Intoxi'Kath'ing Whispers

I'm tired. I'm tired of my job, of doing recruitment, of dealing with clueless and stubborn hiring managers. Of hiring managers who demand perfection yet are only willing to pay peanuts for the person. I'm tired of candidates who reject my offers over and over again. Is it me? Or is it the manager? The interview? The first impression of the company's culture? How do recruiters do this over and over again? How do they survive working in a recruitment firm when I can barely do recruitment any longer? And bear in mind, I am only recruiting for my own company. I want to stop searching for people, searching for talents. I am struggling to take care of myself, of my current work situation. I have no energy left to take care of others. Get your own candidates since you are so picky. Candidates with 1 month notice period is definitely better than those who have 2 months, in terms of waiting. And if the candidate is good, why not? Why hassle on their s...

Ta-da!! Read this. http://www.thestar.com.my/metro/community/2017/08/17/asia-cafe-regulars-shocked-to-hear-news-of-its-impending-closure/ I'm quoted, hahahaha. Perks of being friends with writers in mainstream media. But honestly, I thought it would be a small comment piece in the side columns, not as part of a main article. I'm famous!! (Yea, right...) I can't wait for the long weekend to come. A break from work, a break from the hustle and bustle of working in a corporate environment. I don't think I can survive working in corporate for that long. Am not bitchy enough because apparently (according to my colleague) I am too people-oriented, taking people's feelings into consideration instead of being task-oriented. Unfortunately, nobody takes MY feelings into consideration! Bah! Anyway, long weekend means road trip to Cameron's to spend the time with God, Jesus and my fellow Catholic kakis. Can't wait but I'll be so tired out come the n...

Respect my time please. Honestly! If your interview is scheduled for 10am, then be there by 945am. Why would you want to come in as early as 9am for your interview? Where am I going to let you sit? If I let you sit in one of our rooms, you're taking up our space that was not accounted for for that period of time. Then I get 'harassed' as to why I let my candidates wait so long when it is by no fault of mine or the interviewers. I did tell you to come at 10am, did I not? Geez....I understand that you want to show that you are a punctual person but this is a bit too much. You could have gone off to get a drink then come back later. I don't even know what to do with you myself! "Should I let the person sit here? Should I ask the person to go out some where and return later?" Maybe I should leave myself and hide away and leave you people to sort out yourselves....

Seriously... don't you read? I don't understand certain applicants. If a job advertisement says, "Urdu language skills required" and you DO NOT communicate in Urdu, through either spoken or written, then why are you responding and applying to the job ad? What, do you think that you will miraculously have the language at your fingertips once you apply for the job? It makes me think that you're lazy (not reading through the job ad properly) or just plain dumb/stupid. Let me reiterate that this is not discrimination. We just need someone who can communicate in Urdu to reach out to our target markets. Can you even do that if we hire you? (IF we hire you, of course. Geez...) Urgh!! *pulls hair* Do not waste people's time. I'm sure there are plenty of jobs out there that are more suited to your capabilities. This, is just not it.

Do you know that I have no idea what to blog about? Do people even still blog??? Oh gosh. It's not that my life is dull. Believe me, it is not.  Politics, bitching, back-stabbing, the works I tell you. But yet, as I sit in font of the computer today, my mind is blank. For the life of me I cannot seem to come up with a decent posting. I have been trying to come back to Blogger but that is only when I'm free I suppose. Since I spend 9 hours in front of the computer, I don't really want to continue staring at a screen and destroy my eyesight. Urgh!! I miss my silly postings, my nonsensical rants, photos put in just to 'bulk up' my posting etc. Hahahaha. Well, let's just start with Beauty & the Beast! Thank you TGV, everything was smooth during our company's event, even though one or two of our staff could still claim their popcorn and drinks without the voucher at your counter... hmm... One activity down and hopefully two more to go, ...

After putting all the pieces together, here's what I got... The what?? No..! I cannot find it. You guys didn't complete the clue for me.. Unless you did and I did not see it. Putting these sticky notes everywhere on my stuff. Waste your sticky notes... hahaha. What if I missed out some of it? I haven't looked through my box of packed stuff though. It's still there in the box. I have yet to solve the puzzle of the mysterious appearance of rubber bands on my table too. I suspect two people but you guys deny it... then I have no inkling as to who it is. Though there was a third person but for sure, the other one is innocent.... hahaha. Solve the puzzle for me! P/S: Step 3 of the Grievances of Leaving

Dear Psammead, How are you? I feel so lonely without you. I don't get to talk to opened drawers anymore. In fact, I have totally stopped talking to myself or have mono-conversations. It's sad. I hope uncle BN and aunty AS are taking good care of you. Just ask them to feed you with glittery stickers and craft papers. You like those, don't you? I will come by someday and visit you again. Open up the drawer and talk to you, hope you get enough sunlight once in a while and fresh air. I have to tell aunty AS that you didn't follow me home in the end, then she can wonder no more. You're still there in that drawer at the table where I sat. Goodbye Psammead. Be good ok? Lots of Love, Aunty Kathleen P/S: Step 2 of the Grievances of Leaving.

One of the things that I will miss the most are my kids. Not all of them but definitely a majority of them. These kids taught me a lot. They taught me that my patience is not as good as what I thought. I DO have a short fuse! They taught me that you have to be careful of what you say as they imitate you at times. "That thing" -.-' They taught me that kids are not stupid. You make a promise, you keep it. They taught me that their memory is better than their mentor's. At times. They taught me that sometimes, it is ok to apologize to your kids. They appreciate it a lot. They taught me that in giving instructions, always be clear! They taught me to always be on your toes. You never know when 'accidents' may happen in class. They taught me that love is not defined by scolding. They still give you stickers and little gifts. Haha! They taught me that a mentor begets his/her kids. Kids may copy the behaviour and actions as how the mentor would behave or ...

I should probably be sleeping now but certain things that happened today actually prompted me to think about a few things... Hahaha. One of kids told me today. "Aunty Kathleen you're so cute." Hahahah. 5 years old, boy. Why couldn't he be a guy who's 5 years older than me? Hahaha just kidding. I took over a class today which I was teaching in last year. It is now taken over by another colleague. One of the girls from this class said, "I miss you Aunty Kathleen." Awww.... don't do that to me. Please. You know, I always wondered how I survived my days in primary school. In a Chinese medium primary school at that. I will always remember this one incident which happened in Standard 4. I think we were doing multiplications with 2 digit numbers and above. There was one exercise which I did badly and where I got punished by my maths teacher. She pulled my ears...-.-' The problem with that was, I had no idea what I did wrong in my sum. She didn't...

    Beaver's dam. This is so me at the moment... Drowning again and again and again.

Yesterday, my lecturer wanted volunteers for a voluntary assignment. Basically, he said anyone who has the interest to do it and can volunteer to do so. After that, he walked across the classroom and stood in front of me, looked at me and asked, "Would YOU like to do it?" Ehm... that's not voluntary...   I had a better workout session today, hahaha. Meaning I was more satisfied with my exercise this week as compared to last week because of some annoying gym-goers. Today, the gym was exceptionally full too. It is as if the frequent gym-goers were hibernating until the sweltering heat today woke them up. They came in droves!!! Or pairs rather... hahaha. A lady came over and asked me how to use an equipment, but I didn't know how to use it too. Another guy showed her in the end. Ooppss... Bertie Bott's every flavoured beans. (Just kidding) Colours are deceiving... Walk with me, jog with me and run with me. Always. I did some mini planting with the k...

Am I doing thigs right? Sometimes, I can't help but wonder if what I am doing is good enough. I struggle to be the perfectionist that I am, unfortunately. I want this to go this way, and that to happen that way. But it rarely ever happens. In fact, the opposite does. The classes you are so worried about turn out to fine. Great even! The classes which you thought you were in control of, turned out to be horrendous.... Lesson: Just go into class with an open mind. Expect the worst but hope for the best. On a little side note... hehehe. Sigh. I scolded a little boy in my class today. He's about 4-5 years old. He was being naughty till the extent his classmates couldn't take it. He didn't like being scolded by me... haha. He crossed his arms in front of himself, sat very straight on his stool and ignored me. I ignored him too as I had to go through the lesson with the rest. As the bell rang and the kids got ready to leave, I took this little boy to the s...

Was going to go with the title March Week 2 Updates for this post (so boring * in a whiny tone*), but I came up with FDT! Hahaha. When to know that you have been putting on the pounds.... Answer: When a 3-4 year-old boy comes up to you, literally pokes you in your flabby tummy and say to you, "Stomach." Innocently, while giggling. -.-' True story, bro. He was so adorable though. Was very tensed up for my OM midterm. Crammed and studied as much as I could. Strained my neck after the test. Couldn't look down to my left. Tsk! Feeling a bit drained. Work is pretty dynamic. You can plan and plan to do this and that, but when it comes, things almost always never go as planned. You have so many different kinds of personalities to handle. You have to learn to cater to different kinds of needs. You have to know the different approaches in dealing with a situation. I am still learning. I hope to learn as much as possible and as fast as I can. Thank goodn...

The month of March started off quite hectically for me. First week itself and I am feeling very drained already. Perhaps I am trying to adapt to so many things at once. New environment, new people, new processes. Hopefully as I get more used to doing these things, I'll get better at it too. March is also full of assignment datelines and midterm tests as well! I have thought about it and I may decide to drop one subject the next semester. Meaning I'll be concentrating on two subjects and have my graduation date postponed. Sigh. I will miss my classmates! Especially this semester as we get to know one another better. SM, YKh and I went to the Mines yesterday for our lunch after one of our replacement classes. After which we had our discussion for FM's assignment. I hate calculations.... :'( Thank goodness, we managed to settle 5 questions out of 7. Almost there! However, I was pleasantly surprised yesterday. We left two questions for our group member to do sin...

This was related to me by my classmate which happened when we were having human resource management. (I wasn't paying attention.) A classmate mentioned that exit interviews were useless. According to her, it was useless because the employees always gave negative feedback. From an objective point of view, WHY is there an exit interview held in the first place? Because, a staff is leaving the company. And why would a staff leave a company? Reasons can range from pay to incentives to relationships among colleagues and among others, but, to put it in a general word: dissatisfaction. So, of course, a person would voice his or her opinions during the exit interview. What more is there to lose? And, dissatisfaction brings out negativity. Companies should never brush away all these negative feedback as something not worth looking deeper into. They should in fact, use it and do a post mortem. Post mortem. I didn't mention "to improve themselves". At times, ...

I will be leaving the present company I work for soon. If I were to be asked, "Why?" I will just say, "It's personal." Only a trusted few know the real reason why I decided to leave. It wasn't a brash decision, thought of on the spot or something. It isn't really... but sometimes, like what KT said, you have to know when to walk away. Be it from challenges, from people, from what you want. You just have to. Funnily enough, after that decision was made, I was more at peace with myself. Whatever happened hurts, but I find myself being more calm. And I can smile again, especially with some people who can really cheer up the day. There are two things which I will miss most when I leave. My colleagues, especially those with whom I am closer with. And, my hot hunky customers..! ROFL!! That day, I didn't even know I was serving a model (Daniel JG) until YK told me. Believe me, I am super blur as to who our celebrities are. I will miss the ...

I rarely blog about this aspect of my life. But, here it is. First thought in my head was, "Why???" Before you even hear the answer, deep down in your heart you already know it. And why not? It was expected in a way, yet not expected in some. It was suspected, just not that fast. People will normally give the reason for their leaving as such, to greener and better pastures. The grass is always greener on the other side. I won't blame them. It is their life and it is up to them to live it. Then you think, "Instead of making other companies seem like greener pastures, how can we make it or do it in such a way that the company you are currently in NOW be THAT greener pasture?" If it can be seen as such, then people won't decide to leave. Right? I am actually worried for the company. It's expanding with two, three (or more) outlets this year. It is not a bad thing. It is actually a good sign. The exponential rate of its expansion is fine if we have...

Well, at least I sort of have a plan now. Work hard, just do my best. Do time management properly, slot in part time classes for a Master's degree (pending next year I hope), improve and equip myself with knowledge, experience and useful living skills. (Being able to wolf down a Matterhorn burger is not considered one.) The future is always hazy. Some people rush to get out of it, often knocking into poles, boulders along the way because they could not see. Some take it slow, taking one step at a time as much as their vision allows them to. Some prefer to wait for the haze to clear before doing anything. Me? The haze has somehow cleared a bit and I can see a diversion up ahead. Hopefully I will be able to take the road that I plan to and be successful in it. Hopefully with the experience, knowledge, skills gained throughout the few years will push me up the career ladder greatly in the far future. Hopefully. :)

Was looking up for the definition of cross selling on the internet when I came upon these two useful articles. Will post the link up here especially for my peers who are in the sales, marketing  and business field. Hope it helps push you towards success!!! All the best and never stop believing in yourself. :) 1. 8 Ideas for Cross Selling Success 2. Get Better at Selling

On Thursday, I felt humbled by a simple yet a great experience. A customer entered our shop, looking at the variety of workout that gloves we had. His back facing towards me, I greeted him courteously and informed him that we had more variety of gloves at the other side of the shop. I was ignored. A few minutes later, he turned, smiled at me and walked to the back of the shop where my other colleague was standing. As he was looking at a particular product, my colleague informed him of the promotions we had going on for it. She was also ignored. Being ignored the first time, I was a bit annoyed. (I was wondering why was the customer a bit rude.) But I continued to smile and put on my cheerful expression. (Haha, don't we all??). He suddenly grabbed a shaker and looked towards me. I said, "It's 20 Ringgit, sir." Immediately, he used hand gestures to indicate he couldn't hear. Realization dawned on me and I quickly went over to where he was. I answered him usi...