As you get ready to graduate and enter the workforce, I would like to share with you five tips that have helped me maintain my sanity in my years of working.
Now, these are not your typical "write things down in a planner," "unplug from technology," "exercise often," type of work/life tips. I would say these are a little unconventional, in that you will not find these tips in a Hallmark greeting card or written on the inside of the cover of "Oh, The Places You'll Go."
1. Take your vacation time.
When you enter a new job, especially after recently graduating, you may feel like you have to prove yourself. You have a lot of experience working hard against deadlines, and you are not afraid of putting in the hours. That is great, and by no means am I saying take it easy, but you have to recognize the importance of taking time to yourself. Working through lunch, staying late, and coming in early all the time can have a negative affect on your health. You will feel tired and burned out, and your overall productivity will decline.
Getting your degree might have been a sprint (though it probably felt like it took forever), but your career is a marathon. Take it one day at a time, and do not be afraid to put that time-off request in.
2. Don’t listen to THAT voice inside your head.
Remember: You is smart, you is kind, you is important, and The Help is a treasure of a book and a movie.
GiphyLook at you, with your shiny new degree, ready to take on the world. Unfortunately, you start your career in your dream field and you get that sinking feeling of, "I don't really know anything." It is called imposter syndrome and it is more common than you think.
Imposter syndrome is a psychological pattern that manifests itself when you question your own accomplishments and achievements, and begin to worry about being exposed as a fraud. My best advice here is to put it out of your mind as much as possible, and remind yourself that everyone you work with has been in your shoes. At one time or another, they did not know what they were doing either.
3. See friends in the middle of the week.
When you get your first job with a regular schedule, such as an 8-5 job, you might get into a rut where at the end of each day, you just want to go home and hide. It might not sound like it, but sitting in an office all day is exhausting. Sometimes, your job will have you working non-stop, always go go go. Other times, you might have a light workload or spread your work out so you can make it last longer. In either situation, you get home feeling spent.
This feeling pushes you to get out Friday nights, live it up, have a wild Saturday, recoup on Sunday, and come back into work with a case of the Mondays. Make it a point to get out in the middle of the week. Keep in touch with your friends who stay local after graduating. Go out for Taco Tuesday. Get involved in a club or meetup. A little something in the middle of the week will help break-up the monotony of your regular schedule.
4. Tell people you don’t know the answer to something you don’t know.
This tip is one of the best things I have ever learned in my professional career. If someone asks you a question, and you do not know the answer, tell them you don't know - but then tell them you will help them figure it out - here is why:
When you tell someone you do not know the answer to their question, you change your relationship with that person. You go from being the person with the answers to a person on their team. You and that person are on an adventure together to get the answer, and at the end of it, you both learn something.
This helps establish you not only as someone who is helpful, but someone who will not judge people for asking questions. Try this out, and you might find more people coming to you for help. Come review time/promotion conversations, that will really make you look good.
5. Take your lunch to work.
A simple one, but definitely big: take your lunch to work. It cannot get any easier than that. If you have spent the last four or more years with barely any money in your pockets, when you cash that first paycheck, you might be richer at that point than you have been in years. That is awesome, and definitely go out to celebrate, but be careful of the slippery slope of going to restaurants during the day.
Not only is it bad for you, health-wise, to eat out all the time, it also does a number on your paycheck. Take your lunch to work and save that ten bucks a day. Invest in comfortable office clothes instead, trust me on that one.
Bonus Tip: Don’t microwave fish in the office.
Do you smell it? That smell. A kind of smelly smell. The smelly smell that smells... smelly.
It is just rude.
These tips are good for just about anyone at any point of their career. Something you will find is that the issues and problems you face in your career are not unique. Chances are, someone else at your work or in your industry has felt the same way or faced the same issue. Talk to your coworkers, vent to your friends, take your lunch to work, and most importantly, be proud of your accomplishments. Ya did good, kid.
