Life of a Tech Agent - Chapter 2

I don't remember exactly what the first call was about. I don't remember whether the person I talked to walked away happy or disappointed, but I do know that that first call took its toll. For the whole day, my stress levels were through the roof. But it wasn't the call itself that caused so much stress; it's the waiting, the anticipation, the dreading. We had a brief before we would hit the floor about what to say, when to say it and how to say it. Then, it was time to record our greeting and get busy.

I can't recall how long the wait was for the first call to come in. It might have been a few minutes, it might have been a good fifteen or twenty minutes, but it was impossible. I'll raise my right hand and say it: it was the worst thing that ever happened to me since my near-seizure experience I had when I got scared out of my wits by a few kids who decided it was funny to hide behind trees at night, and then jump out yelling like lunatics. It's a long story; I won't go deep into it.

The first call I ever took as a tech support agent had a dramatic change on my view of tech support. I had to literally go from not knowing anything to being forced to know everything, and that had a dramatic effect on my psyche. I was simply not prepared, coming out of training, for the caliber of concentration I needed to exert on every call, on a daily basis, and still feel under-equipped and under-trained.

The call itself, I think, did not last very long, but the effect of the call did. I came home that day, I could barely drag my feet on the floor, I could barely stand, I couldn't talk, I couldn't think, and I couldn't sleep. I knew it was going to be bad, but I had no idea it was going to be this bad. I know there were other calls that came in that day, but none of them were as dreadful, as painful, and as stressful as the first. But it didn't get any better for a while. In fact, it got worse.

Throughout the first week, I managed to get an early out due to uncontrollable diarrhea, and my inability to concentrate. I did pull it off somehow to actually make it through most of my scheduled shift while I was in the training grounds of the call center. This, however, wasn't the playground edition of call center, where everything was role-played and in a classroom environment; this was training on the front lines.