If you had to choose the worst work experience you’ve ever had, what would you pick?

For one semester after high school I attended a conservative Bible College (that’s another post for another day – several posts, actually) and got a part time job at Des Moines’ UPS hub loading trailers. Because the school had a strict dress code I had to wear a suit and tie to class, but then I had only had about 20 minutes between my last class and the beginning of my shift at the UPS hub which was at least 15 minute drive away. So, each day I changed from my suit to my grubby work clothes while I was driving, but that’s another story.

The first month or two of my job went well. I liked my supervisor. I showed up on time, worked hard, and looked forward to advancing up the UPS food chain. I was making a nice hourly wage even though the number of hours was limited.

When you are a loader, you have multiple trailers for which you are responsible. The boxes come down the conveyor and a picker sorts them so that they come down a shoot into the trailer. You grab the box, double check the zip code and start building your walls of boxes. The bed of the trailers had a false floor, so you start by filling the bottom of the trailer, then lower the false floor and build more walls of boxes on top. Of course, you are constantly running back and forth from trailer to trailer trying to get ahead on one before you get too far behind on the others.

One day I showed up at work and got my assigned trailers, which included the dreaded Bedford Park trailer. The line started and we got slammed quickly. I got into the Bedford Park trailer to find that the entire bottom of the trailer was piled high with boxes. The boxes had to have been dumped in the bottom of the trailer before the shift started. The boxes were coming down the conveyor so quickly that I had no time to try and clean up the mess. I shut the false floor on the pile of boxes and started building my walls on top.

When I told my supervisor what I had found, she refused to believe me and blamed me for it. Suddenly, she turned from Dr. Jekyll to Mr. Hyde. To this day I don’t know who I ticked off or what I did, but suddenly I found myself the team scapegoat. I was made to feel like the team leper. Nothing I did was right and my supervisor came into my trailer to tell me what a terrible job I was doing and threaten to fire me. I had done nothing wrong, but I was in a no-win situation. No one believed the word of a young new hire against a tenured supervisor.

Obviously, I was not wanted so I quit before I was fired. I had to work more hours at another job to make the same money I was making at UPS, but I found a job I enjoyed and one where my hard work and contribution were valued. I sometimes wonder what the true story was, but all things considered I did just fine.

And, I didn’t have to change clothes while driving any longer.