I work in communications as an account executive. I make $42,000 base pay plus commission. I am about $20k underpaid (base) compared to other account executives in the same industry. I started my career as an assistant. I used to care. While working from home, I did 90% of the work on an account while my new coworker was still learning the ropes. I was very dedicated in the beginning of my current role too. I would bend over backwards to help my customer and make sure the material was there when they needed it.
I was on the phone with my customer yesterday and he is an older man who has literally spent $10,000 with our company (not a lot). He’s acting like the order is $100,000. He’s getting frustrated saying we should know how to do our jobs better even though the issue wasn’t our fault. “You need to do ____”. He came at my sideways so I responded in an agitated, heated tone right back. Several occasions he has told me how much experience he has, gone directly over my head to my boss instead of me, tried to diminish my experience, and just made me feel incompetent when I am not. My industry is male dominated and I am a woman. I deal with a lot of cranky men who prefer to work with men. I am so over being treated like this by customers when I do 99% of the things right. One thing out of 100 can go wrong and they will literally go off on you like this is one of several mistakes you have made. They’re equally mad even when it’s not your fault.
I say fuck it- I don’t care about providing top of the line service anymore because even when I do- it’s not appreciated. Years ago, my company bought out several employees who had shares within the company so that the shares would just be family owned. They clearly don’t care about improving the wages of their employees as a 500M revenue company so why tf should I?
BTW. This ^ is how you lose good workers. And this ^ is how dedicated good employees lose their spirit, decide they don’t care anymore, and become mediocre employees. I am not going to stress myself out for $20/hr.