Every day at Marchon was a new adventure. Working at such a big company there was always something new to do, deal with, and resolve.
My day would usually begin at 7 am getting ready for work. I made sure to always check my little blue notebook and revise what we needed to do and which projects were currently under development. In no time my train would take me to station Sloterdijk and in my daily 20-minute walk I would relax and observe the surroundings. See it as the calm before the storm. Once I checked in my key chaos began, but a positive type of chaos.
I opened my computer to find multiple messages on teams asking for things, my email bursting with updates from higher-ups, and my teammates telling me that the warehouse called for incoming packages. Every morning was filled with adrenaline and little anxiety but these messages and calls meant projects were moving forward which was always rewarding. Having to get approval from 5 different people to do one thing can set us back many months but as a team, we learned to work together and get as many approvals as possible in the shortest amount of time.
At around 11:00am, my teammate would pull up her very delicious snacks and mid-morning snacking would begin. We probably had way too much chocolate and coffee but we took that little moment to chat a bit about the day before and tell each other about new plans we had over the weekend. It was strictly no-work talk. Although there was always someone coming into our office or calling that interrupted our mini break. We went straight back to work, probably covering our keyboards in chocolate but a little more energized for what was to come.
At 1:00pm sharp, on the dot, we always heard our finance neighbors run to the cafeteria for lunch while we usually preferred to stay in a finish some tasks for peace of mind more than anything. Except on the days of food trucks due to the long lines or Thursdays when our boss would buy wraps for everyone and we dined in the conference room. My boss was such a peculiar character that seeing him was refreshing on Thursdays (yes, he only went to the office on Thursdays). We would hear his stories about how he traveled to new global eyewear conferences every week and how swamped he was with emails. He had to approve everything from the EMEA region so that comes as no surprise. What I most remember about him was that even when there was a horrible week ahead he always took everything as an opportunity to do more, always with ambition to improve something and have quick solutions for problems.
After lunch, the heaviest part of the day began. You were full from eating so much and wanted to just fall asleep on the finance couch but work was ahead. I beat my desire to just lay down by taking the time after lunch to go bring packages from the warehouse and actively wake up. It was always funny to see how the people from the warehouse looked at me when I had to carry 20 boxes on my own to the office. I preferred to make only one trip than needing to come back the next day.
Many emails later, it was time to go home. I always sat down for a bit before packing and reflected on how much I had done that day which was difficult but very rewarding. I walked back for 20 minutes and got ready to finally get home and lay down in my own couch.
My little blue notebook was certainly the star of the show 🙂 he knows where the passwords are buried.