Mike Ainsworth

Domestic

I’ve worked at Trafford for just over a year. For a long, long time I’ve been wanting to get a job here, but always something happened, or I didn’t meet the criteria or whatever. Anyway, eventually I saw a job come up as a Domestic, went for an interview, and the same afternoon, they phoned me up and said you’ve got the job, so it was happy days!  I was quite pleased actually.  

I’ve done a few things before this. A season in Butlins as a barman. My main job when I left school was an engineer. I did about 35 years in engineering – a bit of warehouse work, a bit of delivery driving, a bit of taxi driving – but I always wanted to work at the hospital.  It’s a good cause job, isn’t it, if you know what I mean. Empathy is so important, and the older I’ve got, the easier I’ve found it to show that empathy. I think that’s partly because I’ve mellowed from what I used to be like. If you can put a smile on somebody’s face, just once, you’ve had a good day. 

Of all the domestics, I’m probably the most public-facing one, because I’m on the corridors all the time. I’ll say to somebody ‘do you know where you’re going?’ and they’ll say ‘oh, I’m not sure’ and then they show you their letter, and then I walk them down, have a chat with them, give them a bit of time out of my day. 

I’ve been very, very lucky, to have the pleasure of working with some of the nicest people.  A good 90% of the people who come through the door here professionally say good morning, good afternoon – doctors, nurses, the other domestics – they’re all really nice people, which is a surprise, especially when you’ve worked in factories or warehouses your whole life. I’ve had some good laughs here, and considering I’ve only been here a year, I’ve made some good friends, which is nice. And coming to work now for me – whereas you’d get up in the morning and think ‘Oh god, I’ve got to go back in there again’ – I don’t have that now.  I don’t have that anymore. I actually enjoy my work because the day absolutely flies. 

I get up at twenty to four and make a cup of tea. I can’t leave the house without a cup of tea, then I get washed, dressed and on my way to work for 5am.  I use a machine that I sit on to clean the corridors.  It has a couple of brushes and pads which come down, rotate, scrub the floor with cleaning liquid, and then it’s got a squeegee on the back with suction which sucks all the dirty water up. I also have to empty the bins on the corridors, make sure the hand sanitizers are all topped up, clean all the ledges, behind the doors, door handles, dusting.  

I usually work right through till 9am, and then I have a ten minute break and work till 12. Then I’ve got an hour’s lunch, and by the time I’ve had my lunch, I’m packing the machine away, cleaning it down, getting my trolley ready for the next morning. So my day, it really does fly. I’ve got my own routine, and my own route along the corridors. 

Before I worked here, I’ve been an engineer, I’ve worked in warehousing, and then my last job was Customer Services.  So I went from factories and warehouses, where every other word is a swear word to somewhere you can read couldn’t swear at all, not a chance. I started work and thought, this is different, but I’m doing alright. Next thing I know my supervisor comes up to me and tells me I’ve won star of the month.  I didn’t even know what it was. I asked what for and she said ‘Best customer services advisor for the month. You’ve won it.’  So I carried on in my role and six months later, she came back and she said ‘I hope you don’t ever leave, because we’ve got absolutely nobody on our team who can talk to customers like you can’ and I said ‘well, I’m just me, my normal self!’.  And she said ‘No, you’ve got this way, this ability, to put them at ease.’ 

Since working here, it’s got to the stage where I can see somebody – from a young girl, to a young lad, middle-aged man, middle-aged woman, elderly lady, elderly gentleman, and within three seconds of looking at their face, I know how to approach them. Whether it’s ‘hello love, how can I help you’ or ‘good afternoon madam, can I help’ – I’ve got this knack, and I don’t know where it’s come from. I’ve got no idea whatsoever how I’ve managed to obtain that ability, but it works. It’s a knack – to look at somebody, and say – not so much that I know your background, but I know how you want me to speak to you – whether that be formally, informally, jokily – I don’t know how I do it. I have absolutely no idea.

I’ll be here till I retire now.  As I say, this is the first time in my life I can honestly say I don’t mind coming to work.

Illustration: Rebecca Horswill