Under new management

There have been a lot of departures in my company over the last few months, and the one I am most sad about is the departure of my regional manager. I said goodbye to him yesterday.

He told me that he very much enjoyed working with me (most people do, fortunately), and that "with me on a project, I have no doubt that you will find a way to make it happen."

Very nice words indeed, especially when I don't always see myself in that way.

I'd worked with him since I joined the team. In fact, when he interviewed me for the role, I found him so engaging and supportive, to the point that I could tell he was the kind of person I'd like to work for. It's not often that you walk away from an interview feeling like that. I don't know his replacement, but I sure hope he's as supportive and kind.

Pride

It's been over a year since I took a leap of faith and changed roles within my company. After such a long time of working in the same function, it has been strange, terrifying and exciting to now be in a position where I am no longer the expert. Particularly in a time in which my industry is undergoing a significant amount of change and we are all expecting a restructuring to take place in my office.

From working on my first project - a small project that has been mentioned in my company's newsletters more than once - to working on some of the largest projects in not just my region, but the entire company, it's been such an amazing opportunity, albeit immensely stressful and scary too.

I had my performance review recently and was glad to hear that I'm a valued member of my small team and doing well. Just today, my regional manager checked with my line manager to see if I was in the high potential programme (a programme aimed at developing senior-level executives). I am - I'd been nominated for it on the basis of my performance in my old role - but just the fact that he'd asked made me glad that he was considering putting me up for it despite my relative newness.

I still get really stressed out by committees, and I still berate myself for not saying enough during meetings and I still have to force myself to network, knowing how important each of these activities is to my progression.

Still, I'm really happy about this move. For the longest time, I thought this was my dream job, and, now, I know it is. The nature of the job may change all too soon, but, for now, I can say I took that chance and made a difference.

Changes

I must really thrive on being overloaded, as, on top of the wedding, yoga and dancing, I've decided to make this year extra-busy for myself by getting a new job. Not just any job, mind you, but a role that I've been wanting for years now, since ever before I met my fiancé. And, to make things even more challenging, it's a role within the same company, so I can't just drop everything the moment I finish my notice period, but there's every chance that I'll have to work in my current role beyond my notice period, or even end up double-hatting for a while. 

New year, new start

So, here we are. The first full proper weekend of 2015 after the first full proper week of work and yoga. It's been such a busy week that it's hard to think that we've only just had Christmas and New Year. Still, I suppose that's a good sign, particularly in this economy.

I'm still on a bit of a high from having purchased my wedding dress and booked the wedding banquet venue, which must mean that I have made the right choices on both fronts.

Woo! (Assignment Results)

After two months of waiting, I've finally received the results of my distance learning course. I passed! And, I didn't just pass, I passed with distinction. The instructor said that it was "a very good job and among the best I have read. Well done!"

I'd managed to convince my boss to send me on a post-graduate certification earlier in the year. At the time, I didn't realise that we had a training budget, and that the cost of the course was just over double the budget, but he didn't say anything, and it was approved.

The course itself took place over 16 weeks, with a module out every two weeks. There was no time pressure other than the end-of-course assignment, which worked out both good and bad for me, because I found it difficult to study after I finished work, but it did mean that I ended up doing a lot of reviewing towards the end of the course, when I was on holiday in Singapore.

There’s only this

I’ve come to the realisation that I have gone for more interviews than the majority of my friends. Heck, I’m willing to wager I’ve gone for more interviews than my boyfriend, my brother and my best friend combined. Out of all of those in the past ten years or so, I’ve converted more than five and less than 15 (I’m conscious I shouldn’t be giving out too much personal information here). I’ve turned down two. I’ve only ever regretted one of those two rejections, but, the trade-off was my moving to London, so there’s really nothing to regret there, just the ghost of a life that could have been.

In recent months, I’ve submitted my application – via recruiting firms – for a number of roles. (Yes, I’m happy enough at my current job, but I sure do wish it paid me what I believe my market rate to be.)

Out of those roles, there were only three that I was really hoping to at least be considered for. For two of them, it turned out that the role was already filled even before my application was seen. Nothing to beat oneself up over, I guess, but, still, it stung.

The third, I was turned down for today.

Jobs, schmobs

I’ve been struggling with writing an update as to how my job hunt has been going. I’ve got what quite a few people would consider as good news, but, personally, I’ve just been feeling rather ‘meh’. I’ll do my best to lay out what’s occurred but I’m sure you’ll understand if I have to leave out some details.

I was told by the company I’m contracting for that they wanted to make me a permanent offer some weeks ago.

Life post-employment

By now, most, if not all, of you will have figured out that a) I landed a job and b) that I started it last week. I haven’t written too much about it despite having written a fair amount prior to that as to the impact of this relatively prolonged stretch of unemployment on me, which culminated in my writing The Accidental Guide To Enjoying Life While Unemployed, which, face it, was pretty much a guide to enjoying life no matter what kind of circumstances you’re in.

If you haven’t read it, you should. I’ve been told it’s good, by people who aren’t friends, and who didn’t have to say any such thing. And, yes, I am proud of what I’ve written, because it’s a labour of love.

Anyway, for someone who’d been off work for so long, I’ve written woefully little about the job or how happy the news that I’d been offered a position made me, particularly as the offer came just two days before my self-imposed deadline of deciding whether I should remain in the UK.

The Accidental Guide To Enjoying Life While Unemployed – Part 1 – The Essentials

As you might guess from the title, this isn’t something I set out to write. At least, not something as long as it’s become. The inspiration, as it were, for this, came about when I’d met up with some Twitter friends. They hadn’t realised I’d been unemployed for as long as I’d been as I’d been so great at keeping myself busy.

Now, I’m not an expert at this. Nor do I ever wish to be. And everyone’s circumstances are different. Take everything I say with a pinch of salt because, while I’m offering serious advice, my tongue has been pretty much firmly lodged in my cheek the whole time.

I’ve categorised my guide into four parts:

Part 1 – The Essentials
Part 2 – Eating & Drinking
Part 3 – Keeping Fit
Part 4 – Expand Your Mind

So, just how have I managed to enjoy living the life of the unemployed? Let’s start with the essentials.

Cognitive dissonance

I wrote the previous post in a fit of despair and despondency, following a phone call regarding a job I thought I was a shoo-in for. Never mind the fact that I’d been waiting two months to hear back from the hiring manager. After all, it’s been a slow economy and HR had tied him up with all sorts of approvals he needed to get. I’d had a great meeting with him and another colleague, and one of my friends who works in the company had put in a good word for me, unasked. This was a company well-known in my industry for being particularly good in the sector I prefer to work in.

I had high hopes for that role – although I’d also written it off given the passage of time. A perfect illustration of cognitive dissonance.

Hanging in there… just barely

“It is not the critic who counts: not the man who points out how the strong man stumbles or where the doer of deeds could have done better. The credit belongs to the man who is actually in the arena, whose face is marred by dust and sweat and blood, who strives valiantly, who errs and comes up short again and again, because there is no effort without error or shortcoming, but who knows the great enthusiasms, the great devotions, who spends himself for a worthy cause; who, at the best, knows, in the end, the triumph of high achievement, and who, at the worst, if he fails, at least he fails while daring greatly, so that his place shall never be with those cold and timid souls who knew neither victory nor defeat.”

- Theodore Roosevelt, “Citizen in a Republic,” Speech at the Sorbonne, April 1910 (my emphasis)

For those of you who’ve been following my tweets in recent weeks, I think it’s been fairly clear that, among the usual cheery and sarcastic tweets, there’re been signs that I’m feeling very down. It shouldn’t be too hard to figure out why.

Burnout II

I've been attending a whole bunch of Social Media Week events in the hopes of finding out more about this particular field. I've learnt that social media is much more wide and encompassing than what I'd originally thought.

But that isn't the reason I'm writing this post.

My reason for writing this is that the most valuable thing I've gleaned from Social Media Week so far is from a conversation I had with someone I met at TweetCamp last year.

He'd experienced several episodes of burnout so far in his life. He said, on average, it takes between three and six months to fully recover from. And, you know what? I've only been in it for three and a half months. No wonder I'm still feeling so worn out.

I certainly never expected to still be feeling this way, not sure when the light at the end of the tunnel is going to appear. I guess all I really can do is give myself time.

Burnout

This post is a little more "stream of consciousness" than usual as it originally started out as my just writing about burning out, but evolved a little into dream jobs. Rather than attempt to organise this more properly, I've left it as it is. 

I've started applying for jobs again. Or rather, I've put my CV up on an industry job site and have started reconnecting with head-hunters. The good thing is, there do seem to be opportunities out there. The bad thing is, they're, unsurprisingly, in what I used to do, the area which I'd lost all passion for, which, even now, I can't think about doing without hearing my inner self scream with horror and frustration... all internally, of course.

Yes, I haven't done it since June, when I left my previous company, but, the thing is, I haven't been motivated by what I used to do in a long, long time. I was incredible at it, and I still think I would kick anyone's ass at it if you made me do it all over again, but the main issue is, it doesn't do anything for me.

My plea for 2012

Happy new year, everyone! I sincerely hope 2012 is everything that you need it to be. I know I really need it to be that for me. I'd been using the festive season as an excuse to escape from the reality that is life; after all, no HR person was going to be reviewing job applications prior to January, right?

But, now, the new year has come, although it has not quite gone just yet, and I have no real excuse other than bonus season to explain my procrastination in applying for jobs. It's not because I'm lazy. Far from it. All this doing nothing is driving me crazy.

I am shit scared though.

I took the huge risk that was my last job as I was desperate for a career change. Now, I have to figure out whether to go back to what I was good at and accept I may not be able to change from that ever. The alternative is to figure out what it is I can do and how to go about getting there. The latter is far more appealing but infinitely more difficult than the former. And, as with all things, especially as a person faced with a number of big bills coming up (£2k for my visa extension application, twice that for partial renovations of my flat, and another grand for other stuff), I need money. I'm not hard-up, but the reality of it only hit me an hour ago and I am now terrified.

So, 2012, it's not that 2011 was a horrible year for me. It really wasn't. But I do need you to be spectacular in the one way that 2011 wasn't. And I need it to happen soon. So here's the deal: I will do whatever it takes. I will leap on any opportunity that comes my way. I will do my best, as I have done throughout my life.

Just come through for me, okay?

Decompressing

I don't know who came up with the term, and, quite frankly, it smacks of management consultancy, so it's not a term I am particularly fond of. However, it sure does seem like the perfect term to describe what it is I am now doing given that I left my company on Friday.

That's right. Little Miss Risk-Averse left her job, with no fallback planned, because I have taken more than enough crap from senior management, and, in all honesty, whatever experience I was getting was not worth the aggravation and heartache.

I wish I could have said I resigned, because that's what most people assumed I did. I didn't. Rather, the old contract came to an end (i.e. they terminated it unilaterally), the company offered me a weekly contract on a rolling basis "probably until Christmas" and, at the end of the first week, I was asked not to come in for the next two weeks as, because of overseas visitors, they would not have sufficient desk space and computers for everyone to use. Instead, they'd call me at the end of the two weeks to see if I was still interested in coming in.

Yes. At the end of it all, it came down to that: desk space.

Should I stay or should I go?

Wowzers. It's been over a month since I last posted. That's what having an incredibly demanding job and trying to spend every other minute with a boyfriend does to you. And it's the former which has prompted this post.

I've been tweeting about my predicament at work for the last few weeks now. Long story short, I've been told I haven't been performing up to their expectations. I accept that. Their expectations, as many of my friends have acknowledged, are insane, and management direction, which, more often than not, contradict from one week to the next, has been piss poor, to say the least. Now, I might be biased, given tha I am now in the position I am in. However, please note that a statement telling me my product knowledge, after three months on the job, is not more than that of my clients, people who have spent years in the industry, when I never represented myself as knowing anything at all about the industry when I was interviewed, is pretty damn ridiculous, by anyone's standards.

Sure, I could have spent more time brushing up my industry knowledge, but anyone who has seen me in the last few months knows that was nigh impossible, with my boss constantly telling me to get out there and talk to clients rather than focussing on the research and knowledge side of things. And then, now, he tells me this. Contradictory direction, like I said.

In any case, I have been asked to 1) reapply for my current role, 2) apply from a different role (to build up my knowledge, so they say) and 3) I can work as a contractor for them while I decide.

Now, given the shit that I have been put through, I am not exactly keen to stay. At the same time, I took this job because I wanted to change careers and function, so staying on for a while longer, even as a contractor, may not be a bad thing, in terms of experience, until I hav gained enough to have iron my CV properly and get the hell out of there. Still, I don't know the terms and conditions of their offer, whether it will be enough for me to live on, given I am accustomed to a certain lifestyle, plus I have a mortgage.

I will admit , though, that when they made me the offer (more on how poorly they did so in another post), I felt relieved. I thought, I can finally have my life back, go to Power Plate, go to dance class, go traveling with my friends to Argentina in November, that sort of thing.

But I recognise how I feel shouldn't be taken into consideration when it comes to deciding.

Tomorrow, I go back to the office to finish off my existing contract. I still don't know what to do.

Expect the unexpected

I am, apparently, going to be leading the London office of my company. That's because I am experienced, likeable, articulate and intelligent. I certainly didn't expect that.

I also didn't expect to be warned, in a manner of speaking, about the eccentricities of my boss, as well as his paranoid and controlling tendencies.

So, what I have is a role that seems to offer me a tremendous opportunity to grow and develop, but one in which I have to be incredibly mindful of office politics. I didn't think it was possible to have politics in an office that small, but I guess it goes to show you how little I know and how naive I can be.

And, lastly, I definitely didn't expect to have gone on what could be considered one incredibly extended date, and certainly not when I am so far away from home.

Mini-crisis

As ever, I am in a bit of a crisis. I started my new job last week and have been fighting between feeling exceedingly bored in Sydney as I know no one outside of work and feeling very stressed as I have been leaving the office past 8 pm most nights. I have also had clarification on my role in the new London office; I am indeed expected to take on a leadership role and be "the face" of the company there.

Good thing I'm pretty. That might help make up for my lack of experience and knowledge.

Work aside (and I really should be working on my presentations now), I am looking forward to meeting up with a friend flying into Sydney this weekend. In a way, I guess it could be a date, had I not ruled that out. He is nice and all, but there is A Big Thing I am not able to get past (gasp, yes, a Dealbreaker), and, even though I kind of like him, I know for a fact that I can't deal with it, so no go.

Still, at the rate work is going, it looks like I made the right call in deciding I really don't have the time or energy for dating.

Why does life have to be so darn complicated?

Back to reality...

All the soon. All good things must come to an end, I suppose, even if this particular good thing happened to incorporate a very bad thing (a bout of dengue fever). I start my new job on Monday. I'm not looking forward to it, to be honest. Maybe it's because this is the longest break I've had off work in a long time, or because I've been at home and been feeling incredibly nostalgic the whole time and do not want to leave. Maybe it's because I've been spoiled, as I always am, whenever I come home.

Or, maybe, it's because I recognise that this is when I find out once and for all whether this job really will be everything I desperately want it to be. It's going to be a lot of hard work, and a lot of pain, and a whole lot of not-great pay and benefits, but, hopefully, the indomitable spirit that has got me to where I am will carry me through.

So, this is it, babe. The day of reckoning approaches. But, whatever happens, don't forget to do your best to live life. Get some rest. Go on some dates. Enjoy some gigs. Talk to old friends. Make some new ones. Laugh.

Whatever happens, just remember this, it's just a job. And you're going to knock it out of the ball park.

One Chapter Ends...

As of today, I no longer work for my old company.

It felt so strange to wake up this morning and not have a BlackBerry to check. I know some will think me mad for that, but I have got so used to having to check it every morning that I feel somewhat naked without it.

My last day at work was marked by an incredibly late arrival (leaving drinks the night before), a two hour lunch, two hours' worth of goodbyes, a lot of desk clearing and, remarkably, a submission of a paper.

I expected to feel sad, but I didn't expect the sheer amount of goodwill and best wishes from everyone. I didn't quite realise that so many people knew who I was, even if I hadn't worked with them, and I certainly did not expect the gifts I received.