I never really thought of myself as one who craved direction. Fairly independent, I have gone through my college years and these early years of post-school adulthood more and more aware of the fact that I dislike authority.
So one would think that getting a job that seems to lack a strong leadership team would be just the place for a person who dislikes authority to thrive. I will say, it is quite exhilarating to make quick decisions, have the freedom to speak up, and have the cajones necessary to run with an idea and pitch it to your boss, quite certain that though his self-assured, overly inflated ego may prevent him from immediately seeing the merit in your idea, soon enough you will be able to revel in the irony of him eventually saying the exact words that you so discretely fed to him just weeks before.
In truth, it’s an empty kind of thriving.
Yes, I have fodder for my portfolio, for the moment I eventually get out. Yes, I am developing important life skills (i.e., learning how to not throw yourself on the floor in the middle of a meeting out of pure frustration). And perhaps most importantly, yes, I have collected another “certificate” (i.e. documented proof that I can hold a job down). However, it’s hard to go to a job where every day, you learn more and more ways in which your organization sells fluff, not hard benefits. At least not benefits that are immediately apparent to the average Josette.
Maybe it’s the millennial in me, hoping to find validation, desperately wanting to believe that the place I was picked to perform a job is actually doing something to make the world a better place, legitimately.
Maybe it has nothing to do with being a millennial and places of employ shouldn’t be skeevy. Or maybe I am asking too much and expecting that much more from the human race as a whole. And maybe, that is the problem.
Expecting too much of those that are just as human and prone to mistake as I.
As I’ve grown up and become an adult, I’ve realized that those older than me aren’t necessarily less lost than me. And while age isn’t necessarily an indicator of knowledge, it can be a good indicator of how jaded one is.
What age does get you is the experience and the skill set that comes with it. Through countless misfortunes and mistakes, one is able to sniff out a bad deal or opportunity like a trained truffle pig. One knows the questions to ask to avoid certain pitfalls. But in becoming masters of deception, those with less experience are easy targets, lambs to the slaughter.
For while a seasoned professional knows that the best mentorship advice may very well come from a book, a study or a highly vetted person, a young buck will get lost looking for the north star in the middle of an airplane-crowded airspace.
Caia Rose 