Gwendolyn Young Work Autobiography

I can remember doing small chores and earning money from my parents. However, my first real paying job was when I was 14 or 15. It was under a governmental summer youth program either city, state or federal. I worked five days a week, but I'm not sure if it was forty hours or not. It was at a YMCA and I, along with the other dozen or so youth made up the activities department. And
The next summer I worked in an office but I don't remember exactly what my duties were. Typing and filing was involved but I'm not sure if I was typing.
While in high school, I worked in the cafeteria as cashier along with about 3 or 4 other students. It was easy to pass sandwiches and make change and we got to eat all we wanted without paying.
The summer I graduated from high school I worked as secretary to the Executive Director of the Salvation Army Boy's Club. I took dictation, typed letters, prepared news releases and filed. It was a “one girl office” and I enjoyed the work.
My work study at college was in the kitchen, some days I served food and other days I did dishes.
Christmas break from school I worked as an “office temp” doing a variety of clerical jobs. It was fun going to different places, and I discovered some things that I would not like to do (standing making copies all day).
I was still registered with the temporary agency and returned to one of my Christmas assignments after completion of my freshman year. That assignment lasted about six weeks and I worked at other companies. I made the (poor) decision to continue working and got a permanent job with the electrical utility company.
My job was a receptionist on the floor that housed the Public Relations/Public Affairs department. It was an easy job. I had to read newspapers from the major cities in Texas (San Antonio, Austin, Dallas, Houston, Corpus Christi) for any articles in which the “Light Company” was mentioned. Any article that I found I clipped and pasted into a booklet that was circulated to executives. I loved reading!! Whoever thought that I could get paid for reading the paper? In addition, I answered the PBX style phone and greeted visitors. My most famous visitor (to me at least) was Marvin Zindler, local television consumer reporter (and the inspiration for the reporter in the “Best Little Whorehouse in Texas” play and movie).
I worked at the Light Company for about a year and then took a job at a major bank, Allied Bank of Texas as an “Installment Loan Clerk” in 1975. I made sure that the collateral for secured loans was filed with the proper loan, i.e., car and boat titles and in some cases, file the requisite paper work to secure the loan. I also made sure that if insurance was required that it was kept up-to-date. About nine months after I started the other girl in the office, the “Senior Loan Clerk” married and left, and I was promoted. I honestly don't remember what the job duties were but I transferred to the reconcile department within a year. Reconcile is the area that encodes the checks for the computers to “read” them. I stayed in that department for about a year and went to another major bank working in Installment Loans for about two years.
I left that job after a person that I trained was promoted over me. I went to a smaller bank where I did installment loans and regular teller duties. That job lasted about 18 months and I changed industries completely.
I worked for General Electric Supply Company as a “Quotations” clerk, preparing the packages for salesmen to take to clients. It was a lot of statistical typing and copying and I left and went to an engineering company. This brings us to 1981 and slumping oil prices and recession. I was laid off from that job the last quarter of 1982 and was unemployed for about a year. It wasn't too bad since I received unemployment and had a newborn. It was fun to be home with her, but I had to find work.
I worked as a “headhunter” for about six months but ultimately could not take the rejection and not having a regular paycheck. I found I really did not like the cold calling.
I signed with several temporary agencies and started doing “temp” work. I had several long term assignments but none developed into a permanent position until 1985. I was sent to Big Three Industries to work as a legal secretary while the secretary was out on vacation. I reported to the General Counsel. The vacation extended into a sick leave because she caught pneumonia and was out an additional two weeks, returning to work half days. My assignment lasted nearly seven weeks.
In addition to transcription, preparing documents, opening and distributing mail, answering the phone and taking messages there was just energy in the office that I enjoyed. I learned new things and felt challenged. Unfortunately, the assignment ended but, I placed immediately in another long term assignment at Exxon. While at Exxon I was told that the Big Three wanted me back for another long term assignment. That was great because I was bored at Exxon.
I went back to Big Three to cover for a secretary going out on a short term medical leave and would work for the secretary of the corporation and the assistant secretary/treasury. It was a completely new area for me and I learned a lot. Especially that the job involved doing work for other individuals in the department but I got it all done in a timely manner and the day that my assignment was to end, I was offered a job.
December 6, 1985 is the official start date of my employment with Big Three. Big Three is an industrial gas company with the largest gas pipeline system in the United States, with offices coast to coast including Alaska and Hawaii. My first ten months was spent in the tax department, doing sales and use tax filing, maintaining exemption certificates and assisting in tax audits.
However I was able to transfer to the legal department as file clerk in 1986. The amount of paper that came into the department was unreal!! At this time the General Counsel was the only attorney that handled all of the issues for the corporation. He had developed the department and the filing system. It was even “computerized” and all files were entered into the database. This was during the period when the IBM 5520 was THE mode of word processing.
Another attorney was hired and I became his secretary. In addition to answering his phone, filing, and preparing documents, I also handled renewing permits and rentals and making sure outside counsel was paid. I was also responsible for the law library, maintaining updates and paying the bills for the resources used.
Both the attorneys encouraged me to attend paralegal school and I did – as I successfully passed each class the company reimbursed me for books and class costs. I completed paralegal school in 1989.
Big Three Industries was purchased and merged with Liquid Air Corporation with the successor corporation becoming Air Liquide America Corporation. The surviving entity maintained the Houston location. I still performed secretarial duties in addition to working on bankruptcy issues and was the backup secretary for the General Counsel.
In 1995 the merger of the two entities brought the former corporate headquarters of Liquid Air to Houston and the two legal departments merged. My job duties were changed. I continued to handle bankruptcies but I was also to provide secretarial support to the new assistant general counsel and the attorney that handled “bulk” products. I did not like it.
One project that I handled was to convert and combine the filing systems of the two departments into one. One problem being that Big Three's legal department had become an Apple Macintosh environment and Liquid Air's was pc-based. I successfully made the conversion and was assigned creating the department's intranet site. The web page for the Legal Department was one of the first for the company and also was unique in that it featured pictures of department members and would receive seasonal updates, such as for July 4th and Thanksgiving. I had previously taught myself HTML so when I received training for Front Page to do the intranet; it was a breeze to learn.
I learn software easily and am actually quite intuitive about software and computers. I can figure out how something should work or why it is not working. Because of this I became the department's computer resource person. If I can't make it work, then we call the “help desk.”
I acquired the duties of managing the Hold Harmless paperwork and approvals and relinquished the secretarial duties. I had to interact with locations across the nation which I however, since I had to say no, it was not always a good experience. I did this for several years and then acquired managing the automobile accidents to recover repair costs.
My current duties include automobile accident subrogations, bankruptcies, the intranet page and maintaining the department's computers and other equipment. In addition I supervise any temporary staff that is utilized in the department. There is no longer a law library so I conduct any legal research for the attorneys, of which there are now seven, including the General Counsel and Vice President.
All of the above just describes my secular work.
I volunteered for various events and activities at church, at one point becoming a Girl Scout leader. I attended the training offered for leaders on a regular basis. I did this for several years.
One of the outside attorneys founded an advocacy group against child abuse. I created the first website for Justice for Children. I got to the point that I did not have time to update both as often as they should and others began to do those duties.
In 1999 I went on my first mission trip (Belize) and a new awareness developed within me. I enjoyed doing for others. It was something that I knew God wanted me to do. I continued to go on mission trips (Puerto Rico; Costa Rico, twice; Colorado; Oklahoma; Cuba and Cambodia). I also continued to work on various church commissions. I spoke with my pastor about becoming a Lay Speaker and after obtaining approval at the church's charge conference, became the church's first conference trained Lay Speaker. In my capacity as Lay Speaker I could preach as needed at either my home church or another church in the conference. I would average preaching at my church about three times a year. I have maintained my status as a conference Lay Speaker for six years.
I served as Lay Leader from 2005 to 2008, which placed me on all the church's commissions and allowed me to work closely with the pastor. During this time I started assisting with home communion and hospital visitations.
Concurrent with my church activities I work within the United Methodist Women (“UMW”). I held various offices within my unit and was elected as District Vice-President in 2003. In this capacity I planned programs for the district's fifty-plus churches. There were three each year, a training program, spring spiritual growth and fall festival. This meant that I worked with the units in choosing a church for the venue, composed and printed programs, arranged for lunches and speakers and did whatever was necessary for the program to go smoothly. I developed and maintained a rapport with my unit officer counterparts by sending quarterly letters and visiting the churches.
In 2006 the Texas Annual Conference realigned all the districts, reducing the districts from nine to seven. There are over 70 churches in the realigned district. In 2007 I was elected District Vice President for the re-aligned district. In the fall of 2008, I was elected President. The district made a pledge of $70,000 for 2009. Additionally, the budget for the district is nearly $15,000.
By virtue of my office, I am on the UMW Conference Executive Committee, the Board of Director’s of Wesley Community Center and the Conference Committee on Congregational Excellence.
Nearly three years ago during my annual review, there was an issue that came up in which I disagreed with my manager. It was about a project that I had completed. Going into the project I did not feel that there was adequate time given to complete it while the attorney assigning project disagreed. But the entire situation made me angry. While I fumed about it, my conscious asked me what I was going to do about it. I remembered the annual letters.
Each year the employees receive a letter providing the following information: (1) tenure with the company; (2) early retirement date; (3) early retirement pay; (4) full retirement date and (5) full retirement pay. When I first started receiving the letters it was such a joke – retirement in 2020 with early retirement in 2010? – Would I actually last that long? After all, it was 1985 when I started and these letters were referencing not just the next century but the next millennium!! Whoa, this was 2006. I was almost there. I started a count down. I had 1,493 days to early retirement. Now that I had an end date in sight I started looking at online schools. I knew I did not want to make the drive to some campus several times a week, or even on Saturdays. Houston traffic was too unpredictable. Besides, I decided I would not reveal my going to school to my manager. I did not want to hear at my next review that the quality or quantity of my work had suffered because of going to school.
I truly enjoyed the mission work that I’d done and my volunteer work. I thought I’d make the transition to work for a nonprofit or in a lay ministerial capacity. I found Southwestern on the internet after what seemed like hours of searching and rejecting one school after another. I contacted the representative online and, as they say, the rest is history. In August, 2008 I earned my BS in Not-for-Profit Management and this May, I’ll earn my BA in Pastoral Studies.
The surprising thing is that the next year, at my review, my manager commented that my attitude had improved and that my flow of work was good. There were no complaints from any of the attorneys about the quality or quantity of work or tasks completed.
In light of the economic situation today, I am a little hesitant to change careers – I am in my comfort zone. I did come to realize that I really would like to work with or for seniors, such as at a senior adult day care or assisted living facility. Another career option is to work as a chaplain either at a nursing home (or two) or in a hospital environment. I have considered applying for the chaplaincy program at Methodist Hospital here in Houston.
The most important thing, however, is that I now have options, and as of today (February 2, 2009), I have 423 days to early retirement.