Needle, Meet Haystack

Continuing from where we left off yesterday, here’s a few more tales of dumb mistakes that common sense could have easily resolved:

1. Figure out your commute time before you start the job. Because I neglected to properly judge how much time and money I was going to be spending on public transportation, I ended up spending about 15 hours (and around $45) per week getting to and from work.  My employers did not compensate me for these costs, and had I considered how much I would lose by taking the job, I might have re-evaluated that decision.  On the plus side, I had enough time to finish about a book per day.
2. Make sure you’re aware of how much compensation you’ll be getting. Since the job I had just finished gave me time-and-a-half for overtime, I had assumed that the next one would follow suit.  Instead, it took three weeks to find out that I was not receiving any compensation for any work done over the 20-hour weekly limit.
3. Give your supervisor project updates. While working on a particularly intense project for a large client, the project manager decided to be more hands-off and focus on other things.  As she was not around to supervise or comment on our work, when we finally did show her the project (at 10 PM the night before the presentation), we ended up having to redo almost the entire thing.
4. Leaders don’t have to be friends. When I was put in charge of a team that was about twice the size of the largest team I had managed before that point, I panicked.  Rather than establishing ground rules and authority, I instead acquiesced to my team’s requests, focused on a small group instead of all of the people I had at my disposal, and tried to do too much myself to alleviate the strain on others.  Instead of being a leader and delegating things (which I eventually did), I started out soft and lenient making the project more difficult for everyone.
5. Quality beats quantity every time. A friend told me about a former co-worker of his at an old job who, starting with his first day, came in before everyone else and left after everyone else in the hopes of catching his boss’ attention and being rewarded for being a diligent worker.  After a month of this, his boss approached him one evening after most of the office had gone home.  ”I’ve noticed that you come in early and stay late every day,” the boss began.  ”Why can’t you finish your work on time like everyone else?”  The co-worker was fired a week later (for stealing office supplies).

It’s easy to place blame for your mistakes on external sources, or to look back and mock your inexperienced past self.  But if you learn from your mistakes, you will become a more efficient and experienced worker.  Provided you don’t repeat them, of course.