Jobs that deal with public? retail?

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So being an aspie talking with people is not my strong suit. But all the jobs I see where I live involve dealing with customers. And if I sign back up with Voc Rehab again I know they will try and put me in jobs like grocery stocker or such at a store where I have to deal with people. I personally feel I would be horrible at it. Should I even give this a try? what are your guys-es thoughts on doing jobs where you have to talk and interact with the customer? What is the general consensus on aspies doing this work and such?

Thanks

This is my experience, it coud be different for you. I've currently been working for almost a year ( in 2 weeks ) in a supermarket. I started out with a 4/5 contract but after my trial period of 6 months I downgraded to a 24 hour contract. My work day shifts are 10 hours, half being cashier and the other half working in the store.

It's very mentally draining, I couldn't do this job full time. Working one day and being the next one free is alright. But when I have to do 2 or 3 work days in a row, my brain will feel sort of molten and I'll need 1 or 2 days to recover from that. Nowadays customer interractions are alright, they'll mostly always ask the same things so I can pretty much always answer the same ways I'm used to. This took me a good 3-4 months to nail down though, it was a confusing mess in the beginning. Cashier work is still and will probably remain very mentally draining even though I just have to repeat the same thing over and over again. They'll also often say something different to me now and then, and most of the time their words won't reach me but usually just saying yes and smiling works for those situations.

Interractions with co-workers are more difficult. It used to be a problem but now they got used to me being a bit weird and quiet. The hardest part of the day is usually the midday break for me, which lasts 1 hour and is just sitting there with a co-worker. They are mostly nice people though, but the conversations are exhausting and confusing.

Working in the store is the best part for me, there is some teamwork but mostly you just comeplete stuff on your own. You can focus on it and seeing your tasks being completed one by one feels good. It has become pretty routine. It was different for my first 5 months though. I messed up alot and made mistakes on things that are supposed to be simple, forgot instructions alot of the time, couldn't multi-task well, was very slow, and generally annoyed a lot of co-workers because of these things.

So in short, it's hard but doable. My first months were hell, I had several occasions where random people on the street walked up to me and asked if I was alright, also had several panic attacks both on work and at home. I was drained and mostly depressed and thought of quitting all the time, but I ended up pushing through and it got better. I hope I didn't put you off with my message, I think you should try it out and see how it is for you. Definatly don't give up when things don't work out in the beginning, I'd say give it four months atleast. Setting yourself some little goals might help too, be it reaching a certain ammount of money or working for a certain ammount of time. Good luck.

I'm working at Walmart as an overnight stocker. It's okay for now. I rarely deal with customers. Sometimes the store music gets on my nerves.

I work as a cashier at a place I'll call *MegaMart.

"How are you doing today? Did you find everything you need?"

I do okay. Now, I'm 53 years old, so I've had a lot of life experience. Some customers I even draw out in conversation and then bring it to a gentle close at the conclusion of the transaction.

Being Aspie, I know it matters to me as a customer whether I'm treated with courtesy and respect or not, actually I think I'm better at the job than average, and I get more out of it.

I'm not interested in moving up in the hierarchy, particularly not in becoming a front end manager, because they're not backed up by the main management.

2 of the other Associates tend to get on my nerves, but when I don't work with them the job is okay if a bit dull.

I'm wondering if I can try to pivot off this experience to become one of those Merchandisers or Vendors I see delivering Coke or Pepsi or Sara Lee products. Or maybe work in a warehouse.

My 2nd job was over two years doing floor-care at a super WalMart & my 3rd job was 3 months as a custodian at a sporting goods store. I was polite & tried to assist people when I could. I got others to assist when I wasn't able to help a customer. I tried to stay focused on my job till someone asked me for something. All my reviews said I did a good job assisting customers.

I can pretty much second everything said here. I work at a grocery store full time, and I'm not sure I'd recommend it to other aspies. It can be stressful and draining for anyone. It's not so much the customer interaction; that becomes routine after a while as Hawkeye said. It's more the need to work at irregular times, shift quickly between tasks on the fly and stuff like that. My schedule changes every week, and each day when I go to work different situations are going to come up. I frequently get pulled away from one task to do another and this can be very hard for us.

If you're still there after 3-6 months, you'll probably do fine. Getting over that "hump" is hard, though.

I work full time as a cake decorator in a grocery store bakery. Lots of customer interaction, but I don't mind since I'm pretty friendly and like helping people. It keeps me busy (I'm always doing something and moving around) which I like. I'm not as fast as I could be at certain tasks but I'm doing pretty well otherwise. My hours are pretty regular, unlike some people in this thread, so it does make my job easier. I mostly work 10-7, with an occasional 11-8 (usually to sub in for closing), or a 7-4 or even rarer, a 8-5. 80% of the time it's 10-7.

Actually my biggest issue is my direct superior lol. We all hate her though, so I'm not alone there.

Getting pulled away from tasks is an issue I struggle with. Weekends I get people coming up 3-5 times an hour asking me to write something on a cake, which is an easy task but then it throws me off whatever I was working on, be it an order or backstock. Same with people wanting to take orders or me needing to show them where something is on the sales floor. I work through it though.

I agree with the last poster, it's the first few months that are the hardest. I'm starting to get a little better at the 2 month point. I do vacillate between loathing my job and genuinely enjoying it lol.

I'd like to use this opportunity to point out that for many of us on the Spectrum, as a pretty alright generalization, easy jobs can be hard, whereas quote "hard" jobs can be easy! and it's worth focusing on this second part of this equation, too.

For example, in a profession, whether it be medicine, architecture, engineering, law, accounting, professional sales (which should not be too quickly dismissed), pharmacy, etc.

in many cases, you won't have this much of a varying schedule, nor this noisy a work environment, nor this abrupt pulling you from one task to another. Will at least have a minute or two to bring to a stopping point or make a couple of notes. Will be much more of an equal partnership with patients or clients, will be respectful permission sales, etc, a lot of good features. Might find that a lot of clients prefer you to be briefer, not to skip steps but to be briefer with each step.

Only til recently i've gotten a volunteer role at a small clothing store/ charity shop working everything but the till which i'm not trained for. Even though it is primarily a stockroom position, I still have to talk to the other staff, see what they need done, but I only ask what needs done once i've finished a task, and say just a few words they need to listen to, and usual social niceties like saying thank you, hello, good morning etc which I struggle less with now than I did before I started but I still have trouble starting a conversation, and also dread the day I will eventually have to leave the job, where I'd be expected to say, @pleasure working with you@, @had a great time@, but in reality I would say @ok see ya later@ or @alright bye@.

I worked in retail in my late teens and early twenties and enjoyed it although it helped that my jobs were in shops that dealt in my special interests (music and film) - it was great making recommendations to people and showing off my knowledge. Even when it got really busy (Christmas in HMV on Oxford Street is crazy) I found it ok as I could focus on the repetition of till work. I'm not sure I could handle it at my age, though - the noise, the crowds!

One trick I did learn was that the angrier a customer would get, I would get nicer and nicer. That really p***ed them off!

I do remember really losing my s**t once when a colleague kept touching me when she spoke. I kept asking her not to but she kept doing it. That's when the screaming and shouting started. Not my finest moment.

Nowadays, I'm quite happy with my nice and quiet software testing job although I still have to talk to people as I'm also a volunteer children's climbing instructor.

I've done retail in the past and would recommend it, at least for a short period of time. It's possible you'll find it easier with practice since interactions with customers are more business-oriented.

Some jobs involve a lot of customer service, such as being a cashier where that's pretty much what you do all day. I've been looking for new work that focuses on animal care and handling, which also involves people to a degree. Many jobs will have you interacting with others at least once in a while.

My only criteria now are that it can't be in a competitive field of work and it must not involve crowds on a daily basis.