In 2003, the time when I joined the call center industry, it was not considered to be a sound professional choice, with limited avenues for a promising career. Most of my colleagues, who had joined, looked at it, as a stop gap arrangement – either to make some quick savings, before they left the country for higher education or to simply improve their communication skills.

I too wanted to pursue higher studies, but could not get my mind to select the area of specialization. So till such time, I was completely committed to make something out of the existing opportunity of a call center executive.

It took us over two months to finally get where we were meant to be – the shop-floor, (a lingo, commonly used in the call center industry, to refer to the operational calling area) and do the job, we were hired for.

The initial month was tough, understanding the product, navigating the systems and comprehending the wide range of accents and dialects of people from the UK. Once we got a hang of it, it was smooth sailing.

Three months into calling and I was a pro, thoroughly enjoying myself; eagerly looking for opportunities to handle escalation calls, try out something challenging, and thus was at times picked on by my colleagues, who were probably not as serious or just wanted to clock in the number of hours and leave.

My initiatives did not go unnoticed; I had senior leadership members and potential international clients listening into my calls. And very soon, I was given the responsibility to mentor new joiners, giving me, my first exposure of managing people and their performance.

Conclusion:

This brief account of my calling stint, taught me the most important virtue, which is respecting what you do, no matter how others perceive it. Work done with utmost sincerity never goes unnoticed and you reap the rewards sooner or later.

This simple yet valuable lesson helped in harnessing my energies and cultivating success, while working in various positions across industries in the corporate world.

Dear Readers,

This blog is a brief narrative of the initial days of my career, of one of the many valuable lessons that I picked early on.

In the upcoming blogs, I would be sharing tales of the obstacles I encountered, as I embarked towards uncharted territory of the corporate world.  So stay tuned!

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Thank you for reading and have a blessed day!