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Old 03-10-2014, 02:06 PM
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Default i second this

best advice you can get


Quote:
Originally Posted by QXP View Post
I am a line manager and have experience managing several large teams before and have seen a couple of cases like you before.

As I see it, most likely you are having the issue is because you are typical exam smart (which explains your NUS degree) but little experience or competency beyond that. You are now venturing outside your comfort zone and basically your mind is still in a type of brain freeze trying to adapt and comprehend what the heck is going on.

In the working world, you have to play politics, manage customers, manage internal colleagues and all this manifest in the way you write email (eg who to CC who to BCC), how should you write your report, how to angle the thing to look bad to A and look good to B in order to promote you / your boss interest etc.

Some things you need to say it at the right place at the right time to the right people etc, otherwise nothing seems to get done. You are still figuring out how to do that. In terms of analytics and language skills, I assume you should have them since your studies should be good to get into NUS.

My advice for you is first thing calm down, listen more, observe more and talk and think less. You are in the jungle and you must spend the next few months knowing your surroundings first. Don't think of career progression, impressing people or even "doing the job well", all these are secondary. You must discern the actual landscape in the office first before you can figure out how the game is played.

The good thing is so far, your boss and colleagues are not nasty and remain professional. But a lot of times when you gain experience, you will realise things are not as simple as it looks on the surface. The smiling and ever helpful colleague could be the most dangerous one.

Make use of this good luck of a good office environment to spend a few months to observe what's going on - usually there is an undercurrent on how the game is played, don't do anything silly until you figure out who is powerful, who is not, who is really good, who is not, who is your ally or enemy, and how to work with all of them to get things done. Some will call this playing cynical politics, but in real life this is the way to survive, compete and climb the corporate ladder.
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