A Survival Guide To Grounding Yourself At Work: Perspectives of A Job Hopper
Fatmah K. Content Writer Intern
With the rising number of job openings amidst a tightening labour market, we see a rising trend of job hopping. The term, ‘job hopping' is nothing new; however, for many of us, it may come with negative connotations.
When surveying employers in the region, The Straits Times found that Singapore was ranked highest as most employers are most likely to have a negative attitude towards job hoppers. At the same time, they observed that this attitude could be changing, with hirers being forced to think about what are the new skill sets and ideas brought by each new employee, as well as what they can do to create a higher retention rate.
The definition of a job hopper means someone who stays at an organisation for a short period of time, which could range from 2 months or up to 3 years! The Gen Zs and millennials are said to spend a significantly shorter time in each job, compared to previous generations. With ‘job hopping’ becoming a new trend, this made me reflect on how being quickly adaptive to new environments or workplaces is an important skill to have.
I decided to ask Hafizah and Natasha, who were once job hoppers, for their tips on how they learnt to settle in quickly at their jobs!
Hafizah’s Tips:
For Hafizah, prior to joining Bold At Work, she spent some time working in contract jobs as a motion graphic designer. At her last job, she was contracted for 2 months. She recalled having to act and learn fast from the get-go, in order to deliver work fast.
She thinks that being goal-oriented, especially given the short stint, is really important.
“Being goal-oriented and intentional in my steps made it easier to make sense of the work I was doing.” Hafizah had the habit of using a post-it note to write down her To-Do list for the day, that she pasted right on her laptop screen. This not only allowed her to work fast and efficiently; she also used the post-its to remind her of the importance of the design project entrusted to her.
Beyond the work at hand, she also made sure to spend time and effort memorising who is whom and who does what, so as to suss out who could be her potential helpline at work. When things got increasingly difficult in the course of the 2 months, she had a go-to person, her Art Director whose guidance helped her to grow as a designer in the making.
The two months also made her understand the importance of fitting in well, even though it was for a very short period of time. Even though her experience in that company was not too good as they did not appreciate her work and deemed it unimportant, she then realised that she had not value added to the company; she still uses her tips till this day!
Natasha’s Tips:
For Natasha, prior to working at Bold At Work, she was a corporate executive, and subsequently took on a job as an administrative executive. She also spent two years as a freelancer, and another year as a digital designer. As a chronic job hopper, she felt obligated to share her golden tips.
“Ask yourself questions
Do you enjoy your time working?
Do you enjoy and feel proud of the work you produced?
Does how the company work align with your own values?”
Natasha believes in the honesty and integrity of her work, for her, this means that her employer has to be very clear and truthful towards the consumers. She believes that asking yourself these important questions throughout your stint, helps you determine if there is a longer-term fit with the company.
Whereas Hafizah talked about the importance of forming networks in creating for oneself a sense of belonging, Natasha feels that taking care of the spatial dimension is important.
Her golden tip is to “make your office space your own, as much as possible”. She creates this sense of ownership by always being at that spot or desk given to her. She noted how with job hopping, it is easy to neglect this, as you might think that the space means nothing since you are leaving soon. She sees that instead, the space should serve as a reminder to treasure your experience as much as possible since you are there the whole time. For her, this sense of ownership even transfers from the space into her work, for it is in this space she creates the work she does.
‘Even if only for a short period of time, you should remember how you’re still part of that company.” Similarly, she feels one should take pride and ownership over any piece of work done, since it represents your energy and effort.’
Similarly like the two, grounding yourself at work could create a sense of belonging to want to do better at work and gain what you want to learn out of each day.
What are your own personal tips? Share with us on our social media platforms!
#BeBoldAtWork is a Design Your Workplace series that seeks to cover practical tips, stories and tools that would serve employees and employers to better design how you choose to think, feel and show up in workplaces so as to improve the performances of not only your organisations but also the lives of the people you work with.
If you would like for us to enter your workplaces to provide talks and engagements on workplace wellbeing & career resilience, drop us a note at hello@boldatwork.sg!