Kid Territory:Jobs: Helping Employees
Delivery drivers keep the Zoo and Wild Animal Park well-supplied with items both coming and going.
The Human Resources Department helps see employees through the various stages of their careers, from hiring to retirement.
Librarians maintain and help provide animal and plant information for employees.
What we do
Our jobs provide the services, communication, and support that our fellow employees need to do their work.
Some of us work in the Human Resources Department. We help other departments find, interview, and hire new employees, and we keep track of all the employee records. We work with insurance companies, health care companies, and financial companies to provide the San Diego Zoo and San Diego Zoo's Wild Animal Park employees with benefits, such as health and dental care, life insurance, and ways to save money for retirement. We also talk to and help employees who experience conflicts or problems on their jobs (sometimes it’s kind of like being a referee!), and we conduct workshops to help employees work together and do their jobs even better.
Another type of job helping employees is to manage and work in the offices: filling out and keeping track of paperwork, answering the phones, answering questions, keeping important records, getting bills paid, organizing the work flow, and keeping everyone in the office on track. Some of us help our fellow employees by stocking, monitoring, and delivering supplies to all the departments, from things like pencils and staplers to furniture, gardening equipment, test tubes, and even animal crates. Others provide our fellow employees with information, like books, journals, and articles in the library. And these days there’s lots to do in information technology: supporting the use and maintenance of computers, phones, fax machines, Internet servers, wiring and cable connections, and lots more. Zoo and Park employees need all of that to stay in touch with one another and the world.
What’s cool about these jobs
When your job is to help employees, there is a great deal of variety in the tasks you do and the types of responsibilities you have. You have the opportunity to meet and spend time with many different people, and find out about their jobs and how the organization is run. And it can be very rewarding to give someone the information, equipment, or help they need just when they need it.
Job challenges
Just like working with people in other areas, working with fellow employees can be difficult at times. You need to be able to communicate well, listen, and be patient. Also, working with people makes it hard to plan your time—difficult situations, sudden deadlines, or even emergencies come up, and you have to be flexible and deal with them as they happen.
How these jobs help animals
Making sure employees have what they need to do their work insures that we can all keep working for the animals.
How to get jobs like these
For most of these jobs, you’ll need a college degree that focuses on what you’ll be doing: business/human resources, information technology, computer science, library science, business management/administration. It’s also a good idea to take some biology and zoology courses, so you have some knowledge of animals and plants. For any job working with fellow employees, you need experience in communication, working with groups, and dealing with the needs of others. Get some experience working in an office environment where you support the work of others; volunteer at a youth or senior center organizing activities; work as a counselor at a camp or for a scout group. If you’re a “people person” who also loves animals, one of these types of jobs might be just the one for you!
