Last day/first day

My last day at Prosper was Monday. It was strange. In the morning I had almost nothing to do since I had trained everyone else to do the various parts of my job. I walked around and said goodbye to some people, two of which are shown below. (Sherri and Emily are two of my closest Prosper friends and I can't believe I managed to say goodbye without crying.)

In the afternoon I helped Erin put the new hires into the system, answered a few questions while Cami wrangled with the team list, and made generally obnoxious comments. I sent some final e-mails and made sure my out-of-office had the contact information for all my projects/responsibilities. I said good-bye to the the HR staff. Travis, Cami, and Erin all wished me good luck. Susan and I said good-bye during my exit interview and Bradley came out and shook my hand. Emily walked me out to my car and we said a final "see you later" since a couple of us are going to lunch together next week. I learned so much from working at Prosper. Even though it could be very frustrating and tiring at times, I'm glad I worked there. On a strange note, it turns out that Monday was the last day for another person working at Prosper. I won't mention a name since I generally try not to embarrass others, but his leaving surprised most people. If I had known it was his last day as well, I would have shared my good-bye candy with him. Once again, I didn't manage to get a picture of Susan.

My first day at CR was interesting. My new boss, we'll call him M, was really busy and didn't really have time to talk. Natasha trained me on the phones and e-mail system (they use Zimbra, something that I have never used before.) I met lots of new people, who all seemed really nice. I also met my other boss, we'll call him R. I will be helping R with Human Resources and M with all sorts of random projects. Hopefully I will get to meet with M tomorrow to discuss responsibilities and expectations. (It's hard to exceed expectations when you don't know them.) Although change is really scary, I think this was a good one.

Parties at Prosper

On Thursday, a few people got together at Prosper for a pot-luck/good-bye party for me. I was surprised how many people showed up. It was a lot of fun. George, the head of the legal department, said some very nice things about me and I was really touched by all the people who came to say good-bye. Here's a picture of some of the people who came to the potluck:

On Friday, Halloween was celebrated at Prosper. People dressed up and we had trick-o-treating for the children of employees. We then had a costume contest and had pizza. Sadly, we didn't get as much work done as we should have. It was a lot of fun though. One of our owners dressed up as another of Prosper's owners. It was pretty funny. Here is a picture of the HR group (minus Susan):

Cami was Raggedy Ann. Erin was the High Priestess of Evil, I was a Geisha (minus the white face make-up,) Travis was a "mack-daddy," and Bradley was a woman. When I first passed by Bradley's office, he had his back turned to the door and I thought "who is sitting at Bradley's desk?" It was pretty funny when he turned around.

We had quite a few kids turn out for the trick-o-treating. At 1pm, we had the costume contest.


Two of my favorites were Traci the jellyfish and Neal the giant Muppets character.
Happy Halloween!

Goodreads.com and reading

A few days ago I received an e-mail from Alison that invited me to join goodreads.com. I joined and look forward to finding out what other people are reading and getting recommendations on what to read next. I bring this up because I have recently been reflecting on how my life has changed over the past year. In April, I will have worked at Prosper for a year. In the month and a half before I started there, I read a lot. I was looking for a job and, in my spare time, I read a lot of new books. Over the past few months, the number of hours I have worked has steadily rose. Last week, due to circumstances beyond my control, I worked 56 hours. I also have started attending a HR class every Tuesday night. So, on Tuesday, I work from 9-5:30pm and then attend class from 6-9pm. It makes for a long day. A year ago, I read three or four books a week. Now I'm lucky if I finish a book every two or three weeks. I supposed that's what happens when you grow up and get a grown-up job.

Halloween at Prosper

One of the great things about my job is that they celebrate holidays. Here are some pictures from my work. The pirate is Whitney from Accounting, the Ninja is Travis from HR, the witch is Tracey from Accounting, the 80's chick is Erin from HR, the skeleton is Chris from the sales division, and the scary clown is Katie from payroll.

An official employee

On the 20th of June I became an official employee of Prosper, a financial coaching company. I am an HR Assistant. I help with new hire orientation, maintain the employee databases, maintain the employee files, and help with special projects. After being a temp for two months, it is nice to finally be an official employee. My job has so many interesting aspects to it. Right now is a crazy time, especially since the director of HR just had emergency surgery. The HR department, which includes Erin, Joee, Susan, Travis, and Jeff. Jeff is the director, Joee is the recruiter, Susan deals with compensation and benefits, Erin is the communications specialist and Travis is an HR intern. They are a diverse bunch and interesting to work with. Because I am in the middle of a big project, I have been working about 45 hours a week for the last month. This week should be very busy but I think I am up to the task.