If you’ll be starting a new job soon, you’re likely feeling both excited and a bit nervous. While it can be fun to have a new challenge and see what opportunities a new career will afford you, it can also be intimidating to start over somewhere new, both professionally and personally. Luckily, there are some things that you can do to help make this transition a little easier on you and ease some of the tension that you might be feeling.
To help you in doing both of these things, here are three tips to make you more comfortable when starting a new job.
Demystify Your Coworkers
When you’re new to something, it can often seem like you will never reach the same point as people who have more experience than you. This can especially be the case as you’re trying to learn the ropes at a new job. But if you’re able to demystify some of your coworkers, you may find it easier to ask for help and ensure that you’re well on your way to mastering all of the skills and tools that you’ll need to be successful at your new job.
To do this, try to remember that your coworkers were once new to this job, too. In fact, they might have had it harder when they first started than you do now, especially if the company has grown a lot in recent years. So if things around your office are physically comfortable, like you have your own work space and the air conditioning can handle the heat load of your building, just know that the work you’re doing will soon be just as comfortable to you as it is for your more experienced coworkers.
Learn From Their Experience
Once you feel yourself being less intimidated by your more experienced coworkers, you should seek to find ways that you can learn from their experience and get yourself ahead of the game.
If you’re able to shadow someone else or are given someone to serve as a mentor for you, make sure you take full advantage of this person and their knowledge. Try to schedule meetings with them where you can ask all of your questions and download some of what they know and do into your procedures. If this isn’t a possibility for you, you can still learn from your coworkers by watching them and seeing how they handle certain tasks or problems that you’re both bound to experience.
Try Viewing Things Hopefully
Although there will be stress when you’re starting a new job, something that can be helpful is to try to view every new thing in a hopeful light rather than in a negative light. If you can learn to look at things with a “glass half full” perspective and try to be positive even in the face of uncertainty and challenges, you could find that your transition to a new job gets much easier to manage.
If you want to be more comfortable as you start your new job, consider implementing some of the tips mentioned above.
