Breaks. Staff meals. For a person who has not had their first job yet, these things aren’t so familiar. But for me, someone who has worked for the past 3-4 years since a ripe age, these strike a chord within me.

My very first job was at a fast food restaurant where the air smells like stale coffee and oil, and the carpet hygiene is always questionable. I spent two years of my weekends devoted to this job, wiping tables, taking customers to their seats, and picking bits of scrambled egg off the floor. Fun? Hardly. As soon as I could, I rushed off to find a better job and left without a second glance.

But after I started working at more retailers… I realized that my first job was rather horrible.

A shift that is 5-6 hours or more includes a 15 minute paid break and a 30 minute unpaid break in Canada. Whether or not you want to take it is sometimes irrelevant. You have to go. It’s the law.

Then why did my first workplace go without a 15 minute paid break despite the fact that I almost always worked 6 to 8 hour shifts? Were they trying to cut costs? Or did they think that this isn’t something people will take them to court to?

Employee benefits must be given out properly and consistently if you want to be a good employer. Maybe that’s why most of my co-workers from that job have already quit by now. At the end of the day, cutting costs in the wrong areas will also cause you a high turnover rate.