SiouzQ.
9-17-16, 9:47am
Yes, it's rearing its ugly head and totally stressing me out at my new job. I am having a really hard time with Excel Spreadsheets, which is what the gallery inventory and daily sales uses. Here's the back story, going way back - I have always had a math and technology phobia ever since I can remember. I have horrible recollections of my dad yelling at me in frustration while trying to explain my math homework to me when I was growing up; it even dissolved into a broken dish and me getting slapped at some point while I was in high school. I took only the math I needed to graduate and have never looked back. Then computers came on the scene. I can do the basics but am pretty shaky on things requiring much more than that. However, I did sort of set up an inventory system for my jewelry using Open Office Spreadsheets but I only use the Auto-sum formula and nothing else. It is so NOT fancy; I have no idea about any of the other formulas or how to link them between tabs.
Fast-forward to new job: I got very little training. The training I got came on day three of arriving to New Mexico after a 1500 mile , three and half day trip in which I upended my entire life as I knew it. The training lasted about maybe three hours - I was shown how to do sales transactions, and then spent a bit of time inputing about three weeks worth of daily sales into the inventory spreadsheet and daily tab. I caught on after a fashion just by rote, but had very little or no understanding of how the program's formulas work. All goes fine until I somehow lost the formulas in the particular cells, and I keep doing it. The new boss was kind of okay about it at first, but there is something I am doing (or not doing) that I keep screwing up and he keeps explaining it, and is getting more and more frustrated at me, which in turn raises my anxiety level to the point that my brain literally shuts down and NOTHING he says makes sense.
The problem is he is in Albuqerque and I am 45 minutes away. I cannot seem to grasp what he is trying to tell me over the phone as he is telling me how to fix (for the umpteenth time) a stupid mistake I've made. And it makes me feel really, really stupid and mortified that there is something I am not grasping about this program and it is the same problem. The first few weeks I was here we were open 7 days a week and it wasn't an issue, but for the last two weeks we've been closed on Wednesdays and I was never really taught how to deal with the closed day on the spreadsheet. I am a monkey-see, monkey-do kind of learner; I need to SEE someone do it several times and then I NEED to do it over and over before it sinks in as to what is being accomplished. Doing it over the phone for me is way too abstract and I end up clicking on the wrong cell, or don't understand exactly what the formula is to be typed it in. When I hear him get angry at me I end up almost in tears. It's already been a difficult first month anyway, none of which is my fault AT ALL, but I think his frustration at things not going smoothly these past few weeks is a little high. My employers are generally really pretty great, but the co-dependent in me doesn't want to make waves, wants to smooth everything over, etc, etc.
The first month for me here saw all this: hot water heater and plumbing issue, resulting with about a week of no hot water, the propane tank needs replacing, the new refrigerator I bought for the place ended up being defective and he ended up having to haul it back to Santa Fe and bring me a new one last week, then there was a town municipal water crisis this week that had the all the water shut off twice for several days in a row (that got a little dicey for me, as I have no bathtub to fill with water in order to flush the toilet - I filled up all the buckets I could find and still started running out, as it takes A LOT of water to fill a toilet tank up enough to flush. Luckily, there are public restrooms for the tourists up the street). I haven't had a shower in days, but it is finally fixed so I will take one this morning...
So anyway, back to the spreadsheet issue - I have been totally stressing out about it since yesterday because I had called him on Thursday BEFORE I did anything to make sure I was closing out the previous day's numbers correctly. I thought I understood what I was supposed to do, but when I went to do it, I somehow screwed it up and lost the formula and I DON'T KNOW WHY OR HOW TO GET IT BACK, YET AGAIN! Every time I try to fix it the way he showed me it's like going down the rabbit hole and floundering in the dark until I am so befuddled and anxious I can't do anything but walk away. I so dread having to call him today, I do NOT want his weekend to get screwed up again, and I feel incompetent, even though I know I am competent in so many other ways.
I am not quite sure how to handle this - I may call the wife part of the team this morning and apologize and explain why I am having so much trouble and discuss ways in which to fix the immediate issue and my problems with understanding the program. I know that if I got more hands-on training it will eventually dawn on me how to fix a mistake when I make it. I do not want to make excuses for myself, but I have a different learning style when it comes to this and these are two people who have had long careers in banking using numbers and spreadsheets for thirty-odd years each. I have never really had to learn this program, let alone over the phone in abstract. I equate it to being dropped off in rural China and to be expected to be able to navigate my way out with absolutely no experience in the language.
What do ya'll think I should do? I can let the daily sales pile up for a little while but at some point soon I will have to enter items sold in the inventory and close out each day's sales. Like I said earlier, it goes fine until we are closed for a day and then I have to resume inputing info on the next sale day, if that makes any sense. I know I need to take the emotion out of it and let them know I still do not understand what I am supposed to do. It just makes me feel so STUPID to keep ending up with the same problem, two weeks in a row! Can you tell I am stressed out? I have a hard time turning it off because I just want things to go smoothly and I blame myself and my lack of knowledge in this area - and believe me, I have even called the guy who used to run the gallery (who had moved away before I even got here) to have him help me. It would have been much better if he had been around to train me instead of being thrown into the job and attempting to figure it all out myself. Without any training I have had to figure out how to add new artist's work, search for blank consignment forms on a very disorganized file system on the computer, make a bunch of orders, rearrange the whole sales floor, make sure all the items and artwork are tagged with the artist's name (ya think?). The whole place is pretty disorganized but I am getting a handle in it...other than the computer glitch I am having I think I am doing a good job so far.
Fast-forward to new job: I got very little training. The training I got came on day three of arriving to New Mexico after a 1500 mile , three and half day trip in which I upended my entire life as I knew it. The training lasted about maybe three hours - I was shown how to do sales transactions, and then spent a bit of time inputing about three weeks worth of daily sales into the inventory spreadsheet and daily tab. I caught on after a fashion just by rote, but had very little or no understanding of how the program's formulas work. All goes fine until I somehow lost the formulas in the particular cells, and I keep doing it. The new boss was kind of okay about it at first, but there is something I am doing (or not doing) that I keep screwing up and he keeps explaining it, and is getting more and more frustrated at me, which in turn raises my anxiety level to the point that my brain literally shuts down and NOTHING he says makes sense.
The problem is he is in Albuqerque and I am 45 minutes away. I cannot seem to grasp what he is trying to tell me over the phone as he is telling me how to fix (for the umpteenth time) a stupid mistake I've made. And it makes me feel really, really stupid and mortified that there is something I am not grasping about this program and it is the same problem. The first few weeks I was here we were open 7 days a week and it wasn't an issue, but for the last two weeks we've been closed on Wednesdays and I was never really taught how to deal with the closed day on the spreadsheet. I am a monkey-see, monkey-do kind of learner; I need to SEE someone do it several times and then I NEED to do it over and over before it sinks in as to what is being accomplished. Doing it over the phone for me is way too abstract and I end up clicking on the wrong cell, or don't understand exactly what the formula is to be typed it in. When I hear him get angry at me I end up almost in tears. It's already been a difficult first month anyway, none of which is my fault AT ALL, but I think his frustration at things not going smoothly these past few weeks is a little high. My employers are generally really pretty great, but the co-dependent in me doesn't want to make waves, wants to smooth everything over, etc, etc.
The first month for me here saw all this: hot water heater and plumbing issue, resulting with about a week of no hot water, the propane tank needs replacing, the new refrigerator I bought for the place ended up being defective and he ended up having to haul it back to Santa Fe and bring me a new one last week, then there was a town municipal water crisis this week that had the all the water shut off twice for several days in a row (that got a little dicey for me, as I have no bathtub to fill with water in order to flush the toilet - I filled up all the buckets I could find and still started running out, as it takes A LOT of water to fill a toilet tank up enough to flush. Luckily, there are public restrooms for the tourists up the street). I haven't had a shower in days, but it is finally fixed so I will take one this morning...
So anyway, back to the spreadsheet issue - I have been totally stressing out about it since yesterday because I had called him on Thursday BEFORE I did anything to make sure I was closing out the previous day's numbers correctly. I thought I understood what I was supposed to do, but when I went to do it, I somehow screwed it up and lost the formula and I DON'T KNOW WHY OR HOW TO GET IT BACK, YET AGAIN! Every time I try to fix it the way he showed me it's like going down the rabbit hole and floundering in the dark until I am so befuddled and anxious I can't do anything but walk away. I so dread having to call him today, I do NOT want his weekend to get screwed up again, and I feel incompetent, even though I know I am competent in so many other ways.
I am not quite sure how to handle this - I may call the wife part of the team this morning and apologize and explain why I am having so much trouble and discuss ways in which to fix the immediate issue and my problems with understanding the program. I know that if I got more hands-on training it will eventually dawn on me how to fix a mistake when I make it. I do not want to make excuses for myself, but I have a different learning style when it comes to this and these are two people who have had long careers in banking using numbers and spreadsheets for thirty-odd years each. I have never really had to learn this program, let alone over the phone in abstract. I equate it to being dropped off in rural China and to be expected to be able to navigate my way out with absolutely no experience in the language.
What do ya'll think I should do? I can let the daily sales pile up for a little while but at some point soon I will have to enter items sold in the inventory and close out each day's sales. Like I said earlier, it goes fine until we are closed for a day and then I have to resume inputing info on the next sale day, if that makes any sense. I know I need to take the emotion out of it and let them know I still do not understand what I am supposed to do. It just makes me feel so STUPID to keep ending up with the same problem, two weeks in a row! Can you tell I am stressed out? I have a hard time turning it off because I just want things to go smoothly and I blame myself and my lack of knowledge in this area - and believe me, I have even called the guy who used to run the gallery (who had moved away before I even got here) to have him help me. It would have been much better if he had been around to train me instead of being thrown into the job and attempting to figure it all out myself. Without any training I have had to figure out how to add new artist's work, search for blank consignment forms on a very disorganized file system on the computer, make a bunch of orders, rearrange the whole sales floor, make sure all the items and artwork are tagged with the artist's name (ya think?). The whole place is pretty disorganized but I am getting a handle in it...other than the computer glitch I am having I think I am doing a good job so far.