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Setsuna's crazy adventures - a cataloguing
Setsuna:
Yep, I'm double posting for a reason. I explained what happened LAST week with NISA. I would have written this last week, except you know, I wanted to be in a position to mostly resolve it, and at least that's mostly 'We're quibbling over the discount due to the costs incurred.' as opposed to 'Hey, you just claimed half my wage this week after you already taken the money!'
Now I get to explain what happened THIS week (30th May - 3rd June)
As you might have concluded, I'm in the job market as a temporary worker - or for those who might know one of the formal terms, I work as Labour Hire.
For those who don't know what that is, it's basically short term contract work. Drop in, drop out, paid a rate, no job security. It's not casual, and it's usually around set contracts. It's a 'you get what you can get' situation. Your pay cheques vary from week to week, because you can only get paid on what work you can secure.
Since my specialties are in office administration and I can do customer service, I'm pretty flexible, and the skill set helps with the drop in/out nature of labour hire. It's also a good way to quickly hone in discipline and your skills - You learn very quickly to be good at the job you're in at least to meet the standards required, and you learn that your reputation means a lot, so no slacking. If you don't do a decent job, the agency that you have contact with won't send you anywhere else.
Anyway, it's not a nice position to be in long term due to the lack of stability (I don't mind it though, because the variety due to the changing workflow, but you can't get a regular wage that way) so I work on what job leads I can get so I can get a stable income.
Which leads to a job interview that I attended yesterday.
I was referred to there by my employment agency, after he hooked me up for this interview.
The job in question is appointment setting for sales - you cold call businesses, and you try to convince the business that it's worth their time to consider your company's products, and we'd like to send one of our consultants out there to show you what we have.
It's what's known as soft telemarketing - all you're doing is setting up a sales consultant to do the hard yards, and it's easy enough, but a necessary service, since you're getting the foot into the door. The pay rate's okay (Just shy of $24/hr, but bear in mind that the Australian minimum wage just moved to $17.65 an hour, so it's not quite as much as it first seems.) and I figured I could learn a few new skills since most of my work is customer service, not sales.
The interview was a group interview, and I honestly thought my lack of 'hard edge' wouldn't get me through - basically, if you've seen the Wolf of Wall Street, to be REALLY good at sales, you must have an innate skill to always be closing.
I DO have a sales edge, but I take a more calculated approach - figure out who the customer is, figure out what they want, then hit the angle, and offer 'additional services'. There's objective handling, and basically a little bit of force, and I use a softer version of that - via offering solutions, while tailoring them to make sure they generally lead the way to our benefit.
I also don't wield the skill set that much - I can of course, but you probably haven't seen me use that skill set here, due to the fact I don't have to.
Anyway, I get home after the interview, and I let my contact know about the fact I went there, and how I felt I went - I'm brutally honest in my assessment, because there's no point being otherwise for post interviews. You have to impress, and I felt like I fumbled it.
The conversation that resulted (he called me up roughly 10 minutes after I put in my report) went something like this after the usual greeting:
-----
"So how did I go? They mentioned if they liked me enough, they'd ask me to return on Monday to do a workshop and try a call to see if I'm good enough to go onto the floor."
"They've invited you back for the workshop. Only 3 of the 5 candidates that were there were asked to return."
"Ah okay, thanks, I'll prepare for Monday. I wasn't expecting to pass because I was worried I didn't have a sales edge but I'll take the offer. Is there anything else?"
(Nothing unusual here. He set up the interview for me, so this is regular business.)
"Well, actually, something just came up, and I'd thought you'd like to look at this."
"Oh?"
(This is where things go off the rails.)
"Well, an opening at one of our other offices is available, and I'd like to put you forward for that position."
"... Okay. What position is it?"
"It's a Customer Service Officer position at the agency. I know you can do customer service, and I know you can do this position very well. Can I put you forward for the position to our business manager?"
-----
Now to recap:
- The person on the phone was the one who made the arrangement the day before to set me up to the interview.
- The business I attended to is one of their clients on the employment providers' books
- They know where I'll be, and the status of my hiring (namely second stage interviewing), because the agency earn a commission (It's how they make money of course) depending on how many people land positions and how long these referees hold said positions.
To be fair, the job position IS filling my skill set (customer service, office support and administration and front of house operations) better than my mostly untested ability to cold call and appointment set (Which has not been tested in a business setting) so the offer is reasonable.
... I just don't think very many people can say 'I think I just got poached by the employment agency from right under their clients' own noses.'
mariokirby:
--- Quote from: Setsuna on June 02, 2016, 09:07:39 pm ---Anyway, even someone like me has a few vices, and I like Atelier games as a whole, so in the few vices I have, I figured I'd order Atelier Sophie from NISA, as well as other things cause well, I haven't had a chance to actually enjoy life in nearly a year.
--- End quote ---
Correct me if I'm wrong, but I thought Tecmo-Koei has taken over publishing the Atelier series since they bought out Gust (or something like that). So, I assumed NISA no longer publishes the Atelier games.
But, Atelier Sophie is on the NISA online shop, so I thought that's kind of weird since they no longer work on Atelier games.
Setsuna:
--- Quote from: mariokirby on June 03, 2016, 05:21:07 am ---Correct me if I'm wrong, but I thought Tecmo-Koei has taken over publishing the Atelier series since they bought out Gust (or something like that). So, I assumed NISA no longer publishes the Atelier games.
But, Atelier Sophie is on the NISA online shop, so I thought that's kind of weird since they no longer work on Atelier games.
--- End quote ---
You would be correct that Koei-Tecmo have purchased Gust.
However, it's a bit murkier than that when you look deeper.
My understanding is that Koei Tecmo offers NISA the opportunity to do freelance translation work for the series, as well as offer them limited distribution rights - they're the only entity that will stock the English Limited editions of the game.
KT will handle the regular distributions as per normal though, through their normal distribution channels.
So the relationship is very murky, and my understanding it's actually a loan of specific staff for the projects.
mariokirby:
Oh, I see. That's pretty interesting. Didn't know Japanese companies can hire free-lance translators to work for them.
I'm guessing NISA will also help translate Atelier Firis once it comes out.
Sorry, didn't mean to go off-topic. I was just curious. So, thanks for the explanation.
Hope you get a PS4 soon. Must be a terrible feeling to own a game without the console.
Setsuna:
--- Quote from: mariokirby on June 03, 2016, 09:16:15 am ---Oh, I see. That's pretty interesting. Didn't know Japanese companies can hire free-lance translators to work for them.
I'm guessing NISA will also help translate Atelier Firis once it comes out.
Sorry, didn't mean to go off-topic. I was just curious. So, thanks for the explanation.
Hope you get a PS4 soon. Must be a terrible feeling to own a game without the console.
--- End quote ---
It depends. The translators and the localiser working on the Super Robot Wars game being released in Asia is a direct employ.
And as I said, they may have gotten a contract which lets them work on the game as individuals since they do not have branding in the game, but I DO know that for some games (at least) they worked on the Atelier titles as a contractor.
Not having a PS4 isn't the end of the world surprisingly - Considering the PS4k is inbound later this year, the delay actually works out in my favour, considering I can wait for a PS4 price drop. I'm also tossing up if I want to get Firis in Japanese, as I'm expected to do.
There honestly isn't much of a topic set here - I'm just honouring what I said out to do since I made this thread last year - then again, I'm pretty convinced most people read through the thread so far and have said 'There's no way she's telling the truth. No one person can have that many things happen to them in the modern day and age, and not have gone insane, because reality isn't supposed to work that way'.
It is what it is though, reality or not. Basically, for some people, reality takes a completely different bent, and things don't always work out the way they're supposed to on paper.
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