I Am _Believe In Present

I AM

It was Monday morning at work and I started my day checking  my emails. Such a blissful morning so far to start with …

There was an email from Mrs. Brown –

A quick note to say that I am thinking of you today👏👏

I hope you are enjoying much success in your new role.

Always believe in yourself⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️

You have a gift. You are a very talented, intelligent, excellent customer-experience champion. You excel in the role as a "customer solutions ambassador for you company ". I cannot recall the numerous individuals I have shared our story with personally and professionally. Celebrated your personal service.

For my friends still living in the U.S., they told me that your company has a very bad reputation. Fortunately for me, I get to share with them our story.

How you changed my entire outlook on "outsourcing customer service function".

So, I hope that this message finds you well. I know you will be successful in your new role. Remember to take moments in time to reflect and just acknowledge yourself for all that you are achieving as a single, intelligent, financially independent young female adult.

You can do, be, and achieve whatever you set your heart on.

Congratulations and enjoy 2017🌈

Blessings, Ann

Sent from my iPad

Felt proud and blessed  ...

Reading this with a happy smile on my face…I said .. Thanks Deepak ..

(Well that isn’t Mrs Brown..)

My mentor,Guide ,Boss  more like friend .

Don’t be confused ..

Let me introduce him in my next pages ..

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It is windy evening when I’m writing this ..

Thinking of how I started,how things changed me or say so called Life

I’m sure every woman has a different story and has overcome fears and Anxiety in her life .

I am writing this because I feel fortunate that I could survive the illness that i was going through and thank each and every person who has helped me overcome this.

Yes , Illness ..that is none other than my Anxiety which turned out to be depression later .

Depression often doesn’t make itself known. It isn’t a single emotion; it’s a whole range of emotions that can include sadness, despair, anger, doubt and guilt.

Never thought I could overcome my fears , it was pretty difficult but yes I was done with this.

It’s not just how you take things and lead your life but there is always someone who unknowingly changes you entirely and brings out best in you and sometimes the worst.

 I believe in what I AM today and not what I WAS or what I WILL be.

Few incidents just change you, change your life....

I answer my phone without any hesitation ,

I head out of my house without any fear.

I talk to people around,

I’m no more a reserved person, I believe things can change if you want them to ..

Don't think about person anymore who never bothered about me..

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Like every girl I too had a same story where I was broken, hassled , faced the blues ,regretful and spent sleepless nights , nightmares you know..It wasn’t easy for me to trust anyone easily and get along with them .This could be my biggest mistake I believe and that was the reason why it took so long for me to come out of it .

I wrote drafts whenever I found anything related to me on Social media and relieve myself from the stress and trauma . Many times I spoke to myself and have realized after a while or so that I was being anxious and shouldn’t be doing this .

I started watching  motivational videos , tried hanging out with friends ,read books  and  tried spending enough time with Family .

In our country 80 per cent of people who suffer from depression don’t seek help. Depression is like any other illness that requires intervention, but i coudn't share this with anyone because i got along with wrong person, It was my mistake. ..i was afraid that this would hurt  my parents on sharing  and get me married to a stranger...gosh it is really difficult to make someone understand in conservative family..

I may not like to call it conservative  cuz I was more independent compare to other girls in the society , decision to make choices on what I wear , where I study was left to me .

Let me call my Family more concerned ..so yes I decided to come out of all this alone .

Waking up was tough because I didn't wanted to face the day. I was extremely conscious of being surrounded by people because if I need to break down .

If i sleep, i slept for hours together , I had become more an absent minded person .

An year passed after all this apologetic dramas and I thought I had moved on , I started living and  spent time with friends and in library .(With a fake smile On)

I have had spent 3 continuous sleepless nights i remember and just wept for no reason.

I don't think that I could say that I was completely over it (depression). There was always a fear at the back of my mind that I might have a worse situation.. because it has been such a bad experience for me.

I started living for others ,Be it meeting kids in the orphanage nearby home (My favourite place I would say ) or spending time with my Pet.

One more year passed I completed my Engineering , I know I was always a happy person who only was trying to live every moment but was struggling inside every minute to come out of things and tried keeping herself busy and people around me always depicted me to be the same pebby , bubbly girl .

.

I did not realize that I had become a person who would speak out without any fear.. in last 2 years  .

Thank my friends whom I hung out with and my mom who realized that she was missing her daughter without knowing what had changed me .

Still was afraid , I felt helpless many times , broken and pestered.

And drafted texts , if I had to share something …

I realized I was no more Me and decided to join work so that I get myself busy and  move on.

 .

As is said in my previous lines..

It’s not just how you take things and lead your life but there is always someone who unknowingly changes you entirely and brings out best in you and yes ..

Destiny decided to bring out much better in me and I got selected for an interview after 2 rejections  in couple of job interviews .

I would love to share this because I wanna tell you guys it’s not really difficult to love your work , any of  can build passion about your work ..


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Let me tell this was very instant..I  received  a call from my friend asking to join her for the interview that she was going to attend in one of the office in Indiranagar. And I said No , because again it was Call center I had got rejected twice before  .so I had set up my mind this time that I’m gonna learn programming which I was bad at because in the city I lived was Software Hub or call it IT hub .

Now after saying No , suddenly I start thinking of again not staying Idle at home and give a try for this .

Well, I got down the bus and headed back to Indiranagar office and I see surprised face of my friend .

My Interview went pretty well and the two ladies(Interviewers) in my last round asked me if I had any plans of getting married early , that is because my resume said I was from  Rajasthan where parents get their kids married at an early age . And my answer was  “well, if that was the case I wouldn’t have come for the interview nor did engineering.”

I got appointed for very next day, however I wasn’t much excited as this job offer was for customer support  and HR convinced me saying that it is Technical support Job ,we are only going to deal with technical stuff and nothing to do with sales .

I mean of course this wasn’t my dream job.

 However, this was all so instant that I attended interview here and was appointed for the very next day .

I should have had the excitement of joining office , new role, new work place and of meeting people around.

But that wasn’t the case.

Me and my friend Sushma had fortunately got selected for the same profile  but different teams  we both were late but managed to report our HR’s.

So it was my voice and accent training first day .Sushma was in a different room as I said she was selected for a different team.

I saw new faces, talking about their colleges and their first job.

Few around were not interested in talking to each other and just busy with their phones and taking pictures in the training room on first day .

I found one or two girls like this and started our conversation .

And again all the engineers complaining each other that they had to join customer support center .(Laughing)

Everyone I could see there did not just really wanted to work for call center,they just wanted to be  here and  earn money till they get an opportunity to get into software companies or so called dream companies , I realized “okay , everyone has some reason to join customer support for time being and to make money and I too had a reason not for money of course  but to keep myself busy“

After a while a tall , huge big man with brown eyes entered the room with the HR and introduced himself .

Elvin,he was the first man I met at workplace .

Happening person must say , I still remember he made newbees  feel comfortable and made the first session interactive .

His first question to all engineers sitting inside after introduction was why Customer support and there I could see blank faces , looking at each other and few giggling …after a while he answered “it is ofcourse money and you folks are selected for global support not just because you have technical knowledge but also you have good communication skills “ and I said to myself  “aaah , ok there is good improvement. Keep it up  “

Encouraging one isn’t it , me within “really !!did I seriously manage myself to come out and was capable “as I still remember I did not leave my room for weeks after the worst incident I came across.

Anyways that isn’t important now ,

So it was my first break after the session and  I met Sushma in the pantry during this. She tried convincing saying that we could find a better job and  why support ... she grabbed her bag lying on the table and asked me to leave the place (so here plan was to abscond really )

I agreed but not sure why couldn’t leave then , I had nothing to say but after a while asked her to leave .Just had a positive vibe that there is something best here for me .

However she left and I went back to training room .

Now El was back , he did not really start our voice and accent  training on first day  but wanted us to know each and every person whom we  will be working  with before we start.

So yes he told us that he will be introducing us to our managers first , there were two managers under whom we would be working . They couldn’t come on the same day as they were really occupied .

Next day during the session three gentle men walked in and were talking to El.

Amongst them two of them had smile on their faces and there was one Tall Fair man was on phone worried about something , he disconnected after a while but then looked worried and was in hurry to get back to floor. He  really did not look at us and the other guy said greeted all of us in the room   with a smile and “Hello”.

So El introduced all three, firstly he introduced Operations manager who had completed 11 years working here ,

Great isn’t it , I mean how could someone work at same place for so long …everyone looked at him surprisingly . He spoke about his experience there , which I did not listen much because I had only one thing going In my mind who will be my manager amongst the other two..Will he really allow me to be myself .if he is really tough one me , how would I manage to be how I was trying to be .

Anyways all 3 left after sometime .

After a month or so and were done with our technical training  , we guys were all set to hit the floor .

We were informed that our batch will be divided under those two managers and it is not really easy to take calls and deal with customers.

And were also told that it is all your manager whom you will have to report to about each and everything you do at work .

We all had signs of anxiety on faces but El however made it easy as always and now we were confident enough by the end of the month to talk to Foreign customers .

But still I always wished not to go to tall guy’s team as he did not look happy the day I saw him for the first time and had a perception that he wouldn’t let me be the way I wanted to ..i did not wanted someone  to  stop me coming out of what I was going through  , I wondered if he even spoke to his team members .

Infact was never interested in knowing his name ,

I only knew that I will be working with Commercial team , now my curiosity of knowing the person was more whom I’ll be working with.

Now this man was someone whom I was thinking of –“will I really stay back in this team for long time , Will I be able to talk to customers? “ were all the questions that I had .

However I decided not to think much about it and concentrate on training.

During my Mock calls , this tall guy came to our room and asked Raja,my technical trainer-‘when are these folks hitting floor “ and my mind said “oh no, I don’t wanna go to his team “.

I did not realize that i was lucky enough to go to his team . However everytime I saw him in cafeteria or in the bay, I stared at him or never bothered to look as he was never a happy person for me but was someone who was only into work ,

I knew that people in customer support always greet each other and had happy faces because they learn to be polite talking to customers.

Days passed and I managed to clear my technical rounds and was time to hit the floor.

I realized Deepak Mehta was my Manager’s name whom I had started hating before even knowing him ,just because I did not find him smiling on first day.

Now it was my first day when I took call, I remember it was issue related to Wireless network , somehow managed to finish the call and relaxed and early morning I get to know that Deepak will not be coming for another 1 week and this made my day , I was really afraid to talk to him because I believed that he may not like the way I wanted to be .

I was not really professional in my ways. . because somewhere in last 2 years of survival I had become more of careless person .Maybe I could have chosen a different way to live but I did not find one .

Now during the first week , I saw that people around me were very passionate about their work about customer service and heard that of all Managers Deepak was  kind and loving one .

And this was surprising , obviously .

I never imagined this profession had so many things to do and learn  , all I knew was just dial customer care number and get things sorted and today I was on the other side helping customers .

Anyways Deepak was back and he got few chocolates for his team and I was like “oh ..he does something for his team “ still I did not see him smiling .

Why did he always have frown face …or may be was I the only one who did not know him .

Anyways next day one of them from my batch was absconding , she quit the job as she decided not to take calls .

Somewhere even I decided to do so when I found difficulty in making customer seated in a different country and make them understand technical stuff  .

Early morning this tall man came to my desk just to say Good morning and with a smile .He was back from his holidays .

I replied ..- Hey hi, Good morning .. I don’t remember if I smiled back at him .or just wondered .

He greeted everyone infact , he greeted people regularly and went back to his desk.

One fine day he called all newbees , ofcourse I was one among them and asked us few things about the calls we took .

I still remember he told us about his first call , he spoke to us for about 20 minutes .This was the first time where I found him talking  and smiling .During the conversation someone informed him that there were calls waiting and he immediately asked us to leave and pick calls .

Infact, later next day I saw him picking call because call volume had increased for some reason and the staff was less .

Is’nt this strange?

His passion was work truly spoke much about him…

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We've all needed help from a Customer Service Executive at one time or another, sometimes it’s a cell phone with garbled display, or a lost credit card, or an urgent flight booking. Customer Service Executives are required to answer incoming calls from customers for various reasons,I was here to provide technical solutions.

People around me were always helpful and really helpful during work , few girls whom I barged with were great and had given me enough solutions for every call I logged at worked .

Days passed and I found Deepak very helpful.

His attitude wasn’t Bossy may be that was one of the reason why people loved him as a manager or mentor .

Under his mentoring I got to learn lot of things , Customer support had some more value .

Valuable feedback was shared by him on day to day basis which I felt was really necessary at work and I was missing ,

With this I had

Ability to listen and had improved my active problem solving skills

Improved my Good interpersonal skills

Ability to handle pressure.

He is a true leader who respects others , respects his work and takes the responsibility for all the actions taken by his team .

Leadership qualities I learnt from him are worth , time I spent with him was worth .

There is nothing I regret about .

He let me be what I wanted to be and let me work the way I wanted to and yes of course if something went wrong he managed it so well and made me understand what could have been done instead of pointing at my negativities .

 I really did not value my work earlier, but yes I did now .

I understood what being responsible is.

I was not absent minded person anymore ..

Every Profession has its own importance , now customer support was my passion .

There were many who were not easily approachable but this man was and I did not wanted negative vibe around and did not really wanted people around who would only point at your disabilities and discourage .

I had massive respect for him because now I was someone who took challenges and brings out perfect instead .I did not realize what I was going through .

I wasn’t the same now .Yes, I did not have to fight with my illness anymore like I did .

We were good friends after a very long time , he understood what I could think of when some task was given to me and corrected me before I could even execute .

I received a text from one of my friend asking for an outing , meeting him reminded me of those 2 years I spent …and this did not let me come out for about few days ..I found Deepak really worried for me for the first time because he must have found me lost .He walked up  to my desk and asked me if everything was OK , I smiled and said “yea , all good” . I wanted him to just leave the place and let me be alone before I burst out into tears in front of him.But he did not leave , I started walking out of the bay and he came along with me to see if was fine ..i smiled. And as usual someone walks up to him approaching for something and he got busy, I just wanted to escape from here and headed towards pantry.

I did not wanted to let him know my past ,don’t know why ,( I always thought he was someone’s parent) he  treated me like his child most of the times and I never wanted to share this with him .

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I have started writing this after long time again …

Every time I feel something is going wrong and I’m hassled again , I come to this place .

Trust me it is really peaceful, chirping of birds and the blowing winds make you forget everything and you would just love peace.

Certain relations are just unexplained , it is always not just parents love , relation with spouse or with your partner , it is sometimes not the friend’s love even . It is also respect that you give to the person whom you are working with and this relation is really worthy .

I respected him and that's it..I don't need to explain anything.

I was rewarded and recognized for all the efforts i had put in ,Promoted finally after a year and a half .After which i was asked to join newly formed team which required higher grade . 

No one realized that I was lost in work or working with him would gain me more knowledge with which the sign of depression doesn’t relapse later .

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 At this stage I am workaholic person who loves her work and doesn’t want to leave any customer behind or any responsibility behind,

Lot of distractions i remember which would only bring you down the ladder ..

Infact at work I remember that there were people who asked to stop working because their target or say productivity target  for the month had increased ..reason being me in the team.

They asked to stop working for half of the day...you really think someone could stop me now..

yes ofcourse ,I was worried about myself now ..about losing good relation with colleagues.

This broke me down again and I stopped approaching him anymore and he did realize the same and kept asking me if everything was alright .

He did care for is employees but i did not think about this ,

One fine day I bursted out in tears upon asking and he just smiled and said “do you really care?” ,  ‘You know what you are , why listen to someone” and what else , this was just enough to stop listening to others . 
May be this was a learning for me . Now that 20% of fight within myself had become less  when I stopped listening to people who talk behind your back or discourage you .

---------so yes, this was an example or say learning to stay out of all this which brings you down ---------------------------------------

Not just this, there are any instances where he did not let me fall down and gave me opportunities to share my ideas which helps employee to gain self confidence..
He Truly  deserves being called Champion and yes he was rewarded recently...I regret about not attending Annual day  and see him receiving the award because I met with an accident about a week prior to the award show and had small surgery on my right hand...but trust me I was the happiest person and just wished to be there .
I would have enjoyed,hopped like kids ..clapped till he came back from there.. seeing  him receiving most valuable award ...trust me .
My Mentor really deserved it..

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I started believing in myself more when I came across this reminder from Facebook post that I posted-

And i realized i was this ...and just one incident changed me ...

“Thinking about the incident that happened while I was in cab coming back home .

Friday evenings there is hell lot of traffic in Bangalore ,i as usually was sitting at the window seat . 

Suddenly when I looked straight I see a girl waving at me.(cab was standing close to the footpath)

She was heading out there , it was almost about 15 mins over my cab did not move , may be she took time to realize and started waving at me when the cab was about to move .

Till the time I reached I was thinking of here who she was.

Yes I recognized after I reached ,this was one whom I saw near the bus stop.

how can I forget this day , yes I remember this girl .

I couldn’t forget her face.I was glad realizing that it was her .

During my engineering while coming back home i saw this girl at the bus stop.

I couldn’t take off my eyes from her , the pain on her face those smudged eyes did not let me do so  .

She looked here and there and asked people around for a phone.

I was wondering what had happened ,I missed 2-3 buses on this evening .

She walked up to me after a while and asked me for a phone , me in dilema in fact worried at the same time, asked her what was wrong .

She looked at me for a while and wept, I took her near the ledge and asked her to sit there.

Offered some water. (luckily I had a water bottle).

After a while she said-“please dial this number and inform him that I am no more alive”

I was speechless for a while ,of course lot of things were running In my mind ,why?? What??

Many things you know.

I put the phone in my pocket and asked her to tell me what was wrong and whom did she ask me to call.

Finally she revealed , it was her guy who blackmailed her all the time(wouldn’t disclose what it was)

Truly speaking I did not wanted to poke my nose in this but it was her parents who striked at this time.

Without saying much I asked her –do your parents know about this?

She nodded , I took a deep breath to calm my self down first and said don’t you think it is important to tell them. It is you now later could be someone else, do you want this to happen with someone else ?

She looked at me surprisingly ,I asked her to call up her parents .

She smiled at me wiping her tears and said thank you .

I had to leave now as my mom kept calling me.

She did call her parents up I waited till they came and finally when they were there.

I did not miss my last bus.”

Finally some good sign.

I remember being like this girl once ,always lost  and quiet.

Things run in my mind why , why wasn’t I strong enough .

Lots of regrets……….!!!!”

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Now I have another lady in my life who always send her blessings and love from Australia ,

Mrs .Brown.

Ann😊

I was blessed on the day when I received call from this lady reporting problems with her computer , I tried helping her out and worked on her case during weekends I worked on her emails which she was happy about .

She is a business woman who travels in different part of the world always and has been an inspiration for many young women.

We shared our personal email ID , we are friends on Linked in now and she always inspires me with her emails .

By this time Deepak was promoted to his next role and no more my manager , he deserved to be promoted and yes I was the most happiest person and surprised him making some video for completing 10 years at work .I’m so proud of him , even now .

He is been my inspiration always and now there is  another person in the list(Ann).

He will always be someone brought best in me unknowingly...

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My designation is different now after 2 years of support , my new role has given me more visibility at the work place and I am going On and On ...

I may not be  at certain good post now  but I believe in myself  …so I live my life with a positive attitude and  I know career without being myself is not important .