Remember That One Time . . . Chiropractor

My good friend, Brittney, posted a question on her blog yesterday. "What has been your worst/craziest job?" That got me thinking about this one:

When I was about 16 years old I decided that it was time for me to get a real job - one that I didn't get through nepotism. I found a flier for a Chiropractor looking for an assistant in scheduling appointments. That sounded easy enough, right? The best part of the flier was - I could have the opportunity to make hundreds of dollars each day! Um . . . heck yes! I called immediately to set up an interview. The next day after school, I put on my most professional looking dress and had my Mom drive me to the Chiropractor's office. I walked in and told the receptionist I was there for a job interview and she asked me to have a seat while she calls the man I'm supposed to interview with. I sat there for about 15 minutes just patiently waiting and eyeing the receptionist's desk. It was, after all, going to be mine as soon as this interview was over.

A man came bustling in the front door a little out breath and turned to greet me. He was very nice and explained that he was not the Chiropractor but just the manager over the assistants. He then escorted me down the hall to a dark, cluttered office where we had our interview. I must have presented myself extremely well because he hired me on the spot. He even wanted me to start that day! I got up and headed towards the door to go claim my desk when the man asked where I was going?, this dirty, dark and over stuffed office was where I was going to work. More particularly - that corner over there. . . . Oh.

He explained that I am supposed to call people from a list and ask them to come in for a free seminar. Then, when they agree to come I'm supposed to set up an appointment for them to see the Chiropractor. That sounded pretty easy to me. The man handed me a piece of paper with the script for the phone calls and the "list" of phone numbers I was supposed to call. The list was a copy of the phonebook pages A-G. He then went on to explain how I will be getting paid. If they do indeed come to the seminar AND pay for a consultation, I get $25. Wow! $25 for each person that I set up for a consultation? This is going to be so easy and I am going to make so much money! I was already doing the math in my head - if I could call 10 people per hour and I work 2 hours after school 3 times a week, I could be making around $6,000 a month! That is a whole heck of a lot of money! What was I going to do with all that money? I could buy some new gym shoes and some VHS movies, ooooo - ooooo - ooo, and I could buy whatever I wanted for lunch instead of eating a slice of pizza and a chocolate milk everyday. Yes! Oh man! This is perfect!

I got to work immediately. "Hello Mr. Abbott, my name is Rebekah and I'd like to tell you about an opportunity for better health." Click. Mr. Abbott hung up on me. What the crap?!! Well there goes that $25 - thanks a lot Mr. Abbott. Oh well, on to Mr. Abbott #2. "Hello Mr. Abbott, my name is Rebekah and I'd like to te. . ." Click!

It continued on like that for the next 2 hours. Oh, every once in a while a nice person would let me read my whole script before saying "Thanks, but I'm not interested." I left work that day completely unsuccessful. But I came back two days later because I was certain that I would get someone to come in. That day was much better. No, I didn't make any appointments but I did end up chatting this really nice old man for about an hour before he said no thanks. Day after day I would come in and call people and never get anyone to sign up for the seminar. Hector, one of the daytime callers got tons of people. I never got to meet Hector to ask him what his secrets were because he always worked while I was in school. But everyday I would see four or five more marks next to his name. All the while, there were no marks next to my name.

After a month of being completely unsuccessful I decided it was time to quit. I told my boss that I felt I was wasting my time here, working all of those hours and not getting paid for a single minute. I was actually quite upset when I was talking to him. I didn't think it was fair. He agreed with me but said, sorry that's the way it goes around here. Right then, the Chiropractor walked in. He was never as nice to me as my manager. Every once in a while I would turn around and find him at the door watching me. This one day I came in with a cold. I was about to take some DayQuil but he gave me this huge lecture on how today's medicine actually makes us more sick and that our bodies have the abilities to heal themselves but in order to do that we have to be completely aligned. I felt so guilty that I threw away my DayQuil and suffered through the rest of the day.

When the Chiropractor heard me complaining about not getting paid, he explained, in his lecturing tone, that when I was hired I agreed to getting paid on a commission-type basis. Since I didn't make any appointments in the time I was there - he shouldn't have to pay me. I walked out of there with my head hung low and went home where I told my Dad the whole story. He was outraged! He made me call the Chiropractor back and tell him that I was going to call the Better Business Bureau on him. (side note - my Dad loves calling the Better Business Bureau. :) He's all about it.)

The next day my manager dropped off a check for $100. I was so happy! Guess who was going out for lunch tomorrow? A Wooo Hoo!