It’s been almost 3 years since I graduated as
a marketing major. Not counting my internships and the
miscellaneous job hopping, I’ve been working for almost 2 years
now. To keep myself sane, this is also the period I take time out
to reflect on some valuable lessons I’ve learnt. Here’re some
takeaways from my first 2 years of work:
When I was younger, my parents would take me
for 8 hour tuition classes on weekends just so I could get killer
results and get into a good school. All this intensive studying… I
was told I’d get a great job if I got a recognised degree. And when
I graduated, the job portals had so many awesome sounding jobs!
Relationship managers, designers and what not. So I applied for
them all.
But when I got into one of those jobs, I
had a rude awakening. I wasn’t doing what I thought a person
with that title would do. My job title was just that – a
title.
High-paying jobs aren’t easy, and easy
ones aren’t highly paid. These fanciful job titles are just there
to help hiring managers attract more candidates, and for us
employees to bedazzle our resumes and maybe develop some shallow
sense of job satisfaction.
For example, that 19-year-old “Marketing
Director” is probably not a child prodigy. She’s just
the co-founder of a small startup that probably doesn’t know
what it’s doing.
And just because a 25 year-old is
“Assistant Vice-President” of a bank, may not mean she’s ready to
become the CFO of a company. They’re not the same thing.
I used to be so worried about my future.
Because three-quarters of the way through my degree, I realized
marketing is not what I want to do for the rest of my life. It just
wasn’t for me!
So I started asking around if transfers
between courses were possible and when I found out I couldn’t, I
panicked, thinking I was caught in a dead end.
The truth is what we study might not
necessarily be what we end up doing the rest of our lives. In fact,
many of us end up in careers that have nothing to do with what we
studied in University and Polytechnic.
The career you choose is not restricted to
your choice of major. It’s never too late to try something else. It
just means you’ll have work harder. And maybe spend some
time humbling yourself to learn the ropes.
Because the only thing that counts is your
performance now, nobody cares about the rest. So don’t worry, as
long as you’re willing to get down and dirty with hard work, you’re
not going to be doomed to a black abyss of bad careers just
because you choose a major that wasn’t right for you.
I used to think that all the hot-shots in the
world were powerful aliens who got their expertise from some
unknown source of power. But after talking to people in startups,
you begin to realise that everyone starts out the same. Albeit, we
didn’t have the same life experiences, everyone’s just trying to
make something amazing happen.
Your CEO, your superiors, your mentor? They’ve
all started out just like you; Clueless. They didn’t undergo some
secret special training to be good at what they did; They worked
hard, read books, and constantly looked for solutions and knowledge
to help them work better. They were constantly learning,
reinventing, and finding new ways to solve problems.
When I first graduated, I was so happy ‘cause
I thought I could finally just give up and be a sloth at learning.
You know, just go to work, do my job, go home and just watch as
money rolled in the bank? Gosh, I couldn’t be more wrong.
As it turns out, I’m not the only graduate.
Pfft. In fact, there are so many talented individuals, it’s scary.
These days, designers know how to code, writers know videography,
even interns know how to develop programs! If you don’t (attempt
to) upgrade your skillset, you can never catch up with this ever
growing pool of talent.
Even if you slayed at your job, being
specialised in one skill is not enough. You might be enough for the
company now, but it doesn’t mean you’ll continue being enough down
the road when someone else overtakes you.
No matter how good you are at your job,
there’s always someone who’s younger, cheaper, and even better at
your job than you are. So to stay relevant, constantly seek to
upgrade your skills. They don’t have to be related to your present
job, it can be anything that you’re even vaguely interested in.
Before I started working, my parents tried telling me
to no avail that our social connections matter. I did not believe
them until I realised many good positions were usually referred in
by friends and not posted on job portals. Besides internships and
your first job, most positions (the good ones at least) are usually
filled through referrals or internal recruitment. Also, sales-based
jobs rely on word-of-mouth and client referrals.
People enter and leave your life all the time. And
that’s a good thing. Those colleagues you spent so much time
building a relationship with, when they jump ship to another
company, they might recommend you to their bosses. Those clients
you’ve spent time entertaining, they may choose to be your clients
for life, regardless of which company you eventually belong to.
Connections and relationships matter, sometimes it’s the only way
to get that dream job. So network, network, network.
yahoo