From student to employee - the rite of passage

JUST DO IT

You don’t read “How to swim”; you just get into the pool and do your best. A first job is no different, writes Swatee Jog.

The social networking sites have made certain things cool and clichéd, especially if one is doing it for the first time. The first job is one of those. Many of us have come across photos of young graduates at their desks/ cubicles/ cabins with captions like “My first day at office” or “Me at my desk”. However glamorous it may sound and feel, the first job needs a lot of mental preparation. Today’s graduates have things easier with most colleges imparting soft-skills training, conducting routine mock sessions on Group Discussions and Personal Interviews replete with their own do’s and dont’s. That has made getting the first job a cake-walk for many, for the placement cell facilitates with the entire process. Many management colleges today provide training just the way a grooming or finishing school would do, including dressing tips, travel guidance, etiquettes, manners, and more. Young graduates, barely in their early twenties, join the first job with starry eyes and lots of dreamy notions in mind. Things are definitely not quite filmy once you start work and reality sets in. Placement officers abound with cases where students quit the jobs in the first few months itself, unable to adjust themselves to the harsh office life. Almost always, it is the long work hours, stringent performance targets, strict bosses or lack of idle time that weighs them in. Proper counselling sessions and self-preparation can work wonders for the freshers in the first job.

It requires an almost overnight transition from a care-free college-goer to being a responsible employee. Some adapt to situations quickly, while others need some efforts. Various factors contribute towards this rite of passage.

Transition time: Almost all professional colleges today provide placement assistance to the final year students. So you see students who join their first job while still in the final semester and attending weekend classes and rushing to submit assignments. This provides them almost no time at all to ponder and plan for the transition from being a student to an employee, sometimes playing the dual role for quite a while. For those without a job till almost the final exams, it is all the more tense, for the possibility of a defaulting EMI looms large.

The money factor: The Indian family structure provides the luxury of children being dependent on parents well until their post- graduation. However, most of the times, parents expect their child to bear the burden of education loan EMIs once he/ she starts working. This leads to an almost immediate pressure of loan repayment and timely EMIs. Juggling a new job in a new city, managing commute, meals and other expenses while repaying loan can be a daunting task. It is not uncommon for fresh recruits to be seen worn out and the situation exacerbates if the salary does not match the expenses.

All about time: A student’s life, however hectic it may sound or be, is never as bound to the minute-hand as that of an employee. All the flexibility enjoyed and the procrastination of college life comes to haunt you in the first job. Things like entering a class late, skipping the practicals, pleading with the faculty for a day more for submission does not work with meetings, project deadlines and a demanding boss. If a thing has to be done today, it means it was expected yesterday. No amount of clarifications can satisfy the boss when you land up late or miss the deadline. From attending and bunking classes at will, the fresh recruit suddenly finds himself bound to the cubicle for the whole day. This brings a lot of frustration in the initial days.

The office culture: No amount of training and counseling has prepared the fresh recruit enough to handle office politics, bickering and gossip. He is expected to display utmost professionalism, follow every rule in the book and is advised by seniors at the drop of a hat. Young men and women who have never had anybody raising their voice against them, now face a lot of bossing around them. And before they can judge for themselves about the colleagues and staff, they are sucked into the vortex of a deeply set office culture.

The after-hours: The big city life has drastically robbed the youth of the after- hours, what with almost 3 to 4 hours spent in commuting. Leaving home early and reaching back late is the norm rather than exception. This leaves them with no time to catch up with friends, a movie or even a lazy long drive, things that formed a part of their student life for years. They have to make the most of whatever a Sunday can afford - and this includes cleaning the room, managing the week’s laundry, bills, self-grooming, etc. Long evenings spent with friends at the canteen and the first-day-first-show movies soon become things to reminisce.

The mind in limbo: It is when you have a rosy picture of the job and are faced with the contrary, that one starts to doubt decisions. Thoughts of whether you are actually suitable for this job, if you’ve taken the right decision, if you should actually quit, worries of how you’ll manage things in the days to come, all come to haunt a doubting mind. No office is ever a prison, it is how we handle things and people and how well we adapt to situations that decide our future. Quitting is always the easiest option, but seldom the wisest one.

Harsh realities of no leaves, working on weekends and even Sundays to meet targets, constant traveling and being tracked by the superiors, work, work and more work, bogs the person. However, the situation is not lost on this count if one prepares himself for the office life. Speaking to seniors from college who have already joined their work and settled, relatives or even friends can prepare oneself of the office realities. Many offices take the extra step to make this transition as smooth as possible by attaching mentors to freshers and organizing fun induction programs.  One must also bear in mind that in this competitive world, it is the smart worker who scales heights in a career. Managing time and people is the key in a new job. Also, things are not as grim as they seem to be if you look at the brighter side of a fast-speeding career - the perks, new colleagues, new cities you get to travel and the financial independence that you enjoy. Friends scattered across the globe can stay connected on the net and weekends can also be planned to carve a few hours for leisure. Those institutes that provide the students with real-time work exposure score high on a pleasant first job. Knowing the work schedules in advance, getting introduced to colleagues and generally being friendly with everybody without being judgmental, often helps.

At every stage in life, one leaves behind the comfort zone and ventures into the unknown. From taking the first step, to the first day in school, it is all about experiencing the new with an open mind. This rite of passage is indeed a survival-of-the-fittest of sorts.

(The author is a training and placement officer.)