For years now, I have wanted to write a book about my experience in an industry that is thought very little of, often forgotten about and greatly disrespected – the Reception industry. This has inspired me to write a serious of blog posts about my experience that I will be publishing this year.

Often seen as women’s work and for the unskilled, Receptionists in general – in EVERY country tend to be treated with a certain attitude.

As I finally try to claw myself out of my final job in this industry (I have been a Receptionist for 10 years now) I would like to impart some advice I wish I had known years ago when I was starting out. I’ll start out by providing insider knowledge on what to avoid for ANYONE in any industry or job when they are hunting for a new employer.

You see the thing about Receptionists is we see the nitty gritty undersides of the business a lot of the other employees in the company won’t always get access to….. but I’ll expand on that in another blog post.

5 Job Hunting Tips To Let You Know If A Workplace Is A Dime Or A Dud!

1 – They advertise that you get your own work phone and laptop:
I am seeing more and more work places advertise in the ‘perks’ section or in the ‘benefits’ section that you will get your own mobile phone or laptop (and I mean well long BEFORE Corona virus hit).

Now let me ask you this, why do you need a mobile phone or a laptop to do your work? Well that’s simple, you’ll be taking it home with you. Unless your job is to be a Jet-set traveller meeting with different clients, chances are they will be giving you these items so you can take your work home with you long after you have left the office. This means that the expectation is not only do you work 9-5 during the day, but the expectation will be that you go home and work more hours and probably log in on the weekends.

Needless to say, any company that advertises the fact you will have to be giving them FREE LABOUR as a perk, is a company you want to avoid
AT. ALL. COSTS!

2- They advertise diversity as a perk: Why is this a thing? Why is a work place with many ideas and people with diverse backgrounds a perk? That’s a basic need for a successful company. Perks are additional not basic.

And diversity in a workplace does not in any way mean that it’s a great workplace. It could just mean it’s a place full of people, from all kinds of backgrounds, who have come together in one place to all be as equally unhappy, overworked, underpaid and undervalued.

3 – They advertise that you will need to hit the ground running AND that it’s a fast paced environment: All this means is that there will be a lot to do, a lot to learn, and very little training and support provided for you to be able to learn it in a supportive and reasonable time frame.

4 – The role being advertised is an administrative support role (secretary, personal assistant, receptionist, office manager, office coordinator, team assistant, office assistant) and they require you to have a diploma or official tertiary education AND more than 5 years experience in the role: Anybody who has been working for years and gone to the effort of putting in the time to study and educate themselves as well as rack up the debt for this, is not going to want to graduate and work their way up to being someone’s office doormat. I can’t tell you how many jobs advertise ‘must have at least 10 years experience as an assistant or in a supporting role and a professional diploma’ and it’s for a role as basic as Personal Assistant or Office Manager. Seriously, who goes to university or college to simply assist for the rest of their lives?

You do not need to be tertiary educated to be brilliant at any of these roles.

5 – You will be required to organise personal life activities for your boss or manager: If your boss doesn’t have time to have a personal work life balance and organise the activities and responsibilities in their personal life, leaving them to feel it’s so bad that it’s to the point of having to get someone at work to do that for them – what makes you think they will believe you should have a personal work life balance too?

I hope these tips have helped you, I know that I learn’t these lessons either the hard way personally or from witnessing colleagues burn out in these situations.

If you have an additional tips, feel free to comment and share your experience!