Tag: young professional

Milestones

I came home from Shepparton yesterday and went to work in the city today. I really enjoyed myself. I was surrounded by friends. I laughed the whole day. I talked to people I had never met and they engaged me in conversation.

I passed a milestone last Friday. I went to my first ever Aussie Rules football match. I barracked for the Western Bulldogs against Collingwood. I had a good time and even got into it enough to yell, “Come on, Doggies!” It’s a fast and skillful game.

I passed another milestone last Thursday. I ate my first chicken parmi meal at a pub. I also got up in front of a crowd and sang karaoke. The song? I will survive by Gloria Gaynor.

They’re very proud of you

I arrived at work this morning, and did something I shouldn’t but I always do: I checked my personal email.

Sitting in my mailbox was an email with the subject, ‘Results of your interview for a Gates Cambridge Scholarship‘. Very calmly, I clicked it and started reading.

On behalf of the Trustees of the Gates Cambridge Trust, Dr Gordon Johnson and I would like to thank you very much for being available for interview for a Gates Cambridge Scholarship.

A whole sentence and I still hadn’t gotten to the part that mattered. Then:

The Trust is delighted to offer you a Gates Cambridge Scholarship from October 2006, subject to the normal condition of your being offered admission to Cambridge. Please accept our warmest congratulations.

I considered it and tried a small smile. This was good news. Great news, right? Yes, of course. Great news.

A little box popped in the bottom right hand corner of the screen. “It’s Joan! Hi Joan!” So Vera became the first to know.

After signing off my illegal chat, I began an email to my lecturers and work mentor to tell them my results and thank them for the references they wrote for me. Jamie came in as I was about to send it.

“Hi Joan,” he greeted me.

“Hi Jamie. I just won the Gates scholarship. I’m going to Cambridge.”

He stopped, then broke into a huge smile. “That’s great! Wow. Congratulations. Wow. God, Joan. That’s so great! You must be excited.”

“Yeah,” I nodded, a little concerned by my equanimity.

“Have you called your parents? Have you called Damo?”

“Oh no. I’ll talk to them later. I’ll just send them an email.”

“I think you should call them! Wow. That’s so great. But damn, we’re going to miss you.”

I was more pleased by this comment than anything so far.

“It’s still ages away, Jamie,” I said. “The course starts in October. There’s still four months, a third of a year.”

“Now I’ve forgotten why I’ve come in,” Jamie said ruefully. We soon figured it out and began talking work.

After he left, I hit ‘send’ on my email to my referees. I thought about what Jamie had said. I picked up the phone to call dad.

“Hi dad,” I said when he picked up. “I won the scholarship.”

“Oh! That’s good.” I could hear the sudden smile in his voice more than in his words. “So you’re leaving us.”

“In October,” I said. “So you and mum can start planning your trip.” Mum and dad will incorporate London into a round-the-world trip next year.

I called mum next.

“Hi mum.”

“Hi Joan. What’s wrong?” I don’t often call mum at work.

“Nothing. I just wanted to tell you I got the scholarship.”

“Scholarship! That’s good. Ooh. You’re leaving! Well. I guess it can’t be helped.” I hear the mixture of pride and sadness.

“Only for a year,” I assured her. “You’ll have to think of all the computer questions you want to ask me before October.” I am mum’s IT support.

She brightened. “I can start buying you winter clothes!”

I finally got back to work. It was surprisingly easy to concentrate. I had already decided not to tell my managers at work yet, not until I had time to absorb the news, overcome that high that was surely coming, and work out the best way to let them know that I was depriving them of their carefully trained engineer for one year. I had been anxious that work would resent me taking off just as I was becoming a useful, autonomous professional. Somehow, I had to convey the gratefulness I felt for all the training and support they had given me, that they hadn’t wasted their time because I would be coming back.

My email inbox refreshed itself and suddenly there was a flood of emails. What was this? The email subjects were lined with ‘Re: [Fwd] RE: Fwd:’ There were emails from my lecturers throughout my degree, the engineering marketing people, and the Dean of Engineering. The news had spread like wildfire. The Dean had even copied in the Chairman of my company. They knew each other?

Cherida, head of engineering marketing, wrote, “We are all so pleased for you – the office is buzzing and your ears should be burning (all nice things)!”

That was so lovely. When I was studying, I made the effort to get to know the admin and marketing staff. It was a pleasure to be remembered.

Hours later in the mid-afternoon, the phone rang.

“Hi Joan, it’s Cara here, along with Paul and David.” Cara was head of recruitment at my company. “I know you’re in Shepparton and couldn’t it make it to this meeting but we thought we’d call you up so we can discuss the final selection of graduates to join the Environmental Management group.”

As you might remember, I helped interview the graduates two weeks ago.

We had four candidates and three positions to fill. One position had already been allocated to one of our vacation students. The position in the Air group we soon filled with a female candidate. So there was one position left and three to applicants to choose from.

It really came down to a choice between two boys, including my favoured candidate, John. They had both scored very highly in all the tests: the interviews, team exercise, personality assessment… It was a dead heat.

Fifteen minutes of discussion, and still, we hadn’t decided. Such a shame, I thought, to let either of these boys go. Can’t we have them both?

Then I realised I could break deadlock.

“I have something I want to say.” The talking ceased. “I didn’t want to tell you like this so it’s going to be a bit awkward.” I suppose they were wondering what I was going to say. “I was offered a scholarship to Cambridge this morning so I’ll be leaving the company for a year.”

There was a pause. “Congratulations, Joan!” exclaimed Cara. A flurry of congratulations followed.

“I was offered a place in the Masters of Engineering for Sustainable Development a month or so ago but I didn’t mention it earlier because I was still applying for a scholarship. I had the scholarship interview two weeks ago,” I explained. “I wouldn’t have gone without a scholarship.”

“No, that’s great!” Paul said. “I was going to ask if there was any way I could stop you from going!” He was joking, of course.

“Okay, so now you can hire both the graduates.” This was what I was trying to get to. If I wasn’t there next year, they would need someone to fill my place.

“That’s right!” said David. “Well, that solves everything. Good on you, Joan.”

This gave me an even greater buzz than the big email this morning. What great timing! I’ve made a difference in someone’s life and except for fifty minutes durins an interview, I barely know him.

“So we’re hiring an extra graduate,” Paul said.

I spotted his difficulty immediately. “I’ll send you all an official email to let you know about the scholarship. Then you can tell others.”

“Yes, we’ll have to explain to Tasos why we’ve getting four grads instead of three.” Tasos is the manager of the entire Environment Group.

So I sent the email, which in the end, was easy to write. The positive reaction from all my workmates so far made me think that there wouldn’t be the resentfulness I had worried about in the past months when I had thought about my application.

Tasos replied. “This sounds like a fantastic opportunity, Joan. We will welcome you back with open arms at the tail end of 2007.”

I got an email from Tia, a friend from work, “WAY TO GO, JOAN!”

“How did you hear the news?” I asked, puzzled. I hadn’t emailed anyone but my immediate managers.

“Paul has been talking about it. He’s very, very proud of you.”

It feels wonderful, to work for people who are very proud of you.

The other side of the table

On Monday, I helped interview seven graduate applicants for positions in the Environment Group. At our company, there are two rounds of interviews. The first is with a senior manager of the group and a YP (Young Professional, that’s me). Those that make it through this round are interviewed by the human resources people, and participate in personality profiling and a group exercise.

Each interview on Monday lasted between 40 and 50 minutes. David and I asked questions from a form that HR had prepared. The questions ranged from, ‘What was your favourite subject at university?’ to ‘Describe a situation where you had to handle multiple tasks. What did you do and how did it turn out?’

Although the questions were pre-determined, David and I often had to ask the applicants additional questions in order to get STAR responses out of them. It wasn’t a test; we were trying to help them show us their experiences as fully as they could.

After I escorted the applicant out of the office, we came back together to determine a mark out of five for each response, then an overall mark.

The first two or three applicants were all right. I wouldn’t have minded putting them through to the second round. But then John walked in and it was all over.

“We want this guy!” I thought.

He interviewed so well. I wish I interviewed like him. He was well dressed, quiet. When we asked him a question, he thought about it and gave a relevant response. He didn’t sound rehearsed or eager to please, like the previous interviewee. He demonstrated his competence through his examples instead of just saying how good he was.

“Well, that’s the end of our questions,” David said. “Do you have any for us?”

“Yes.” John paused, then: “I know I’m being interviewed for the Environment Group. I’m a chemical engineer so I was a bit surprised to be offered this position but I’m happy about it. I’ve taken a few environmental electives and it’s an area I personally feel strongly about. But what can I, as a chemical engineer, offer to the Environment Group? Can you give me some examples of the work I would be doing as a graduate?”

David looked to me.

“There are quite a few chemical engineers and chemists in our group,” I said. “An understanding of chemistry is so useful in environment work. For example, I work in toxicology and human health risk assessment. For that, I need to understand the effect of chemicals on people, dose and response. You could be working with the Air Group on pollution control, which is really an application of process engineering. You could be auditing chemical processing facilities, like refineries.”

John nodded slowly.

“But I want to make one thing clear,” I continued. “You’ll come in as a graduate. I’m an environmental engineer but I look around and I’m doing the same work as scientists, planners, chemical engineers, botanists… You won’t be put into a ‘chemical engineering’ box. We want our graduates to do everything then figure out what they’re interested in.”

John smiled. “That’s good to hear!” he exclaimed. “I don’t want to be working on heat exchangers all my life. I’m interested in a place where I’ll be doing a variety of work.”

Normally, a job with our company is high on any engineering graduate’s wishlist. I just hope that John doesn’t get a better offer.

They made me cry

Every year at work, we have a Professional Review and Development (PRD) process. In the PRD, each person writes about how they performed in the previous year, what skills they want to develop next year, and sets goals for themselves. Your team leader then reviews your PRD form and you have a formal discussion about it. At the discussion, your team leader will evaluate your performance for the year.

At my PRD review, I had two interviewers: my previous team leader, who looked after me for most of the year, and my new team leader, who will manage my training needs and evaluate me for next year.

Some time between the morning and my PRD review in the afternoon, I developed a severe cold. While Paul and Diane were talking to me, I was constantly snuffling into tissues.

“I’m sorry I’m so teary,” I apologised. “I seem to have a cold.”

“That’s all right,” Diane said, and continued saying things, quite nice things, about my work this year.

I nodded and tried to smile through my tears.

There was a knock on the meeting room door and my big boss, another Paul, stuck his head in.

“I’m sorry to interrupt, Diane, could I –” He saw me. “Wow!” He looked taken aback. “Is it really going that badly?”

I second that

Consultants are renowned for being expensive. If you have a senior engineering consultant come into your company to run a half day workshop, don’t be surprised if you’re hit with a $1500 bill, and that’s not even including preparation time and travel. It’s even more expensive if you ask an accountant or lawyer to do the same thing.

There’s a crazy arrangement called ‘secondment’, where companies pay a particular consultant to work for them full time. It’s like getting a new (competent) staff member except that you’re paying them a lot of money per hour. It will cost you five times more to have a consultant on secondment to you than for you to hire a proper new employee. So I don’t exactly understand what motivates companies to request secondees.

I’m going on secondment on Monday. I will be working from Shepparton for at least the next two months. Shepparton is about two hours north of Melbourne. I’m excited about going. I get to set up an apartment for myself and a workmate. I have the gadgets and wheels I need to do my job. I even have a generous food allowance.

I hope to organise regular internet access while I am away. The internet, even now, is a lifeline to me. I would feel lonely without you, my blog readers, my email-pals, and my Google-talk buddies.

Putting up a fight

“We’ve still got an hour,” Peter said. “We can wait in the Qantas Club.”

Clair and I hesitated. When we tried to get into the Qantas Club in Melbourne this morning, the staff had allowed us in reluctantly. Each member was only allowed one guest per trip.

We walked into the foyer of the Canberra airport Qantas club.

“Excuse me!” the receptionist said. “Can I see your boarding passes?” Peter showed her his. I sort of waved mine at her too. Clair did the same.

“Only one guest,” she said. We looked at each other.

“Can you let us in this time?” Peter asked casually.

“No.” She shook her head firmly.

“Go ahead, Peter,” I said. “We can wait outside. I’ve waited in airports before. I don’t need the Qantas club.”

There was a long silence as we stood there awkwardly, not knowing what to do.

“Well, no, you wait here,” Peter said. “I’ll see if there’s anyone I know.” He disappeared into the club. What? What’s he doing? What’s he mean, see if there’s anyone he knows?

Clair and I waited at the edges. I tried not to look at the receptionist.

Two minutes passed and Peter emerged with another gentleman. His companion looked at us with a small smile.

“Right, let’s go” was Peter’s brisk introduction. Surprised, Clair and I scurried after him.

“Hold on!” the receptionist called. “Do you have a guest already?”

Peter’s companion shook his head. “No.”

The receptionist glowered as the four of us walked into the club, where complimentary wine, food, magazines, TV and internet access awaited us.

As soon as we reached the lounge, we waved goodbye to the accommodating fellow.

“Peter, was he some stranger you just picked up?” Clair laughed.

“Oh, I know him from the university,” Peter said vaguely. “I just thought there might be someone I knew.

The blind leading the blind

I was half paying attention during the training course when I heard Michelle ask, “Who hasn’t used the job management interface before?”

Without thinking, I put my hand up. That’s why I was here, right? I had to get with the program.

“Joan! You can come down to the front and drive the mouse.” Michelle waved me down to the front of the room. I hesitated then put my pen down and walked to the front.

Michelle handed me the wireless keyboard and mouse. I spent the rest of the one hour training course responding to Michelle’s cues: “And if we click on the ‘New Claim’ button… Let’s choose ‘lump sum’… Joan, pick any job manager in the second drop down menu…”

They must have been wondering why I appeared clumsy with the mouse and keyboard. I was just that little bit too slow…

Well, the reason I was unsteady was that I couldn’t see! I had forgotten to bring my glasses and could only make out vague shapes on the projector screen.

“Joan, fill in the job description in the main box.”

I waved the mouse around, nervously looking for any screen movement that would show me where the mouse pointer had gotten to. I finally found it and clicked on the largest white space I could see on the screen. I typed, “New airport in Afghanistan. It was made of gold.” I didn’t know how many spelling mistakes I had made. When they all started laughing, I figured it was all right.

“Thanks for driving, Joan,” Michelle said to me at the end of the session.

I had made it through the hour without revealing my disability. Needless to say, I had concentrated so hard during it all that I hadn’t learned a single thing.

Cows in the grass store

We were finishing up our sampling when a farmer pulled up in front of the gate.

“G’day! Will I be in your way if I let the cows graze here?” he called.

We looked over to the next paddock where sixty or seventy black Angus cows were standing (not doing much at all) in a yellow, dry, tussocky field. We looked at our feet, which were sunk into long green grass.

“Sure, we’re pretty much done here.”

The farmer gave us the thumbs up. He hopped on his buggy and drove to the next gate. The cows looked up immediately. Before he had finished unlocking the padlock, the herd had already begun to move towards him. They picked up speed when the gate open.

The cows ran — and I mean, ran — through the gate and massed down the road towards our paddock.

“That’s amazing!” Trav exclaimed. “They don’t need a sheep dog or anything.”

“They know what’s coming,” Matt said. I was suprised how fast the cows moved.

The herd skidded a little bit past the gate and had to backtrack. The animals came jogging past us in a line. Occasionally, one glanced at us.

“I need to take a photo,” I said to myself and slipped off my latex gloves to grab my camera.

When the cows past us, they dispersed from their file and quickly began munching. They were like kids in a candy store.


“Hey you with the hand auger. What are you looking at?

Working on the prairie

I was typing at a furious pace, hurtling towards a deadline when suddenly, there was a *tick* and everything went black. A unified gasp of horror reverberated around the office. I leapt up from my seat. At the same time, everyone else had stood up, craning their heads over the pod partitions. We looked like dozens of prarie dogs peering out of our holes.

People’s confused expressions were soon replaced with looks of distress and anger. Wails of despair could be heard as engineers, scientists, planners and architects realized that their last hour of work had been snatched away by the blackout.

“What can we do? We can’t write reports, we can’t make calls!” they cried. Some consoled each other, while others went to the tea point to drown their sorrows in coffee and biscuits.

After a pause of worry, I brightened. Finally! Here was the perfect opportunity for me to tidy my desk! Over the past two weeks, I have been so busy doing charegeable work for clients that I couldn’t file the mounds of paper building up on my desk. The untidiness and disorganisation gnawed at me.

Hooray!

Do it corporately

In our particular corporation, emails are ‘flicked’. “Could you flick me an email to summarise that?” “I’ll just flick this invoice to you.”

Flick! Flick! Flick!

But corporate-speak does not withstand the tide of evolution! Guess what I heard today?

“Why don’t you buzz me an email to remind me.” “I’m waiting for him to buzz it through.”

Buzz!…Buzzzzzz!


Flick


Buzz