11 Mistakes You Should Definitely Avoid at Your First Job

Often many young minds who are first time stepping into their first job often have many questions.

Irrespective of what type of job they choose, Government or job in startups like FamPay, NIRAMAI, etc. a graduate had at least a handful of questions that were common.

After a shortlisting, one of the most common and prominent questions that emerged out was "What mistakes should I avoid at my first job?".

11 mistakes you should avoid at your first job:

1. Choose Quality instead of Speed:

This is a recurring mistake done by the newbies almost everywhere. Completing work in a short span of time isn't bad. But you need to remember that you are not hired by the company to simply finish your task faster.

It hired you to do the task in the proper way. Yes, completing work faster may impress others and your boss in the first place. But often speed compromises the work quality, which has a higher priority than the time taken to complete it.

Remember, you are new. So taking an unusually long time to finish a task shouldn't bother you much. Others, who do the task much more quickly are either experienced or lack quality.

And frankly speaking, once you get enough experience, you too can complete the task faster without neglecting the quality.

2. Rectify your Mistakes by your Own:

This heading may look a bit complicated. But let me explain it in simple ways.

Often, people who are in their first job think that since they are the lowest in the hierarchy of the department, committing any mistake will not cause much of a difference. 

In other words, they assume the mistakes they do will be noticed by the seniors, and the seniors or the managers will solve/rectify them.

Such mistakes must not be committed at any cost.

There is a simple reason behind it: Your seniors will think that you want your work to be done by them.

That's something you will definitely don't want to happen.

3. Trust is the Most Important thing:

The main objective here is to try not to commit any mistake. But if one is committed, don't try to patch it up or hide it.

Remember you are new in the company. Hence accepting your mistakes is much better than hiding them or trying to mislead the manager so that he can't find them.

You might have a feeling that you are smart and you work hard. But besides all this, you need to make sure that your managers don't have to regularly check your work for some patches in it.

A golden line that is worth mentioning here which was said by a manager: "If I can't trust you, it doesn't matter how smart you are."

4. It's Your Responsibility to get your own Feedback:

Often freshers falsely assume that if they are found committing any mistake or doing work in the wrong way, their managers will directly interfere and guide them.

In short, they think it's the responsibility of the managers to give you your own feedback.

But that's not the case!

You must never wait for your senior or manager to interfere and point out your mistakes. Instead, you should take the responsibility to ask your senior or manager to inquire about your mistakes, performance, what can be done better, and overall feedback.

For example, take an example of Data Entry Jobs. You can ask questions to your senior like "Whether my work was good?", or "Was there any fault in my work? Had I Misrepresented data anywhere?" or, you can ask the most basic to-the-point question: "What's your feedback about my work?"

You must ask for feedback if you want one.

5. Don't Limit your Network to your Team:

Another common mistake that new entries do is limiting their social network in the office to only their team/department. And it's the HR's (Human Resources) responsibility to introduce you to members of other departments.

Look, building a proper work environment requires interactions with people belonging to other departments too. Without talking with them, without understanding their perspective, you simply cannot do the task the way it is expected by others.

Different departments in a company resemble different organs in your body. Even if one is facing a problem, the whole body faces problems.

Similarly, your work should be in such a way that it is easily understandable and isn't done in a complex way.

Prefer simplicity in your work and make sure it is easy to understand by the next member to whom you submit the work.

6. Always keep your Team Updated:

Suppose you have committed to complete your work in a specific span of time, but unfortunately due to some predicted or unforeseen circumstances, there is a change in your plan.

In such a situation, new employees make the mistake of not updating their team about the change of plan.

Instead, they feel that this won't cause much of a difference. But one thing that needs to be understood here is that though you know when will you finish your work, other members will assume you have broken your commitment and aren't trustworthy.

People cannot read your mind. Hence informing them about the change of plan is a must when you are at your first job.

7. Know what is to be done to get Promoted:

This is a simple mindset of any beginner in a company: Work Hard, Do your work at the right time, have the passion for your work, and you will be promoted!

But in that race for promotion do you think one ever stops and asks himself whether is he doing all the necessary tasks to be promoted?

Is the Boundary he has drawn for his work constitutes everything that is enough for a promotion?

Suppose if he gets promoted whether he is ready for all the change in the work that he will be facing?

Probably not.

Undoubtedly, at least 95% of people forget one key element when they're after a promotion:

They Never ask the Company what should I do in order to get promoted. Instead, they always talk to themselves with the assumption that they are doing everything to get promoted.

8. Change your Point of View about your salary:

Any guy when he is asked about his salary he usually says an amount that he is desiring to; not how much his work deserves.

Any newbie will begin saying "I want...", instead of a realistic estimate based on the work he is assigned.

Unfortunately, this later on becomes a primary reason for dissatisfaction and worse, just due to lack of realization.

The company's salary is based on your assigned work and not on your desires.

All you need is to understand is you should know how much salary your current work deserves.

9. Understand the Company's Decisions before commenting on them:

Very often during breaks, you may find that your colleagues are having a lot of negative comments about any decision taken by the company.

Slowly, as you spend more time with them you too feel that all/most decisions taken by the company are wrong. And you too start commenting negatively about the higher authorities and decisions of your company.

But very often in these situations no one ever tries to see the other side. No one tries to understand why was such a decision taken? What extra responsibilities

does the management has due to which it has taken a specific decision?

It's a basic life lesson: Before you comment on anybody, you need to stand in their shoes.

10. Focus your Work on Outcome, not on Output:

This may sound a bit complex, but let me break it down in a simpler way.

An employee is given a task. He completes it as per the given instruction. He also makes sure that his work has the least mistakes and is done well.

But it is very rare that anyone asks a question that what will be the impact of completing the assigned work.

Any employee must know that there is a difference between Output and Outcome.

The output is something that the individual has to do and does it.

Whereas Outcome is something that happens due to the work he has done.

Focus on the Outcome and do your work according to it.

11. Don't Blame the Company just because of your Manager:

Whenever a manager yells at an employee (particularly a new one), does something wrong or unethical, or would create a lot of stress, or if he is rude, the employee blames the whole company and its work culture.

He never thinks that is the top leader or head of the company having the same attitude? Or is the problem only with the manager?

In most cases, the leader/director of the company doesn't have the same ill-mentality your manager has.

In these circumstances, it simply means that your manager is wrong. Not the whole company. Another point to note/think about is that if the leader had the same mentality, would the company stay in a prosperous condition to hire you?

It is an employee's duty to report such managers who fail in managing the employees well.

Conclusion:

It is very common to commit mistakes. No one expects you to be perfect in your work. Each mistake either teaches you something new or makes you realize something you're doing wrong.

Valuable experience cannot be achieved without committing a lot of mistakes.

Hence, don't feel demotivated. Keep progressing.