Work Story

I started working when I was 14 years old. My first paid job was with Longfords
Own-Made Ice Cream at the Rye, NY location. I worked on average, 20 hours a week as
a server and cashier. The job titles are arbitrary, as we were responsible for much more
besides serving customers and ringing them up. When I graduated high school, although I
couldnt continue to work year-round, I still work when Im home for breaks and over the
summer. I started in May of 2010, and six years later am still an employee of Longfords.
Over time I was gradually granted managerial responsibilities, and still hold a position as
a manager despite my being away at college. I am responsible for taking inventory,
managing deliveries, making and decorating cakes, taking large orders and arranging offpremise catering, as well as opening and closing the store. The most important skill Ive
learned from my years working at Longfords is customer service. The client-base for our
store is loyal but demanding. They expect service that is accommodative and personal.
Conflicts and complaints are handled very seriously and almost always involve giving the
customer what he or she is requesting.
My next job was in the Human Resources department at Virginia Tech,
specifically the University Organizational Professional Development office. I started at
the beginning of the spring semester of my freshman year as an assistant to the event
coordinator. I worked about 7 hours a week in the office doing many miscellaneous tasks
including filing, copying, or assembling materials for workshops and classes. I prepared
and set up the rooms for the workshops. I entered data from evaluations and
questionnaires into excel spreadsheets and corresponded with the respective workshop
teacher on the conclusions from that data. At the end of every shift I was responsible for
rearranging the rooms for the next days workshops and locking the rooms after everyone
had left. At the beginning of my junior year, I was beginning my next job with the school
and decided to choose one to discontinue. After working for UOPD for a year and a half I
decided to focus my attention on my new experience.
For my junior year of college I was the house supervisor of my sorority house.
Since our Greek housing is on-campus residential, theyre required to have an acting
resident advisor (RA). I applied and was selected for the student-staff position in the late
fall of 2014. Working for Housing and Resident Life (HRL) was an interesting position. I
was exposed to all the behind the scenes complications of on-campus living, mixed with
the inner workings of Fraternity and Sorority Life (FSL). Personally, I think that HRL
failed to make adapt their policies that are ore geared towards the main campus
residential hosing, to the Oak Lane Community. This job taught me so much about
conflict resolution and managing responsibilities. Not only was I responsible for myself, I
had various officer positions within my sorority, including house manager; I had my
student employee responsibilities, school, and everyone in my houses problems to
manage. It taught me to prioritize and to ask for help. I learned that it was better to ask
for assistance than to try and do too many things poorly. For my house specifically, its
tradition that members in their junior year live in the house, so I will be passing my
position on and moving off-campus for the 2016-2017 school year.