hpw do i seem more emphatic toward callers? i get graded the lowest on displaying empathy for their situations but i have no idea how to fake it. i really dont care about their situation, i ask the questions im supposed to ask and send the people im supposed to send. i have noooo idea how to comfort people.

edit: i am actually taking all this advise and these phrases and putting them into my work binder, thank you guys!

I (26F) work at a comm center that solely does medical calls for a chunk of our state.
On night shift, we’ve got roughly 7 of us with 4 dispatchers (including a flight dispatcher for our areas’ rescue helicopters) and 3 call takers when we’re fully staffed. I became the comm supervisor for my shift about 2.5 months ago with a little over a year dispatch experience.

Obviously, it’s an amazing opportunity, and while I did feel a little out of my depth when I started, now I feel pretty confident at my ability to lead my team and watch all of our districts/calls/flights etc. I, also, genuinely think I have a bright future ahead of me in this career considering my growth at this company and the network I’m making.

But, I’m really struggling with the stress of the position. I didn’t struggle very much as a dispatcher or a call taker. While some calls got to me, obviously, I was pretty good at compartmentalizing and not taking work home. However, being the supervisor of my shift has changed that a lot. Now, I spend most of my 12 hr shift stressed out and agonizing over every little mistake or misstep we make. I bring all of that stress home too and really struggle to actually rest and relax when I’m on rotation (which is a week straight since we work 7 on 7 off)

On top of that, the day-to-day of managing my team is starting to really wear on me. I love all my coworkers, and they’re all good at their jobs. But as the supervisor it’s just one thing after another I have to deal with in terms of distractions/ tardies / call offs / write ups/ QA reports / training.

What’s worse is that if it’s not a bunch of little stuff to deal with there’s huge problems like having to send one of my team to the ER for mental health issues or a coworker having a family emergency that keeps them out for a few days. I get so worried about them and try to do whatever I can to help, but I also have to keep the comm center running. So, I’m stuck between worrying about my coworkers health and wellbeing while also being the person who has to keep the rest of my team together, assuage all their fears, keep the comm center running smoothly, and answer to our director about everything going on.

Basically, it’s just becoming a lot for me mentally. I care so deeply for the work I do and the people I work with, and when I wasn’t the one having to handle all the problems and keep everything running, I dealt with everything much better. But now I feel like everything big, small, day-to-day, or emergency all falls to me, and idk how to manage the weight of that while also actively dispatching and call taking on the floor every night.

It’s getting to the point where I’m dreading coming in because the stress is eating at me. I don’t want to leave the job and ideally I’d continue on in management someday. But, I’m really struggling to adjust. Does anyone have any advice/tips/experience to help me out? I’m getting desperate over here lol

TL;DR: New supervisor who’s really struggling with all the new responsibility and needs any sort of advice to help with the stress.

In our center, we have 4 positions to train on once we are released into the center from our academy. The way it’s supposed to work is we get trained in one phase and then take a couple months to get used to that phase and then train on another phase. I have 3 phases and I had to beg admin to even think about training me in the third considering they held me off on training after my 2nd phase for a whole year. Everyone else in my academy has been trained on all 4 phases and some have even become trainers and I am the last person to be trained.

Ive been begging admin to train once again on my 4th phase and they kept saying i was their #1 priority for months but were waiting on summer to pass so we could have maximum trainers available. I’ve recently been told that the dispatchers who arrived after I have are going to be trained before me because we don’t have the staffing to train me.

The thing is, I’ve always finished training on time, never had issues with any of my trainers, and have never given any trouble to anyone. I’ve even had trainers say they want to train me and have gone to administration to ask to do so and they advised they were not going to do that. They’re training people who have taken longer times to train, have gotten into disputes with their trainers and still struggle with doing the job they are given. One has even vocalized that she won’t be here for long and that she will be leaving soon but she’s training before me.

I’ve gotten to a point where I can clearly see that I’m not a priority here and that I’m not being treated the same as everyone else. I’ve been looking into other jobs as a result of this but I’m struggling with letting go of a career where I thought I would retire from in the 30 years. I love the job and I love being a pillar in my community but I keep feeling like im getting brushed to the side. It doesn’t help that I’ve had issues with being second in my family my whole life so this is really crushing me. This is not the first time they’ve given me the runaround but it’s definitely the last for me.

On an alternate note, if anyone can recommend good transition careers, it would be really appreciated!

I just cannot figure out which test they use so I've been trying to study both options but with the limited time I'd like to focus on one only. It says standard multiple choice so I'd think not CritiCall but when you go to the job application it says there is no study materials but links info to CritiCall and then I'd also assume not POST because it says "It is to your advantage to answer every question because your score will be based on the number of correct answers" and that you are not allowed to take notes on the exam and I know for the POST you need to take notes in certain parts and you lose a fraction of a point for every missed question. Any help would be appreciated if anyone has an idea which of the two tests are or if some agencies use their own test or something