Diversity In The Workplace

When considering the sheer amount of people in the world, it’s fair to say that meeting different people with different thoughts, ideologies, and experiences is basically inevitable. As such, I too have met my fair share of different people, despite being shy and introverted, however the people that had the most impact on me came from my first workplace. The people who I met at my workplace where people whose different experiences in the same workplace helped me start enjoying working for Whataburger.
As soon as I turned 16 I knew I had to get a job, I didn’t want keep relying on my mother for money, but I was still surprised when I got an interview with Whataburger only two weeks into my job hunt. Throughout my orientation into the job I became

steadily sucked into the Whataburger Family propaganda, which promoted teamwork and a familial bond with the company.

However, when I started I immediately got moved from my position of choice, the grill, to the back in order to prepare produce. On my first day I stayed from 5 to almost 1 o’ clock preparing the perfect salads for my strict manager, I wasn’t feeling the Whata-love. Thinking about how I was going to have to spend the next two years precisely cutting produce until late at night, I quickly lost my enthusiasm. To add to my un-enthusiasm I was only one out maybe 3 new hires that month, meaning I was the only new hire in a group of long time employees. Despite setbacks I still held a hope in my heart that I could foster some form of friendship with my new coworkers, such as the ones you see on TV. However, all my coworkers seemed jaded and hardened from years in the fast food business, none of them had the passion that I had at the start. They only spoke to each other and were older than me, which meant that I with my lack of social skills could not bring myself to trouble them with chit-chat. By the second month I was almost ready to hold a funeral for my Whataburger-brand Pride, Care, and Love, but luckily that was also the

month that the drive-thru cashier decided to pick on the new hire. The cashier didn’t like drive-thru because he felt it was boring so he took to bothering me, however soon we became the best of friends. One friend was all it took to get my foot in the door in terms of coworker friendship, and soon I won a new friend with my perfect recital of the Whataburger mission statement. One friend turned into two friends, which soon became the entire evening shift, I had broken into the same world as my coworkers. My Whataburger Soul was burning with care and love for my coworkers, and soon the boring produce guy job became the fun, challenging Quality Control position (Quality Control Team member was my full title). With pride, care, and love in my job and a burning Whata-passion, my coworkers jokingly told me that I should become a Team Leader (Assistant Manager) and accidently started me on my 8 month long journey for a promotion. I started loving my job all of sudden, and working with all these people made me yearn for a managerial promotion so that I too could lead a team of coworkers.
At the beginning of my first job I had a lot of hope for new friendships, which soon faded as I was confronted with a position I didn’t want and grizzled coworkers. However, in the end after making one friend, my friend counter grew exponentially. Thus, my Whataburger brand hope and passion was gloriously revived and I now care a lot for my job thanks to the coworkers who didn’t share my passion for my job.