A netizen asked me worriedly: "I've changed two jobs in two years, and both managers fired me. They said I'm hardworking but learn too slowly and move too slowly. Because I learn slowly, I don't last long in jobs. How can I improve my situation?"
Karen remembered her own naive days at her first part-time job, which takes us back to right after high school graduation when she applied for a position in the food and beverage industry. Back then, her manager described her as a blank slate—so blank you couldn't get any blanker—easy to teach but also not easy to teach.
One day, the manager asked me to sweep the floor in Area A and organize the tables and chairs. So I very obediently swept Area A's floor spotlessly clean, then went downstairs. When the manager came upstairs to check, he ran back down and asked me, "Didn't you see there's trash in Area B?" I said, "Yes, I did!" The manager asked again, "So why didn't you sweep it clean too?" That's when I naively said, "But didn't you only ask me to sweep Area A!?"
The manager was stunned on the spot, knocked his own head and said "You really are a blank slate!" Even now when I think about it, I think to myself, how could I be so dumb!
I shared this example with the netizen who asked the question. I told her, "I think you haven't yet grasped the difference between school and the workplace," because the workplace mostly requires employees to take initiative. It may not be part of your job duties, but if you see something, you can take the initiative to help solve it. Fresh graduates tend to just dutifully complete their assigned tasks, so when other things happen and they don't help out—even with a small thing—the manager might think this employee is rather slow.
Actually, when I answered the netizen this way, I was just making an educated guess about her situation. I first asked her if she personally felt she was moving slowly, and she said no. I also asked if she had worked part-time during university, and she said she only had internship experience, so it didn't count as work experience. For fresh graduates with completely no work experience like her, it's easy not to know whether to help proactively or how to help. This leads managers and colleagues to think she's inefficient, can't be helpful, has no value to utilize—why bother using her?
This netizen then told me that I'd hit the nail on the head: "Because actually I also felt that as long as I did my job well, that was enough. I overlooked that my manager wanted everyone to work as a team." Using her example, I also gave some advice to friends just entering the workplace. When you're a blank slate, you have the privilege of asking questions and pretending not to know, because most people will choose to be tolerant. However, such "naivety" is easily misinterpreted as "passivity" or "inefficiency." Over time, your work attitude, work style, manner, and personality will be stereotyped, which is harmful rather than beneficial to you.
As a fresh graduate, we should be curious and take initiative, but stay within bounds. Show your proactive side so others will be willing to teach you. If you only "follow your own thinking" or "naively complete assigned tasks" without lending a hand when the team needs help, you're the one who loses out.
How to improve and learn? I suggest that students should find more opportunities to work part-time during university, but this part-time work shouldn't be at a small company, and the work content shouldn't just be odd jobs like making tea or cleaning; the industry should be related to the full-time position you want to pursue after graduation. On one hand, you accumulate workplace experience in advance, and on the other hand, you actually observe and experience whether you truly like this job. But don't let part-time work take up most of your time—your studies are still very important.
