My name is Becky. I work at Tom Sturgis Pretzels in Shillington. I have worked there for 6 years now. I absolutely love where I work. I am a manager and have had the privilege of hiring my own employees to work with me. Of course, having said this, I love who I work with in the office. About 1 1/2 years ago my job duties expanded to include production. I work full time plus in the office as the office manager, and I am the on call manager for 24 hour production as the production supervisor.
As for my home life, I have been married for 10 years and have an adorable 3 year old daughter. She loves coloring and playing with play dough. She is the best and most trying thing in my life. If you don't have kids you can't judge me on that statement.
I am just over half way done getting my MBA. I started about 4 years ago. I put off going back to school trying to decide whether I wanted to get my MBA or get my RN. After thinking about it for about 3 years, I finally decided to go with the MBA program. Of coure, I promptly got pregnant. I took 3 classes while I was pregnant then took about a year off after having my daughter. Now, I'm trying to balance a 3 year old, a husband, a job and school. Some semesters are easier than others. Fall is our busy season at work, so this semester looks to be super stressful.
Hi Becky
ReplyDeleteI totally agree with you that having a family, work, and study all at once is definitely a very challenging experience because there is always a risk that you have to take in consideration. When I came to this country the first time, I had a 3 year-old daughter and I was 2 months pregnant of my second one. It was a long stretch to finish my career because of the time that it took me to educate and teach my kids about our culture and language in order to give them a more stable and clear identity. The identity will help them to visualize the world with a more broad and definitive perspective of life.
What a hectic schedule, quite a full plate with the things you take care of. Glad to see you are progressing along with your MBA, with a 'break' in the middle for family. While undergrad, I did 12 credits plus a 40 hour work week for a while, so I understand some of your stress.
ReplyDeleteI'm hoping to hear parts about your work experience as it relates to this class at Tom Sturgis. Based on your comments, I'm guessing you've had few employee relation problems and can share what you think has contributed most to a calmer working environment. I looked up the website for the pretzels and just learned what the OUD symbol on the packaging means.
Wow, taking three classes while pregnant. That's quite a feat, and must have been ridiculously stressful. I took three classes while working fulltime during the spring semester, and I know that I will not do it again...
ReplyDeleteWhat's it like being a manager and being able to hire your own employees? It sounds like you really enjoy your job, which is great. Not everyone can say that, and a lot of the people I work with say "as long as it pays the bills" when asked how they like their jobs. I think this is a poor attitude to have but I realize that there are people out there who'll never be happy no matter what they do in life.
I see you're a 24 hour on call manager for production. I was the emergency contact for my department at my last job and would get called in at 3am for all kinds of crazy things. Sample refrigerators losing cooling, bad freezers, etc... I'd have to remove samples and find replacement fridges and freezers to store them until the others could be fixed. I'm just curious as to what happens when you're called in? do you have to stay for the entire shift?
I agree with you about hiring your own staff. I had that opportunity when I was restaurant manager. I was brought in to clean up the evening staff. It took 6 months, but it was well worth it.
ReplyDeleteI don't know about the pregnant part, but I did take some time off from my MBA studies while my wife and I raised our 2 kids. They are now 4 and 2 so I figured it was time for me to get back into the groove after a 4 year layoff. I was planning to take 2 classes this fall, but with my work schedule I couldn't. It is hard balancing work, family and school. I would love to come home from work and be able to sit down and work on my MBA, but my kids take priority until they are in bed. I wouldn't change it for anything.