Working in the eye of the storm

I’ve been working all week at Suss Microtec, the company that has employed my dad for over 20 years. It’s a little bizarre: everyone knows about the tiny town of Waterbury, Vermont, and expects me to be from there, since that’s the location of Suss’ US factory. A number of people at the company know my dad due to business trips over the years; some even remember meeting me as a youngster. But most of the people I work with directly don’t quite know what to make of me. They’re used to interning college students, but not Americans with no technical experience or related studies. About 80% of the employees are male, so I stand out in that sense too. People are generally friendly and there's a positive atmosphere: they seem to enjoy each other.

Suss is preparing to switch to SAP on July 1^st, so it’s extremely hectic. I’m helping out with SAP stuff, and have learned enough this week to roughly describe its fundamentals. It’s a huge database system that streamlines all the company’s information, from employee contact info to machine serial numbers to delivery dates on orders. People in my department are so busy that they didn’t have time to prepare for me. My boss didn’t show up until I’d been at work for 5 hours on Monday. (He’d worked over the weekend.) I couldn’t do anything until I got my laptop Tuesday afternoon, and even since then, I’ve had significant lag times between getting assignments. It's good news for my newly purchased journal: I’ve written over 20 pages describing my time in Innsbruck. Things should pick up quite a bit: I'm going to start moving between a few groups, according to which one needs my help at the moment. All have plenty for me to do, it's just a matter of finding time to explain it to me.

When I actually had work to do, it involved staring at thousands of numbers, trying to either check them or create a new document summarizing them differently. I don’t mind it, as long as my eyes don’t start to hurt: repetitive, menial tasks usually don’t bother me. All I need is a little intrinsic motivation. In this case, it’s the knowledge that I’m reducing people’s stress and practicing my German whenever I chat with co-workers or get instructions. They're all doing more or less the same projects, which are really crucial to the company's success right now. Getting paid in Euros doesn’t hurt, either! Though things have been slow for me, I have to wait for one of my housemates to take me home, and they all work 9 or 10 hours a day. So I expect to earn some overtime pay. It's not a thrilling job, but I think it should be a good experience.