropped out of college in 1999-2000, despite a few failed attempts to go back.  After a couple of years of simply waiting tables 5 hours a day, and then doing nothing else, I found myself spiraling into a pool of patheticism.  At first, there is something charming about a job which, at its earliest, requires you to be there at 4:00 PM and rarely keeps you there later than 10:00 PM, but after a while, you realize you are, quite literally, sleeping your life away.

Another reason was my experience I had when the company asked me to go to Houston for 5 weeks last summer to help train employees at a new location.  I saw, from the inside, how the company I work for exists at the higher levels, and I really liked what I saw.  I had a few conversations while I was there that began the wheels turning.

There were other, monetary reasons as well, although the money waiting tables at this job is really pretty decent.  Mostly, it was just the feeling that I was running in place, and I needed a jump start.

So, I mentioned to my GM that I might be interested in managing.  Apparently, that was all it took, because within a couple of weeks, I was doing training in the office during the day.  On a random Friday, I got a phone call asking if I'd like to do a management shift that evening.  I agreed and, fairly unceremoniously, I was a restaurant manager.

For a while, I really enjoyed it.  I guess it was mostly because I felt good about doing something, anything, constructive.  I had some motion in my life, and it was very satisfying.

So, here's a typical management day.  I arrive in the morning at 11:30.  What follows is my favorite half hour of the day, as it is just me, alone in the restaurant.  It's the only part of the day in a restaurant that is quiet.  Slowly, after that, deliveries arrive, porters and prep cooks begin their days, and the place is buzzing in no time.

During this time, I am answering phones, taking reservations, running reports on the previous day's sales, and entering invoices for inventory purposes.

I know, it all sounds dazzling.

Around 4:00, servers begin showing up setting up the front of the house.  I, and the other manager on duty, set up the tables for parties, make the floor chart, make sure everyone arrives, make the bank run, and other mundane activities.

And then we wait.  We wait a long time.  We wait because all that rushing around and getting things done has ultimately led up to a slow, dull hour or two waiting for, you know, people to get hungry.  It's my least favorite part of the day because there is absolutely nothing to do.

The night picks up, we get our pop.  I pull wine for servers, and make sure that food gets run to the tables.  Occasionally things go wrong, and I do a table visit.

Believe me, it is exactly as interesting as it sounds.

As the night draws to a close, I do server checkouts, dispense money, and wait for 10:00 to shut the place down.  Once that is done, it is merely a waiting game until all the guests leave and I can count the money and go home.

On a good day, the shifts are 10 hours long or so.  On a bad day... well... let's just say that it's a lot more than 10 hours.

A funny thing happened about 3 months ago: I started getting tired of it.  Well... actually, I didn't realize I was getting tired of it.  It first began to manifest itself as just a general dissatisfaction for my job.  (It should be noted that this coincided with several fairly chaotic incidents in the life of our restaurant.  Without going into too much detail, we went through a stretch where, for one reason or another, we lost a pretty decent amount of our staff, leaving us severely undermanned.  It was also during this time that the corporate office decided that they wanted to change virtually every step of service that we have in the restaurant.  I wasn't happy about it, but, in retrospect, I probably made that time harder on myself than I should have.  But I digress...)

The malaise I felt severely affected my mood.  I'm generally a happy person.  I'm quite often the loudest person in any given room, and most of the time it's because I'm trying to keep people laughing.  That went away entirely during this time, to the point that I was having trouble getting people to want to be around me.

So, there I was, at a job which was chaotic and unfulfilling, which put me in a bad mood, which caused people, my friends, to not want to be around me, which made the whole situation worse.  Oh yeah, and I was working tons of hours because we didn't have enough people on staff.

I dropped a few hints about it on the blog, but I didn't really talk about it too much.  Aside from some funny stories about customers and the like, I have made it a point not to complain about my job on here.  In fact, this post will represent the most I've said about my job.  This post is also, to date, the post that I'm most uncomfortable posting because of that desire to protect my job, but something that I feel is required, simply as backstory to what is happening now.

So, on to that.  About two months ago, I was mulling over what I could possibly do to enact major change in my life.  I thought about moving away somewhere.  In fact, I talked to some of you about places like San Francisco, Chicago, New York City, etc.  I thought about giving up and just getting an office job.  I thought about a lot of things.

But, eventually, what became apparent to me was that, despite the fact that I was looking for a change, change didn't have to be drastic.  In fact, the answer was something that had been lurking in the background for a while.

Last month, I spoke to the owner of our restaurant and told him that I wanted to quit managing at the end of the year because I had decided to go back to school.  This is not the first time I've tried to go back, but it is the first time that I've really, honestly wanted to go back.  I'm ready to start moving forward.

Which is the interesting part to me: I started managing because I wanted to shake things up and get some forward momentum going in my life again and, in an unexpected way, it's done just that.  While I don't look down on restaurant managers at all (quite the opposite, in fact), I realize that this is something I'll never be happy doing.  This knowledge has whipped up a real motivation in me that I haven't felt in a long time: that the future is unfolding in front of me again, and that I'm not just running in place.

It's just community college for the time being, as I have a great deal of my core curriculum hours still to earn, but I'll be able to work on the school paper there, which I'm quite excited about, and then I'll transfer on to a university where I'll focus on journalism.

It is due, in large part, to this blog that I'm going that direction, but it is the first time in my life that it all makes sense to me.  I've said this often to friends, but I wish someone had sat me down my senior year in high school, when I was dead-set on being a music major, and asked me the question, "What are the two classes that you got the most out of in high school?"  The answer was then and is now, my Sophomore and Senior English classes (Sophomore year with Mrs. Parrish, who taught me how to write, and Senior year with Mrs. Jones, who taught me how to write well), and my US Government class with Ms. Mize (the best teacher of my high school career, who had the uncanny ability to make every single student she had seem like they were her favorite.  She passed away a few years ago of breast cancer, and I'm sad that I can't go back to my classroom and visit her).   If I'd realized it then, I'd have very easily been able to decipher that journalism would be the way for me to go.

This has been lots of rambling, but it was a much needed brain dump.  All of this, incidentally, is not disconnected from this blog.  Without this blog, I would probably never have considered this move.  This blog has been the most fulfilling thing I've ever done in my life.  That sounds overly grandiose, but I've never written anything here that I meant more.  The community of bloggers that I've become a part of, the friends I've made, many of whom I may never meet but feel unbelievable connected to, and the ability to come here, daily, write whatever is on my mind, and that people not only read it but want to read more has been the biggest blessing I've ever received.

Thanks for being here with me during this time, and thanks for being here with me as I move into the next part of my life.  Hopefully I'll be able to make it interesting.

Comments

[Ms. Q]

Dylan! Dude! That is awesome news. I am really excited for you. You will make a stellar journalist! And I am sure you'll make it interesting. Just be sure to remember us when you're famous!

[alleyrat]

wow! congratulations on figuring it out and going for it. i can't wait to read all about it...

[Mark]

Dylan you're a good bloke and I applaud the courage it takes to make a self-enacted life change. Best of luck with it....and perhaps we will meet someday. Shouldn't be too tough to swing. Only question is would you WANT to meet me. LOL.

Keep us informed.

[Kathleen]

This takes me back several years ago to when we worked at Front Row together, and I believe you had just left school. I loved giving you a hard time about how one semester off was going to turn into nine semesters off. One of the few times I've been annoyed about being right. Sounds like you've waited until you knew you were ready and able to go back, so good luck!!

[PSoTD]

Dylan - great news, and I find myself in somewhat the same boat, I've owned the same small business for almost ten years, and now I'm thinking about shaking things up and starting a new business in the next two years. Sometimes you have to let little earthquakes occur in your life, and sometimes you have to do the shaking yourself.

So... congratulations!

[Ty]

Sweet! Watch out Washington!!! You do realize that if you work this right, you could be working in journalism right around the 2008 election? How perfect would that be!! :)

[Lori]

D-my bachelor's is in Journalism and, although I didn't pursue it as a profession, it was the most rewarding course of study imaginable! You'll be absolutely stellar!!

I'd be happy to talk offline about schools and programs if you ever wanna brainstorm.

So, proud of you! Quite something, indeed.