Roomies on the first day of work. L-R: Training, Local Marketing, Accounting, Human Resources
I work at a Human Resources Management firm, dekat bandara [“close to the airport” – we say this phrase every morning to our Blue Bird taksi drivers!] Initially, I started out in the Human Resources department – which was daunting because I had virtually no background in human resources and my first task was to evaluate reports and suggest improvements to the company’s performance management system!
Lunch with some of our colleagues from Human Resources and Overseas Marketing at Hokka Hokka Bento, Soekarno-Hatta Airport
The following week, I was actually moved downstairs to the Local Marketing department. I’m sure many of you are wondering “Human Resources Management?” We are a PJTKI (Perusahaan Jasa Tenaga Kerja Indonesia or Administering Agency for the Placement and Protection of Indonesian Workers Overseas) and our “products” are people: TKI (Tenaga Kerja Indonesia – factory workers) and TKW (Tenaga Kerja Wanita – female domestic helpers). Our firm provides vocational and language training to the workers while we job match, process paperwork, and send them on to their 2-3 year contracts overseas. My department is responsible for recruiting these men and women, mostly from Java, and keeping track of their legal documents and registration and job match payments. My job: to analyze the daily reports – monitoring the progress and status of payment and documents and following up with staff so that we can send these workers on their way to their new jobs, “For a Better Life.”
Classrooms at Pt. Yonasindo Intra Pratama
My department is actually very noisy: cell phones constantly sounding ringtones ranging from the Nokia theme to emo Asian music, people talking on the phone simultaneously, people greeting the new recruits and discussing the process to get them working overseas, and a very loud phone that everyone in the department uses located conveniently on my desk! Fortunately, I developed the ability to tune out noise as a child trying to read books at big fat Filipino family gatherings (thank you, cackling aunties! Please know that I really mean this in love) and generally have no problem getting in the zone in noisy environments. I mentioned the noise because it’s has been very easy to drown it out and everything and everyone else in my department by burying myself in work – not to mention I know dikit-dikit [little] Bahasa Indonesia and I was placed in a department where only three people can communicate in English.
Probably the longest sentence I can say right now (besides “may I please have a fork and spoon” – Boleh saya minta sendok dan garpu?) is “I’m sorry, I don’t speak much Indonesian because I don’t know many words - but I want to learn…” [Ma’af, bicara sedikit Bahasa Indonesia karena tidak tahu banyak kata - tapi mau belajar…] I’ve been realizing since the move to my new department that there is so much more to overcome than the language barrier: a bad attitude about getting to know my colleagues better and being in my new surroundings, and fearing rejection – the former, a sobering realization; and the latter, I am grateful to have finally understood now that I have come all the way across the world. After hours of staring at excel spreadsheets, I knew that there had to be so much more to my time here. To describe the transition to Local Marketing, I will reference the PDCA cycle (which I ate, slept, and breathed the attempt to understand it…actually, it’s a simple performance management model when, used correctly, can be very effective in facilitating growth and improvement) as a tribute to my short time in the Human Resources department:
Plan – Why am I here at Pt. Yonasindo Intra Pratama? Not just to work, but to build relationships with my colleagues and to share the love of Christ with them through my life – in actions, and hopefully someday in words
Do – I was doing my job analyzing reports and then discussing the data with my supervisor, the CFO. I would actually skip the morning briefings with my department to try and sift through at least eight reports in an hour and a half before meeting with Jeffrey to discuss.
Check – Upon evaluation, I can say that I did pick up quickly on what it is that I am actually supposed to do in terms of actual work. But I wasn’t doing a good job of loving people with the love that Christ has for me. My heart wasn’t in the right place with the meetings, for example. It’s true that I needed to analyze the data to talk with Jeffrey about how we can move forward and keep track of things like payment and achieve our monthly target recruitment…but I didn’t want to be sitting in meetings where I couldn’t understand a word. It just seemed like a waste of time, especially after feeling very awkward in the first morning meeting that I attended where everything just sounded like a blur of Bahasa Indonesia.
Act – Sometimes, you just have to jump. It’s no fun feeling dumb, and even worse, no fun anticipating getting laughed at when you try and fail – with anything! But specific to this situation, trying to speak a language one doesn’t know very well at all. But, on Tuesday, after asking God for help with a change of heart on the way to work in the taksi that morning, I said to one of my colleagues, Warsid, in my broken Bahasa Indonesia that I was sorry that I didn’t talk much. He said that he understood that I was sibuk [busy], which broke my heart. After exchanging a few more words, he apologized for his poor English. I assured him that his English was better than my Indonesian, and said “Saya mau yang kita teman,” [literal translation: I want that we friend]. He and another woman, Nur, agreed enthusiastically, and we agreed that we would learn together each other’s languages. They also invited me to the morning meeting and to a birthday lunch later that day from some people here at the firm.
I can’t believe I’m referencing Stephen Covey’s The Seven Habits of Highly Effective People because I feel like I read it ages ago in my high school sophomore seminar taught by Mr. Coyne. One of the habits is “Seek first to understand, rather than to be understood.” Tuesday morning I also realized that morning meetings were an easy opportunity to improve my listening skills. Good perspective makes everything so much better! After that brief conversation in Bahasa with my new friend Warsid, I braved the meeting with the aid of my iPod touch (thanks to Josh Tishhouse for helping me purchase it and the computer from which I write this entry) and the iKamus/eKamus [kamus = dictionary] application. I typed words into my dictionary like crazy and wrote down the definition and each word 5 times (this goes back to my days at First Assembly Christian School, thanks to people like Mrs. Anita Rumery – such a great way to learn words!) while listening. I not only understood that there were many masalah [problems] but I was able to match the words to the feelings of my colleagues and really understand the thoughts of the people who write the comments on the reports that I diligently upload into Google translator everyday (thank you, Google. I love you. Except for when you don’t have translations for common words – and when you have incorrect translations for simple words, too. Please care more, thanks. I kid you not – I actually really want to write that every time I click “contribute a better translation” on translate.google.co.id).
Celebrating birthdays at work
What ended up happening to the birthday celebrants at the work birthday party
Jadi, saya belajar pelan-pelan bagaimana bicara banyak kata [So, I learn slowly how to speak more words] and am trying everyday to understand my surroundings and the people better. It’s been so exciting to learn so much! Sampai nanti [until later]!
