It's been a year at my current working place. Labor day, an interesting day to start work! The first year at any place after PhD. Firsts are always memorable if not special. Well this was certainly special with its plethora of experiences. During PhD I often felt I was in a candyland where you are tempted to try all before picking your packet. Well here that was actually possible.
I wrote this post earlier for the first 6 months so won't repeat its content but yes the rest of the year followed suite mostly. Here are some other observations about industry life in general based on experiences throughout the year.
It's a very dynamic domain. If you are looking for absolute stability, you are at the wrong place. For this is an everchanging place be it on terms of work, responsibilities or the people and hence the culture. However, if you can accept that growth requires changes and thus any place which is pacing towards growth will be dynamic, you may even enjoy it. If it's exciting to try new stuff for you, you will enjoy. Of course some changes do take more time for adjustment than others but the key is to accept rather than resist. Go with the flow.
I mentioned last time that some places become a way of life. I still agree. But it's very important to define not just physically but also in mind the work and home time. It's very important to switch off from time to time to be recharged and happy in what you are doing. One shouldn't feel guilty or hesitant about that. And places where you have those opportunities are the good ones.
In terms of people, I have heard more than often that there are no friends in workplace. Comments such as "don't look to make friends" and you have to be professional at all times and never be emotional or take things personally are often heard though I don't agree entirely. Then there is that theory of "people management" where the people are asked to be warm and friendly. It integrates diplomacy, kindness and genuine friendliness into a murky mix called professionalism. It can be a bit disorienting in the beginning. But it's easier to be nice than not to be so it's better when the culture encourages friendliness rather than extra strictness. Of course timelines don't exactly encourage long discussions unlike college times. Maybe those were easy times for friendships where one has a lot of time to just talk. But I still feel friendships are people dependent more than environment. For friendships, a good test can be to see how many people you interact with when you don't have to, whom you would keep in touch with if you changed workplaces. Those will be mostly very few.
Speaking specifically, here the environment itself has been good, as close to relaxed lab environment as one could expect where there is friendliness, teamspirit, goodwill and a kind of lightness which itself is very rare from what I have generally heard. Sometimes that's also enough.
Well this has been my jumble of thoughts for this first year. An everchanging yet exciting and enriching time so far. Lets see what the journey holds ahead!
