It was in the summer of 1989 that I started my new job at
the local service in downtown Akron. I
remember my mom thought I was absolutely insane for quitting a job that had
benefits with paid vacation, but as I explained to her, it is not healthy to
stay in a job in which you are miserable if there is any way to get out of that
type of situation. Giving up the
benefits was actually a benefit in itself because I was going to some place
where I knew I could again enjoy the work I loved. That more than made up for the so-called
benefits I was losing.
My main account was for a large hospital from the Cleveland
area. This service also transcribed the
H&Ps for St. Thomas, the very hospital I left, and usually one of the MTs
would work a later shift and do any H&P dictations that came in up through
7 o’clock in the evening. When she was
off, I would stay and do those H&Ps for her. So some days I was there from
9 a.m. to around 7:30 or 8 at night. But
I loved the work and never had a problem with those long days. It felt a little ironic that I was sometimes
transcribing reports for the hospital I left behind, but it was great to be so
familiar with those dictators.
One of the MTs I worked with also had a home office, as she
was paying for her college and needed the extra money. I used to marvel at the fact that she would
drink a 6-pack of Coke everyday (not diet Coke) and smoke cigarettes all day
long. My boss was a smoker, so she had
no problem if anyone wanted to smoke at their desk. Luckily my desk was at the
front of the office and the smokers were in the back, so I really did not
notice it very much. I guess she had to
have all that caffeine to keep awake because of having a full- and part-time
job on top of going to school. Oh, to
have that much energy today! The more she talked about that home office, the
more I thought that might be something to try.
I had another friend who also worked from home, so it was sounding more
and more intriguing to me. I wondered if
I would have the discipline to get up every day and get the work done without
having to leave the house other than to pick up tapes. Could I get everything done and returned the
next day without procrastinating and thus having to work until 2 a.m. to get it
all done?
My Home Office
My Home Office
As luck would have it, I had the opportunity to get my hands
on a word processor with Word Perfect DOS (remember that software?), so I asked
my boss if I could give working from home a try. As long as the work got done, she really did
not care where it was done, so about a year after I started with her, I set up
shop at home. I was still her employee,
so this was not my service just yet, but it was my first steps into having a
home office. I found that I absolutely
loved working from home and never looked back.
I was a little surprised at how well I handled the self-discipline I
needed to make sure I met my deadlines.
It is not that I thought I would put off the work, but I was a little
concerned that maybe it would be hard to not let distractions get the better of
me, like chatting on the phone or playing with my dogs, and thus getting behind. It never happened. I was able to handle the phone, the pups, and
even breaks with relatively no problems.
I also did occasionally go into the office when H&Ps
needed to be done in the evenings, but the majority of my time was working from
home. About a year into it, the account
I was working on was unfortunately going away.
They were very happy with my work, but as this was an account from
Cleveland, which was about 45 minutes away, they had found a service that was
right in town, and they would save a lot from having to drive that distance
everyday for pick-ups and deliveries. My boss did not want to lose me, but at that
particular time, there were no other accounts for me to work on and no new
accounts were coming in, so the most I could do would be the H&Ps when that
was needed.
They say timing is everything, and that was never more true
for me, because the very day I was told I would be losing that account was the
very day I got a call from the MT I mentioned above who worked part-time from
home. She had gotten a call from a
physician’s office who wanted her to do his dictations on a regular basis. He had a very large practice, and it was
going to be a lot of dictation. She felt
she had no time to take this account on, so she called me, having no idea that
I was losing the account from Cleveland.
I was terrified and ecstatic at the same time! It was such a relief knowing I could possibly
have work to replace what I was losing, but what would I charge, how would I handle
turn-around time, what references would I need?
Those were just a few of the hundreds of questions that were running
through my head.
I needed the work, so I had to put those questions away and
dive in to this new venture. I did have
a general idea of going rates in my area, so I knew what I wanted to charge,
but I had no idea if this guy would go for it.
I pulled a resume together in short order and headed over to his office
the next day. Again, the timing was in
my favor, because they were in an almost desperate situation to get someone on
board because of the amount of dictation and at that point having no one to get
it done. They quickly saw by my resume
that I had a lot of experience, and I even explained about my certification,
which also impressed him and his office manager, since of course they did not
know MTs had any kind of credentialing.
The hardest part for me was telling them my fee, how I counted the work
for billing and such. They were fine
with it, and thus in December of 1991, I had my very first client!
I ran a very successful service through the summer of 1994,
when I found myself moving from Ohio to Idaho, and thinking it will be nice to
take about 6 months off and not work at all.
I wanted to get used to my new state, get things settled in my house,
and get over my homesickness. But 2
weeks after my arrival, you guessed it, I got a call from a practice needing
help with their dictation. No 6 months
off for me!
No comments:
Post a Comment