Wanted: a Third class Minion

The conquest of the galaxy is advancing, and we need expendable minions for the planned Valco Death Star.

In other words, to be the world's nicest evil corporation and to serve our customers better, we have decided to open a customer service office in Kajaani, Finland, and we are looking for TWO people for part-time employment in our newly opened base.

Why Kajaani? Because your future supervisor lives there, and it is a short bike ride away from the future headphone and Death Star factory in Puolanka.

Essentially, you could be Valco's new minion if you meet these few conditions:

1. You have nerves of steel, as most people who contact customer service are usually quite pissed off. You must understand that this anger is not directed at you personally, but mainly at us entrepreneurs who do not want to receive those hate messages ourselves.

The core of being a minion is to take crap and bullets for the entrepreneur, whether it's from an angry customer, the tax office, or a space wizard knight sabotaging the Death Star. A sense of humor is helpful in this job.

2. You can read and write, at least in Finnish and English. Mathematical skills are not that important (better for us). Knowledge of Germanic barbarian languages and other cryptic communication methods is considered an advantage. If you write excellently and humorously, you have the chance to become a higher-class minion, namely a second-class internet minion.
3. You understand perhaps something about technology. You know that electrical devices work with smoke. When the smoke comes out, the device no longer works. For a minion, basic technological skills like copying and pasting are usually sufficient. A PC driving license from the community college or a home computer almost qualifies you for this "demanding" expert position. Of course, we wouldn't mind if you happened to be a self-taught, soldering-capable audio and headphone guru. We are just not ready to pay extra for it.
4. You are willing to live in Kajaani or at least commute there for work. Sometimes you can work from home, as long as your home is in Kajaani or somewhere from which you can still commute to Kajaani for work. After having done only remote work for the entire company's existence, we have concluded that remote work just makes people lazy. Of course, the entrepreneurs will continue to work remotely. You will not.
5. You are not particularly stupid. A little stupid is okay, but not so much that you don't understand given instructions and cannot think with your own brain. You must be able to be given some responsibility. Physical deficiencies are not a hindrance in the job; mental ones are.

BONUS SECTOR

We are excited about these skills and special abilities, but we do not specifically require them:

• Versatile language skills (the working language is Finnish, and 80% of customer messages come in Finnish)
• Experience with Gorgias, email, or other similar customer service systems
• Experience in customer service for consumers or companies (online, by phone)
• Familiarity with an e-commerce platform, we use Shopify
• You dare to make and answer phone calls because no one here dares or wants to.
• You know how packages move from the world to warehouses and from warehouses to customers
• Surprising IT skills, any kind, from running an OnlyFans account to anything else
• Some kind of perversion for audio equipment (or at least experience using headphones)

You don't need to be a young, dynamic team player with a positive attitude or any other crap usually found in job ads.

We're fine with someone who's tired of life, seen it all, and is just waiting for early retirement, who knows nothing about "internet buzz," but can respond to annoyed people patiently without quitting immediately.

An intelligent and ambitious person might have a career at Valco, but you can get along here even without being either.

We hope that you are available for a long time. If you, for example, plan to board a spaceship with your cult and travel to Alpha Centauri or have joined the People's Temple, we assume that these transitions will happen no earlier than the 2030s.

We intend to grow big and use many minions for it, so of course, we don't want to lose good minions. This applies only if you are good. If you are bad, you can leave earlier.

WHAT MINIONING ENTAILS

• Responding to customers via the Gorgias customer service system or social media
• Phone customer service
• Assisting in maintenance during peak times if needed
• Work is done at the office on a computer

A typical workday might go something like this:

You wake up in the morning, scratch your butt, go to work – by car if the old Skoda starts – otherwise by bike uphill in the rain. At the office, you make coffee and turn on the computer. You answer messages that came in overnight, chat with a colleague, make more coffee, turn on Teams, and participate in the weekly meeting. You pick your nose during the meeting because you forgot you were being filmed. After the meeting, while munching on your lunch sandwich, you wonder with your colleagues how damn stupid everyone else in this company is, except us.

After lunch, you answer more emails, a German customer annoys you, you complain to a colleague, who understands you. In the bathroom, you watch cat videos and wonder if the lunch sandwich had expired bologna. Sweaty, you return to the computer and answer emails. On a special day, you might get to work on an exciting project, like updating the company's partner list in Excel. You hope it's a special day. Today it's not.

The phone rings, it's Marjatta, whose headphones are not playing anything. It turns out Marjatta doesn't have a device to play music. You explain to Marjatta that headphones do not come with music pre-loaded, but it must come from elsewhere. Marjatta does not understand. You are pissed off.

The email inbox is finally empty. You return home with the same empty look on your face. You watch TV and eat sausage until you fall asleep on the couch. Mustard has dripped on your shirt.

WHAT WE OFFER A THIRD-CLASS MINION

• A third-class minion's salary, which is about the same as working at a store checkout or flipping burgers (i.e., 13-15 €/hour).
  
  The starting salary is not mind-blowing, but Valco is a company where you might someday have a Porsche in the driveway and if you work really hard, maybe even a Ferrari.
  
  The entrepreneur currently has a Porsche and he would be happy to buy a Ferrari when the company starts making more profit. If you ask, he might even come visit.
  
  
•  Working hours between 20-37.5 hours per week, depending on the workload. Ideally, you do 40 hours of work in 20 hours, so the entrepreneur gets the Ferrari sooner.

• A fairly easy job, suitable for almost anyone and sounds much fancier than it is. If you can answer an email, you can probably do this job. 

• Plenty of Valco products. Maybe also some other perks and bonuses, but rarely and sparingly. We have no real employee benefits. We promise nothing, so you won't be disappointed. Maybe a warm handshake.

• A computer terminal, some sort of office-like place to sit with a couple of others, and rather strange entrepreneurs. The work community is not dynamic or fun at all, like in all other job ads.

• Work is primarily weekdays between 8 am and 8 pm. Otherwise, you could work in the middle of the night and on weekends, but collective agreements, laws, and the like restrict this.

• If you really have other skills besides turning rye bread into crap, it is theoretically possible to take on other tasks in a growing company. However, we promise nothing.

We are not particularly interested in answering the phone (that’s your job), so if you have any questions about the job, email your future supervisor Aino – aino(at)valco.fi. Applications for this position, along with your CV, should be sent to aino(at)valco.fi. Open applications to hr(at)valco.fi

ps. We are currently looking for a Finnish-speaking customer service representative for Kajaani, Finland. If you feel that you have something to offer Valco, you can also send us open applications. Our goal is to hire between two and five million people over the next few years. So, at least two people, at most five million. 

We will be accepting applications for this position until 12 July 2024 or until we have found suitable candidates.