Reflective Pieces

While working at Hollywood Video, I realized that choosing a slow, relaxing job may have not been the best choice as I found myself fighting to stay awake. I wanted a change of pace and thought that being a retail store, it would have some sort of customer base, but I was surprised at how few people still actually rented movies from video stores. As the day dragged on, I counted down the minutes until I could leave and dreaded having to do it all over again tomorrow. I knew I had stuff that I probably could have done to pass the time, but not anything I was excited about doing. I asked myself, “When will this day end”? Although a laid back work environment, like Hollywood Video, seems less stressful and more intriguing, the increased productivity, higher quality employees, and overall quickness of the day makes a fast-paced work environment, such as Arby’s, the better choice.

Increased productivity in the work place is vital to a well-run company. Without productivity, everything would constantly be falling behind. Working in a laid back environment could potentially give someone the chance to get stuff done, but where is the motivation? Nothing is there to motivate or push someone, so what is stopping them from just standing around and talking with friends, or checking on Facebook? For example, I found myself looking on Facebook and playing games on my phone quite often while working at Hollywood Video. Having a lot of extra time on their hands gives people the “I will just do it later” mentality, and nothing will ever get done. I found this to be very true in the case of most of my employees.

In contrast, when working in a fast-paced environment, there is no chance to slack off or put a task aside until later. Everything is constantly go, go, go, which makes it easier to get the necessary things done. Constantly being busy and concentrating on tasks keep the mind on track at all times and provides no time to day dream or get distracted. While managing an Arby’s, I got a lot more stuff done throughout the day than I did while managing a Hollywood Video store. Everything at Arby’s was fast-paced which kept me on track all day to get stuff done before my shift was over, so I did not have to stay late.

Along with increasing productivity, a fast-paced work environment has a way of easily weeding out employees that just cannot hack it. Just about anyone can stand around and occasionally help a few customers here and there, but it takes a good employee to be able to keep up with things in a fast-paced work environment. Sometimes it was hard to tell which one of my employees was truly great at Hollywood Video. If the store was fairly clean and there were no customer complaints, it seemed like an OK night, but I never knew if they were sitting on the counter most of the night or out on the floor talking to customers as they should be. Managing people at Arby’s, however, was a different story. I could tell pretty quickly who was going to be great and who was not. There were a number of tasks that needed to be done on a daily basis as well as helping with the constant flow of customers. If someone was used to slacking at work, it was not possible at Arby’s. Being able to notice this quickly gave me the chance to weed them out and try someone new. This resulted in having a great quality staff.

Another reason that a fast-paced work environment is better is that it makes the day go by very quickly. Working in a slow, laid back work environment can make it seem like the minutes suddenly have a lot more than sixty seconds in each of them. When the mind is not being kept busy, time drags on. The time in one day at Hollywood Video sometimes felt like two or more days. So much extra time on my hands would seem nice, but it just had me checking the clock that much more, counting down the hours, minutes, even seconds until I could leave. While working at Arby’s, sometimes the day went by so fast it felt like I had only been there for an hour. Constantly having things to get done, and having customers to help made the day fly by. When the mind is consistently busy, there is no time to think about checking the clock. That made the day so much better. It is much easier to come to work knowing that the shift will be over before there is time to blink.

A slow, laid back work environment may seem like the easier choice to some, but how will it make them feel at the end of the day? A high amount of productivity is of course great for a business as well as having a high quality staff. And having the day speed by is great for a person’s sanity and happiness. Enjoying coming to work is important. I enjoyed working at Arby’s far more than I did at Hollywood Video, and it was all because of the work environment. Choosing to work in a fast-paced work environment is more satisfying and exciting than most people would tend to think. Everyone should try it out and see.