New Job: CHECK!

It has finally happened. A new job has presented itself to me… after an interview that was only in Spanish and after taking a mandatory IQ test (eh?).

I turned in my resignation letter to my current employer yesterday. Considering I wanted to leave on good terms, I had to turn in a nice “thank you for the opportunity” letter as opposed to the one I really wanted to turn in.

Which is why I’m posting the one I really wanted to send in here, with the names removed of course.

 

Dear Soon-to-be-former-Employer,

I’m writing this letter with regret… and hopes for the future. I’m resigning from Blah Blah Blah, not because I dislike photography or the people I work with, but because I’m too educated, over-worked, and poorly paid to continue on in this establishment.

I will, however, leave you with a few observations of your company and your employees. Considering I have been an employee for your company for more than three years, I can assure you my words will be honest and valid.

Firstly, you need to rethink how you treat your employees. As an over-worked and underpaid employee, I can honestly say I have thought about walking out in the middle of my work day more than once… more than ten times actually. Your employees work very hard for very little. They work so hard that they can use a massage from an actual masseuse (something you should think about providing at the end of the summer). We get no breaks during our work day, there is no water fountain or water cooler anywhere in the studio, and heaven forbid I have to pee. As we are not allowed to leave our studios, the water cooler in the pick-ups office does not count. You should think of buying a water cooler for your employees as well as your customers.

Money. I know you have a lot of it, I know your employees do not. Most of us live paycheck to paycheck. So imagine working over 80 hours a pay period, with no breaks, with one day off (the only day the studio is closed of course), and no bathroom breaks (which is fine since we have no water at work anyways), only to see your paycheck and have your heart drop all the way down to your ass. A $700 paycheck.

Now let’s move on to the actual paycheck. I’m glad you finally stopped paying me through Additional Funds and have actually put down my hourly pay rate. It only took you a year. As this is a resignation letter, this really doesn’t matter too much anymore. What does matter is the fact that I have to go through my paycheck every pay period just to see if you paid me correctly. Here’s a little advice, direct deposit. We can’t check up on you, so you can get away with more. Think about it.

You need to get to know your employees a little better. In doing so, you will learn who your good employees are and who your bad employees are. As one of your fastest and best selling shooters, I will tell you that it makes me very angry to get punished for being fast. I work every night shift and every weekend shift. It also makes me angry to see other employees work less, care less, and shoot slower, but get paid the same or more than me. I’m sure you have some genius reason as to why this is, so I’d appreciate hearing the explanation.

After almost four years of working for this company, you still do not consider me a full time employee and therefore refuse to give me sick days, vacation days, and a retirement plan. However to appease me, you will allow me to take the insurance out of my paycheck every pay period which is only given to full time employees per the employee handbook. Please explain to me how I am allowed to have insurance, but am still not considered a full time employee.

Now I’m going to move onto you as a person. You are condescending. Look it up if you don’t know what it means (sound familiar?). You look at all your employees as if they are beneath you. You think all your employees are stupid. You don’t hide your sentiments very well. I can assure you most of your employees are very well educated with college degrees even. I believe your education is based on experience alone.

I hope this letter shines some light on what is going on in the company you have built from scratch and are slowly letting fall to the ground. Treat your employees better and your company will have a better chance of succeeding.

 

Sincerely,

Kat Laire

PS: Thanks for by husband.

PSS: Your daughter is a crack head. I mean this literally. She sniffs crack. In the bathroom. At work.