I graduated from UC Berkeley 5 months ago, here are some learnings from university to corporate.
Like most of my peers I spent my last year hustling and prepping for interviews in hopes of landing a full time job after school. Come second semester, the hard part was done— I got the offer! Signed, sealed, delivered. I was stoked, the pressure of landing a job was off my back, and I could finally relax……ha not.
I knew that getting the offer was only the first step and the real work had yet to begin. However, there are so many more lessons I’ve gathered in the first couple months of my transition from student to full-time that people don’t really talk about.
Start to accept change
I’m the kind of person who craves stability, I hate change and uncertainty— I am a creature of habit. Your first year on the job has change written all over it. Whether you are at a scrappy start-up or a structured (ha) large company, you will experience change—especially in tech. People move around between companies, and within. During my first couple months of working, I have experienced more change than I anticipated.
I went through major org changes in the span of 2 months, all of which took a toll on me. I definitely lost some sleep during the transition periods. The only thing that kept me going were the mentors and relationships I had built early on.
Change may suck but it builds resilience. If you can build that early on in your career you are set for life. Knowing that you can handle mass transition + uncertainty will set you up for being able to tackle opportunity from the start.
Find the opportunity
In my first two months, I went through some changes which essentially left me drowning. I was given the opportunity to drive launches I normally would not have been able to. I was literally scared shitless, mainly because I felt so much pressure, and the fear of failing was getting to me. It was pressure to please not only the millions of people on our platform but also my cross functional stakeholders who were now looking to me to provide insight my former (more experienced) colleagues would have normally provided.
That was my first mistake— letting the pressure get to me. My second mistake was thinking my cross functional partners would let me drown. If I set aside my own worries for one second, there was a huge opportunity in front of my eyes.
The opportunity in being left alone had a big risk of failure but it had a huge ROI of growth, learning, partnership, and ownership.
I continue to try my best in not having the opinions of others overpower or pressure me, but it is hard. Try to focus on the opportunity that could come out of the risk. Even if you fail— now you know exactly what not to do! If I could come out of this saying I was able to help build a team and drive launches right out of university, that is incredible. Sure I don’t know what I’m doing but better to take on that challenge now when I’m the most hungry I will ever be.
You will feel stupid a lot, and it’s ok.
It’s hard not to compare yourself to others. Chances are if you are right out of university you are going to be one of the younger people on the team. When I started working, I had to constantly remind myself the women (and men) around me had 20 years experience on me and it was OK if I was not on their level. It was also OK to ask every single question I had.
Something that helped me was leaning on a mentor. Everyone will tell you to find a mentor for your career, you aspire to be like and learn from them. I’m all for mentorship, but it is also important to remember that many of our mentors executed their accomplishments during an entirely different economic, technological, and professional landscape than we are in now. Our journeys will be different but how they maneuver through change and tribulation will be a learning experience to take from.
Mentors should be used as motivators, an inspiration and a lesson to learn from, so we can observe and grow and (hope to) be 10x better.
I still compare myself to others on the job and question my ability but at the end of the day, if I’m the smartest person in the room— I’m in the wrong room.
Work-life balance is a real thing
I would always get annoyed when my loved ones came home from work and I would be ready to wind down and relax together— but they were still answering emails. I now fully understand how hard it is to detach myself from work.
I’m still working on how to get out of a work mode when I come home. I believe it’s something that will take years to get down. There are definitely times when its hard not to bring work. It’s even more difficult if you are at a company that defines itself through real-time news and pop culture. I still don’t consider what I do work because I genuinely love it. But, it is important to understand how much more to life there is than your job. Family, friends, mental health, music, fitness, taking the time to enjoy all these moments are just as important as launching products.
Find a challenging internship pre graduation
I was fortunate enough to land an internship at Twitter during university. It was probably the most helpful thing when it came to my full transition out of student mode. Granted coming in as intern is way more fun than as a full-time employee however, there are crucial skills that you are exposed to which will help the journey into joining the real world. I learned things such as:
- Presentation deck formats
- Interacting with senior executives
- Speaking with cross functional stakeholders
- Email etiquette
- What an all hands is
- Understanding the organization structure
- What a retro meeting is
- How to set up meeting agenda’s and notes
- and much more.
There are so many things that I would have had more difficulty with during my onboarding as a full-time had I not been exposed to company culture and work-life during university or even earlier.
Parting Thoughts
If you are a recent grad going through the transition into work life, I hope you can relate to some of this. Change is inevitable, but we have the ability to reach high resilience. It’s just the beginning of a life long journey for us, never feel like you’re wasting your time. If you are learning anything you are not failing.
Always be open to change, find the opportunity in hardship, seek challenges, and trust your gut. If things are super shitty, remember you are never stuck in one place. Find the opportunity…anywhere 😉
Author,
Rabiah Damji
Twitter, Product Marketing
rabiahdamji.com
Don’t forget to check out 3 Lessons Learned from My Conversation With YouTube CEO.
