khamoshi-ek pal ke liye…

Work Woe1: I think my BIG BOSS is really TOO sweet. Seriously. I HAVE to quit work, but he is just SOOO sweet to me, that I dont know how I would say that I dont want to continue anymore. Not because the work environment is not good. But because,

A. I want to sit down for two months and study religiously and crack atleast one of the J-Schools.

B. This is NOT what I want to do. I wanted to be a JOURNALIST. Someone who goes out, sees the world around her and comes back to tell that very world what the ‘world’ is like.

I have been planning to resign for the past ONE month, but all in vain. I just post-pone my plan every week.

Work Woe2: I just HATE it, when my team doesnt understand what I am trying to convey. Just because I am the juniormost in the hierarchy doesnt mean that I am not entitled to have a viewpoint. Stubbornity pisses me off bigtime. And even more anooying is the fact, that you hear someone out and still feel that YOUR opinion, still holds true.

This is my first JOB, as in a JOB! I have never worked full-time before this. I guess, this is a wonderful platform, with extremely co-operative teammates. Just that my department, the content side, works from Bangalore and I am the only one working from here. Which makes things very difficult. I have never seen my department boss. Just Gtalk conversations and telephonic conferences are not enough to hold a TEAM.

Working gives you a high. My BIG BOSS, oh man! I really wish I had a relative like him. Like my foster-father or something. I think, his kids would be damn lucky to have a daddy like him. He is smart, funny and has RESPECT for opinions, even if it doesnt match with his own ideas. I guess, that the kind of people I want to be around. Who would have ideas which might not match with mine; but respect my idea as much as their own.

Every week, I keep pestering dad to write a resignation letter for me. I dont KNOW what to write in resignation letters. This job is really special for me, cuz this is where I earned my first REAL cheque. This was an amazing platform for an amateur like me. The work environment is very different from regular media organisations. This place is not pro-smoking, its a 10-6, with educated classy people who have their own tastes and ideologies. I am the youngest in the lot from the small group of people, and I feel so much like home.

Start-up companies need a lot of push in the beginning. I remember making tea, washing my own plates for a few days in the beginning. Inspite of being the youngest, I address all the others by their first names. No sir, or no mister. Last week, I took three offs because I wanted to complete a college project and following my leaves, I have been coming to work at 2 in the afternoon, because I had to go to college. And my BIG BOSS didnt even complain.

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Pep-up talk by BOSS: As I was writing this post, by BIG BOSS called me to his cabin for some pep-talk. So, now we shall divulge from my original story.

 Because my team head, wasnt understanding what I want to say, tears started to trickle down my cheek. As I stated in Work Woe2, I get really emotional about everything, very soon.

He started to explain as to how you should NEVER get personal about work. Being OBJECTIVE is the safest bet whenever you work in an organisation. There are emotional over-heads in every organisation. In this organisation, no-one thinks of you as an employee, everyone thinks of you as a kid! And they are very protective about this kid. One of my colleagues saved the last slice of pizza for me when I was out of work. Some of my colleagues are very protective of me.

He says that there are only three things that should keep you driving in an organisation. One is learning. You should come to work only when you think you are learning something out of the process. There should never be a level of stagnancy. Second point is contribution. Only when you contribute, do you get feedback. And feedback is very necessary. The third thing is having fun. If you are not having fun at work, you are not working for the love of work; but for the heck of it.

You should always be so confident about yourself, that even when your are on the brink, you should be able to stand up for yourself and get a new job. The capability of someone is judged when they are hired in my company. They were the best of the best, and that is why they were in there. When they come into an organisation, I have to drive them to be better than their best. But I cant keep HONKING all the while. You are good, and you dont need anyone else to judge that.

As Narayan Murthy said it, ‘The best way to be successful is to surround yourself with successful people. Seeing their sucess, you shall automatically push yourself harder.’ Mediocrity always perpetuates mediocrity. You will never grow, if you dont learn to get outside your shoes and outbeat your ownself.

Remember, never to get personal about work. You could cry for your family, cry for your friends, cry because your dog got hurt, but never cry for work. Work should never be a reason for tears. You should never get sentimental about work. Sentimental about targets and outputs is alright, but because we are in a knowledge economy, clashes in ideologies are evident.

Clashes in ideologies mean THREE things-

1.Either the other person is actually wrong.

2.Or you are so engrossed in proving your own point, that you dont understand the other person’s perspective.

3. You may be right, but you are not able to communicate your point well.

Give all these points a consideration. This organisation is your first job. It might not even be your career, when all you want to be is a journalist with some top-notch organisation. But this is your learning platform. Here, atleast you have flexible colleagues, who give you an ear. But big-wigs are too engrossed in their own things to care about opinion. A good manager is the one who gives a rat’s ass about seniority and just goes with productive ideas. Specially in a creative field like ours, ideas are not reflected by seniority.

There are times, when we have to rub our shoes and climb the ladder. We might also have to convince people on the ladder to believe in what we are saying. But, you never know, YOU might be the ladder someday. Just treat people the way you want them to treat you. Always remember, at any given point of time in your life, there will always be TWO choices- the right one will always be the MOST difficult one. When you know what the difficult choice is, you will automatically be able to know what the RIGHT choice is.

You can fight for your family, fight for your friends, but never fight in case of work. There is no point. Once you ring the door-bell of your house, you should bundle up all work worries and get into home like a content person. Taking work back home is the WORST thing to do.

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All of the above was the talk inside the cabin. I was so impressed by him. I really dont think I could work under a better person than him. He was talking about something personal, where these few lines popped up:

Remember, you only fight for things, when you feel for them. But after you F-I-G-H-T for them, you start to feel detached!

After this entire thing, me wanting to resign is all the more difficult. But if I go by all that he says, quitting work is the first thing, I should be doing. For one, it is the most DIFFICULT thing to do, so it must be right. The three pin-points of learning, contribution and fun no longer hold true. Honestly, when I started working, I didnt work because I wanted to work. Glorified pocket money is not the driving force. I wanted to always be a cut above the rest of the kids of my age. I have a LOT of energy in me. I just wanted to invest my time and energy into something that is fruitful. Where I could learn something.

I have learnt a lot of things with this organisation. I learnt how 9-6 desk jobs are like. I learnt to station myself in front of a desktop and stare at the screen endlessly. I learnt how to make tea in a microwave. I learnt one new word everyday. I learnt how to google smartly. I learnt what it is to be with intelligent, yet geeky people. I learnt that there are organisations which respect ideas inspite of hierarchical seniority. I have changed a lot since I started to work. I have become serious in a very funny way. I have grown confident in a way. I have learnt to live in my own cocoon and live with or without anything/anyone.

All this is good. But I end this post with the same question I had in my mind, before I started to right this. Should I resign?