5 things I learned this week (Part 13)

What do you say when someone asks you “How’s your ass?”

I know that it is not a typical question to be included in the “English for Dummies” book. From last week’s blog, you might have come to know about my predicament, and hence, the need for me to find an apt answer for the above mentioned question. When you get asked the same question, repeatedly and from a small group of people, you would undeniably feel the need to spice up the reply.

But by the time I came up with a kick ass reply, people stopped asking me the question. I don’t know if they suddenly sprouted psychic antennas on their heads to know of my premeditated reply, but once I made up my mind to answer  the said question with “Not as good as yours.”, no one, and I repeat, no one asked me how my behind is.

Moving on to more important matters and milestones, in less than 50 hours of the official publishing of this blog, I’ll be reaching the third anniversary of the birth of my career. Three years of trying to find my feet in this big world. Three years of optimizing the way to optimize your work. Three years of waiting for increments and grading, only to reassure oneself that it’ll be better next year. Three years of successfully avoiding the thought of higher studies. Three years of convincing oneself to not resign from the job.

Why you may ask? My idea of my career was always centered in and around my beautiful city of Trivandrum. This was so that I could be lost in the surroundings that I feel reflect my inner mind - the serenity, the “laidbackness”, the inertia to change, the weather, the hartals, and from what I heard, a whole week given as holiday by the Government so that everyone can sit at home and enjoy the torrential rains this monsoon.

How I wish I was back in my room at my home. With the rain tapping on my window, some bouncing off the metal sheets over the parking lot, and with thunder flashing across the sky. That would be heaven.

But here I am, on a Friday evening, sitting at my desk in office at 8pm, compensating for the short leaves that I took this month. I got overtime tomorrow for some work. I don’t go home for another two months. There is not even an inkling of rain here, even though there seems to an unrespectable amount of it in all the neighboring states.

As I reflect on what I deem to be a cruel trick on me by my fate; which professed to me a successful, fulfilling job, when I allowed it to uproot me from my comfort zone, and plant me here; I think of the next batch of freshers joining here on Monday. And keeping in mind the feedback that I’ve received regarding my Interview tips blog, I’m going to do a “Tips for Fresher “ themed post here so that my experiences can be of some use to them.

So, let’s begin, shall we?

Did you know…

1.  …that you should be humble enough to do any work, no matter how trivial or menial, that comes your way?

“Go take that printout I just gave. (cos I can’t be arsed out of my seat)”

“Stamp these files.”

“Go and see if so-and-so is there at his seat. (cos I don’t know his extension number)”

“Count the number of pages in this set of printouts. (cos I think you are sitting idle)”

“Do this (meaningless) data entry work (that I’m too lazy to do).”

You’ll be hearing a lot of these and more. I’ve seen enough “I’m an Engineer now” egos stop the said person from undertaking these tasks. And I get their point. Fresh out of a reputed college with a B.Tech degree, you are thinking of being the next big thing in the field, working with the brightest minds on the latest technology. But, you have to understand that before assigning you to such work, those higher up in the hierarchy should be confident of your abilities to do the same. The seriousness and accuracy in the way you react to menial tasks will be used to extrapolate your performance in more serious matters.

So, please, for your own good, don’t say that “I’m too good to be doing this.”- at least the first few times.

2. …that you are better off not showing a genuine enthusiasm to the trivial or menial works?

If you follow my advice from above, blindly and indefinitely, you’ll sure enough be arriving at this one by yourself. From experience, I can tell you that any form of enthusiasm in doing the “other” work is considered as being selected as the default candidate to that work – forever. So, when you say a reluctant “Yes” to doing the “other” work, do make sure that you moan about it, so that the person giving you the work will be less inclined to do give you the same latter.

3. …that you should keep your ears open at all times?

This is not so that you can get the latest rumor scoop, even though doing this helps a lot in doing that. ;)

This advice from me is to make sure that you don’t miss the little stuff. I believe that information – of any kind, coming from any source – is valuable. So, keep your ears open and listen at all times, no matter who is talking. Let it be your CEO explaining to you how to run the company. Let it be the office boy telling you how to cure the “paper stuck” disease of printers. It always helps to have a patient ear.

4. …that hard work and dedication may not always be rewarding?

Again, this is another thing you should really be learning through experience, first hand. I’m not saying that showing these two qualities is going to always unfruitful. But remember that you got only 24 hours a day. If experience shows that something is unrewarding, irrespective of your attitude towards it, you are better off employing your hours elsewhere.

5. …that the client is God, even though they act more like Adolf Hitler?

The less I say about this, the better are my prospects of keeping this job. But you get the idea, right. ;)

And with that let me take your leave so that I can join in the banter taking place in the next row.

Oh!! And one more thing. No matter how much you hate coming back here on a Monday morning, at the end of the month, you will always love to hear the virtual ringing of cash falling in your bank account. :D ;)

So, that’s all folks!!!

Have a great weekend!!!

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....and we got 2000 HITS here...
Thank you. Yes, you. I'm talking about you only. You are the reason I churn out my mind into readable bits every weekend. After the untimely death of my football playing days, this blog post has become the reason for me to look forward to the weekend. Your responses and your comments make my work better. A few of you were kind enough to enquire about when the next post is coming - which eggs me on to keep writing. But most of all, just knowing that you read this makes me feel better.

So, thank you my dear friend.
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