Communication breakdown

I think what I really need to do with my life is to become a communication skills consultant for businesses.

Today I have been mostly doing an impression of that famous painting by Munch. I've started a new temp assignment, this time with a different agency. Its hard to know which company is the most crap, the agency or the place I'm actually working at. Everyone is just so bloody vague about everything. I've been told I'll be there for 'a couple of weeks' but no one has bothered to tell me exactly how long that is. Am I there this week and next? Or will I be there the week after as well? This morning I had an induction at a different office to the one I'd be working in. I had to ask what time they wanted me there. If I hadn't, the woman from the agency wouldn't have told me. When I got there I was kept waiting for about 20 minutes because the HR woman wasn't expecting me. Oh joy! All I did was read an info pack and get a badge made up. I made my way to the office at the other side of Bolton. Its not like I went shopping on the way or anything but I didn't exactly rush to get there as the previous day the manager had said "We'll see you when we see you." (this was after he'd said he wasn't sure if I was supposed to go for an induction). I got there at 10.15 to be told that the manager was in a meeting because they'd expected me there at 9.45. Nice of someone to tell me, eh? After a brief tour I was left with the girl who would be training me. Except she couldn't train her way out of a paper bag. Its difficult to describe why she's so rubbish except to say that she was very vague, would only tell me important stuff when prompted by a question, just handed me a sheet with some names & numbers on without going into specifics (or 'pacifics' as she said) about what they did or what half the terms on the sheet meant, muttered something about needing access to the computer but didn't tell me exactly what I needed access to or when I needed to use it... I could go on. Rubbish.

I don't even have a definite start or finish time. I'm told the general office hours are 8.45 til 5pm but that I can sort out with N (the girl who's training me) whether I start and finish early or late as we would take it in turns. She wasn't really willing to give me a straight answer either. And then there was the lunch hour. I can accept that the nature of the job is such that all the calls I take will be different and maybe it doesn't lend itself to a structured training programme but I wasn't even being told the basics. Its a customer service line I'm manning but I've been told just to take messages until N is back from hols next week. Oh yeah, a day and a half 'training' and she goes on hols. Wonderful. God help the poor tenants who are going to ring me. "I'm sorry but I've no real idea what to do with your enquiry, d'you want to take pot luck and I'll put you through to a random name on my list?"

The agency aren't much better. I was sent to an interview last week but given the wrong info about what the job was. When they first rang me about it the woman said it was in Over Hulton on the A6 (or somesuch), even saying herself that the A6 was the road that ran from Manchester to Preston (ie its a fucking long road) then when asked for something more specific she seemed to think that just telling me it was in Over Hulton (on the A6) was enough. Even on the second call they were unwilling to narrow it down. "If you can't find it on Monday just ring us & we'll give you directions." Why not just give me the fucking directions now then I won't have to call you on Monday? They didn't even tell me what the hours were or what the pay was. The guy interviewing me said he'd know whether I'd got the job that afternoon. It took the agency 2 days to tell me that I hadn't got it.

And now to this job. Again they didn't bother telling me the hours or the pay until I prompted them. They couldn't tell me exactly how long I'd be working there and were vague about what time I was supposed to be at my induction. And they've obviously not bothered to tell me that I was supposed to be back at the other office for 9.45 or told the HR lady that I was coming. While I was on my way I got a phone call asking me for details of a referee. Info that I gave them 5 months ago when I signed up FFS!

And now to cap it all, when I got home I've got a form that's been sent to me. Its a form about my tax payments/P45 for the new temp job but I haven't the foggiest idea who its from. No compliments slip, no note, nothing. Is it from the agency? Is it from the Job Centre (I'd tried to sign on again last week as, at that time, no one had called me to offer more work)? Is it from the tax office? Fuck knows. Its a good job I don't have to send it back to the people who sent it to me as I've no fucking idea who they are.

Why are some people just so fucking crap at communicating?

So maybe I should make a corporate video? Design some posters? Become a communications consultant (which, lets face it, might as well be called a 'common sense' consultant or a 'having some fucking manners' consultant) and make a mint?

I need a telepath though. One from TV or film who the general public would recognise. There's plenty of 'em in Babylon 5 but that's a bit too niche. Would the Ood from Dr Who do? Hey, there's a thing...

"Ood have thought it? Telepaths don't actually exist. If I need to know it then you need to open your mouth and tell me."

How's that for a catchphrase?