I worked at FedEx Ground for just under three years.
Originally I became a package handler at the Norcross location during COVID as a means to make ends meet. As an essential business, it was one of the few places urgently hiring. I ended up sticking with it and transferring to Marietta when I enrolled at KSU. It was a difficult job at times, hard physical labor that was at times dangerous. But for every moment I hated it, there was another where I loved it. I gained a tremendous amount of respect for the people I worked with and the line of work as a whole, however unforgiving it could be. There was a wide array of shifts and decent pay and it kept me active and decently fit. For a while, I even worked the midnight shift while going to school during the day.
Last year, however, I was granted an opportunity to be promoted and to be a part-time operations manager in the unload area. Encouraged by coworkers and not at all minding a little bit of extra money, I took it up. Long story short, it was a horrible experience. From the constant chewing-out, to the disorganization, to having the majority of problems being out of my hands, it quickly became a toxic work environment. Not being the type of person to quit out of spite or difficulty, I stuck with it and learned a lot about taking accountability and being in the professional world in general. Unfortunately, the toxicity never went away no matter how much I learned and tried to be better. Like the old saying goes: “If you don’t like something change it, if you can’t change it, change your attitude.” But what happens when changing your attitude does nothing?
You leave. That’s what you do.
Leaving FedEx Ground is what brings me to the true topic of this post, which is intended to serve as my ‘career resource opportunity’ in my KSU Careers in Writing class. That topic is of the trainer interview that I partook in at the FedEx Ellenwood location.
To say I didn’t like FedEx would be an exaggeration. I had my grievances with the way they ran things but that could mostly be just how the Marietta location was run and beyond that I never really reached my full potential as a manager so I don’t know if I really was able to let it take its full course. I also had my own problems as a manager, mostly related to my personality, and I didn’t stay long enough to really be able to say I was a part of it. In the end, it was being a manager that I didn’t like (and didn’t have space for in my life, as a full-time student), not necessarily FedEx Ground itself.
So, while looking for other jobs, among my options was a part-time trainer position in Ellenwood Georgia. It offered pay similar to operations manager while being less stressful and requiring less time in the warehouse, plus the position was the midnight shift, which I had been really missing (still do a little bit). Ellenwood was nearly an hour away from me, but it was the only job listing for a part-time trainer that I had ever seen and I thought it’d be great to keep my options open. Additionally, with each interview, I’ve always learned something new. So a week after I left FedEx Marietta, I got a call for the interview and I went.
The Interview
It was a long drive in the night, even for my standards because I love driving. I arrived at the Ellenwood facility and it was quite confusing as to which building I had to enter and the security was far more substantial than Marietta’s, but eventually, I found my way in. The man I was greeted by was the Smartpost location’s sort manager, along with an area manager (I think). They were the usual FedEx manager personality types, ambitious, fiery, and passionate to a fault, but still somewhat humble. I knew as an operations manager I could possibly run into the same problems because from what I have seen it’s similar levels of toxicity across the board, but as a trainer I could potentially fulfill my duties quite well compared to as a manager. The Ellenwood location seemed about as large as the Marietta location, if not larger, though it seemed a little bit less busy.
In the interview, they asked questions related to my problem-solving, people skills, and my personal ambitions. I answered them truthfully and as fast I could. Technically you can take as much time as you can on the questions, but I like to answer them with the first thing that pops into my head in order to keep my confidence up and to not waste my interviewers’ time. One of the questions they asked was in regards to the fact that I was a manager trying to step down. I simply stated school as the primary reason, though I did throw in a small mention of a toxic work environment, to which the sort manager agreed with me from his limited experience working at the Marietta hub years prior. The interview took about an hour and a half and concluded at around 2 am. I left feeling confident, especially considering my past experience with the company, even though I knew taking the position was not really the best idea for me. If they gave me a job offer I gave it a 10% chance I would take it given the other opportunities I was looking at.
That was back in late March and as of writing this post in late April, I never heard back from them, which is unusual for FedEx as they usually call or send an Email regarding you being unfit for the position, but I suppose that could be a bi-product of me leaving the company. In the end, I went with Costco, where I have since been working as a night stocker. It has been a bit of a culture shock because Costco almost aggressively tries to care for its employees, which is the exact opposite of FedEx. Unfortunately, it is less physical work and the scheduling is much more strict compared to FedEx, though the pay is better than a FedEx package handler, resulting in some pros & cons in comparison. But, in my eyes, it’s certainly a win over being a manager, at least in my current state in life, even with the fact that it is significantly less pay. You would have had to pay me $35 an hour or something absurd to have kept me in that position with how much you have to deal with.
Either way, I’ve taken a lot away from this whole experience. I’ve gained and lost, went forward and backward in different respects, and taken hold of my life.
In the interview itself, the main things I learned were considering the second interviewer. About halfway through, I realized I was only looking at the main interviewer and not the second one, who just so happened to be a woman. It was not intentional, but rather just unfortunately within my nature. So after that, I began intensely looking at the woman during the questioning. I guess that’s something I’ll be taking into consideration next time. I also learned to be conscious of shaking women’s hands. I’ll be honest, as a man I’ve been taught to shake hands firmly and with a good grip, or else I risk being judged. Most guys are not afraid to comment on how weak a handshake is. But when shaking the woman interviewer’s hand, I instinctively crushed it pretty badly while she hardly squeezed at all. Oops.. I guess another lesson learned.
I wonder if that has something to do with the fact they never called me back? Whatever though, it doesn’t matter anymore.
