Starting A New Job-The Inevitable Feelings That Come With it

You show up, usually overdressed, ready for the welcomes and the goodie bag you get to open that includes a fancy water bottle, a notebook, a pen, a stale cookie if you’re lucky, and the whole arsenal of corporate propaganda of whatever respective organization you are joining. You have no routine, you have no seat, no identity and you reek of not knowing where you are going. Like being the new kid in school. 

The day goes on, you get to your desk and you pray to god your log-in works so you don’t have to add another thing to your onboarding checklist of new shit you have to deal with. You finally get in and you find yourself stuck with the mandatory HR/Compliance courses you must take. You would think after countless hours of training to not be creepy in the workplace you either get the message or you don’t. At this point, I consider it part of the hazing process of onboarding at any job. The first stop your patience gets tested before facing any of the real problems you are going to have to face at work.

Finally, in the midst of their busy day someone realizes you have just starred at your screen for five hours straight, making your eyes bleed leading you to shadowing. Shadowing is always a humbling experience. You realize that you are, for the time being, an inept fool. Considering you don’t know your day-to-day functions yet and probably do not have access to any systems to even attempt to do any sort of work. You are kind of the puppy that gets dropped off at someones desk. You are enthusiastic, your brain is stimulated trying to keep up with everything they are telling you and the person who you are shadowing just wants to make sure everything goes well so they can tell the big boss that we learned so many things!

No matter what the paycheck is hitting, you should enjoy this time now because before you know it your phone will be non-stop ringing, your teams messages will be pinging in your sleep or you’ll end up changing your name to “pls fix” as addressed in numerous emails. Eagerness to learn is good but enjoy the ride because the balding stage of our careers is just getting started.