For some reason, I find myself reflecting back on when I first stepped into my line of work. In a way, I guess I’ve always been in it, for as long as I have worked, but more specifically I mean my ‘post-university graduation’ work. My first job out of uni that was specifically to do with something I had studied, rather than something I was already naturally good at.
I remember feeling a bit lost, to be honest. I loved my job while I was a university. I was supporting regional cancer patients in their stay in Brisbane while they, or their loved one, received treatment. It was a rewarding job, and I genuinely felt like the people I worked with didn’t have any ulterior expectations on me. They accepted and appreciated me, and that was that; I was able to show up and not only do my work, but enjoy it as well.
I only quit because I was about to graduate from university, and they weren’t able to offer me a more full-time role, which is what I needed. But, supported and celebrated by them in this transition in my life, I moved on and found my first post-uni role in a marketing and communications team.
Here’s the thing though: I didn’t study marketing. I was a wordsmith; mostly (only) interested in putting the words together to help communicate to people. What I have learned in the years since is that while marketing and communications DO go hand-in-hand, it might have been a little unfair (in retrospect) to expect myself to thrive in a role that required an entirely different skillset as a large part of my responsibilities, of which I wasn’t all that interested in.
I remember distinctly feeling green – like I wasn’t taking naturally to it, even though they had seen examples of my writing and they, plus my interview, were enough for them to hire me. I just wasn’t getting to do all the writing I imagined for myself in my ‘brand new life’. Instead, my attention was required on other, more fiddly areas. More marketing-related things. And look, this is nobody’s ‘fault’ or anything. It’s just what the role required. But it then meant that my experience for my next role wasn’t enough for more ‘just’ writing, and that then needed to be in this blended world of marcomms too.
I remember having a moment with a colleague in my team, who was close to my age, in the storage room while we were gathering materials for mail out. She was a couple of years more experienced than me, but also she was there for the marketing side. I wanted to reach out and ask for guidance, or maybe even reassurance. I wanted to share with her how green I really felt, and how I just needed a little bit more encouragement. I didn’t though. And that’s fine. But it is interesting to think back and still remember that moment, and those feelings, so clearly now.
I didn’t feel a part of their club, and that’s because I wasn’t. (We can discuss whether it should even feel like a ‘club’ in the workplace another day).
Here is where I’ve been reflecting on how it is up to you to give yourself what you need. This isn’t some hyper-independence war cry, but rather a prompt to encourage reflection, and that giving yourself what you need begins with you.
You cannot expect someone else to give you what you need if you are not leading the way. Giving yourself what you need might include access to or acceptance of that from someone else. For example, I was finding myself really drained and, to be honest, quite irritable when it came to taking care of the yard. I love a good, clean yard, but it must be something about this super thick, all-too-eager to grow grass that makes it just a frustration. I wasn’t feeling good, and I also wasn’t my best self to be around for the other human and two dogs who live in the same home; not when I’d be stressed about the weather and whether it would allow me to get it done on time, and “oh God, if it rains” then the plan is all out etc (etc etc). Giving myself what I needed was saying to my partner “hey, how about we let someone else do this?”
They came in and did it this morning, and it took three of them 15 blissful minutes.
What I really needed in that moment at my first post-uni job – whether it came from someone within the team I was working with, or an external person who understood and could help guide me – was exactly that. Someone I could be open and honest to, who could offer some guidance.
The world speaks a big game about mentorship, but how does one meet it in the wild? All of the mentorship I have ever received I have had to put the pro-actively seek.
So… Again. Give yourself what you need and needed ‘back when’, now.
And then pay it forward.
One of my favourite roles I get to do is mentor those who are more in the position I was, and give them what I never got at the time. Sometimes it’s very literally to do with the work, the job, the career, and other times (actually, always most of the time) it’s about the soul of it.
Stop expecting people new to *whatever* environment to get through it all alone.
And stop doing that to yourself as well.
This article was first posted over on my Substack.
