Since the starting of my career in 2012, till Dec 29th 2021, I worked with startups. Initially I was with Grey Technolabs for six months, then seven years with my own firm Neo Green Labs, then two years with DFM Softech Solutions. The manpower of all these were below 25 and we worked there or I can say, we lived there like a family. Convenient working hours, complete decision power and ownership, full responsibility, close personal relations with colleagues were some of the startup life benefits. For me, what I enjoyed most in my past nine years of startup life was the close personal relationship. The positive thing was the complete transparency between the whole team on the work, not just on work, but personal things as well. We used to discuss everyone’s happiness, professional and personal problems, regular team outings and lots of food.
By 2022, after nine years of startup life, I started my corporate career. While joining, my biggest concern was How will be the corporate culture. Some of my friends warned, this cultural shift will be difficult forme. But, as a person who take everything from a positive perspective, I looked this as a big learning opportunity. Fortunately, our program management team is superb and very supportive. And this is the first place in my career, where I am getting a manager, or a team, to whom I can request help to take decisions and expert opinion before doing a confusing task. Previously, for these nine years, I was a decision maker, may be the final was mine. I enjoyed that, but there were lot of times when I felt like, if there were somebody to guide me for deciding this… So, now, after almost two months here, at the beginning of my corporate life, I must say, I am totally happy, lot of learnings, lot of new things. All the people around me have more experience and knowledge than me and I am seeing an immense learning opportunity.
But, one thing I am missing is the strong personal relations, the long conversations, the food 🙁 As a person who love talking to people, hearing their experiences and learn from them, I talked to maximum people here. Right from the people who keep us safe, the people who prepare food, the people who keep our workplace clean, all the colleagues, seniors and all. Now I have one project and is now in good sync with the teammates. I am describing a small mistake happened today, but it taught me few important lessons of professionalism.
I must say, Since the first day, I was and am very careful while talking or writing mails or taking decisions, because I know the culture is totally different. And till 24th feb 2022, haven’t encountered a mistake. But today it happened.
We were facing a serious problem and was behind that for few days. Today we solved it somehow and I got an immense relief. After this, some of the team members were having a conversation. I was in a happy mood after we solved the confusing problem, and totally forget that where I am. So to some of the casual discussion between the team, I replied to my teammate, This is what I was telling to you , dash mahan!
Right after the dialogue delivery I understood my mistake, I was like damn, I shouldn’t call him that. I also noticed that the teammate (infact he was a senior guy) felt it bad, but he haven’t showed it. Then the conversation continued and I returned to my seat. I was thinking, I must talk to him, may be in evening, but to be honest, I was confused.
After the tea, he called me over phone and made sure that I was not busy with other things and I am not between anyone. Then he politely told me that I must no talk like this inside office. I immediately said sorry and told, It was my mistake and I was about to meet you after the office. And that completed, perfectly.
I felt really happy, and felt lot of respect to that person. The way he dealt, it was appreciable. He called me personally, made sure I am alone and explained the thing. He haven’t said anything which hurt me, but he conveyed the message.
Lesson learnt
- How much close you are with your colleague, keep professional language at office
- If you have a problem with a particular person, talk to them personally, make sure that others wont hear it and solve the problem immediately. Do not allow it to grow and explode one day. Patch up with people immediately.
- Accept your mistakes. Never try to defend your mistake, accept it, people can understand it. Human make mistakes. (but won’t repeat the same mistakes).