Your Problem is My Problem
My longest job was 4 years, 1 month in Manila and it was a crazy amount of fun but also a crazy amount of stress. And honestly, i think most jobs are like this. But I always felt really grateful for that job because I made so many friends whom I now consider my closest pals.
When I moved to Singapore 5 years ago with no job prospects, I didn’t know what the future would hold. But this past month, I passed the four year mark at my current job and I couldn’t be more grateful. Not only because jobs in this climate are always on edge, but because I honestly can’t believe I lasted this long.
It took me a while to warm up in the company. My first year, I spent in a team that was assigned to help out country teams in their day-to-day marketing operations and that meant flying to Jakarta week-in and week-out! Travel! A concept! I definitely wasn’t the happiest camper but in hindsight, it was pretty amazing an experience. Sure, I also got sick (i.e. deaf in one ear cause the congestion never went away and I got something called otitis media — don’t google it, it looks gross!) and that had to end, but that’s another thing to be grateful for.
I did want to remain with the company and continue to work with my team but the job was pretty much a traveling role (at that time) and if I couldn’t travel, then what? I was definitely grateful that the CMO and my boss found me a place in another team (less travel!) in a slightly different role — tooling for marketers (and more!) And i’ve been there ever since.
The company has a bunch of values that we’ve had throughout the years but ‘your problem is my problem’ has been my favorite one just yet — even if we’ve sort of retired it. I still remember when people would really huddle together to get shit done — regardless of what team you were on or what you had to do.
It’s been a crazy four years in this team, seeing it grow, contract, grow some more and it’s pretty nuts to see what we’ve accomplished quarter on quarter. So many tough times, rolling out new tools and deprecating old tools for hundreds of stakeholders is no joke — especially in the middle of a house move, but somehow we’ve survived. In the moment, I always feel like throwing up and there’s definitely a bout of tears to go with it (it’s normal, I cry really easily). But somehow I’m still having fun.
It also helps to have a really amazing boss. I can’t stress this enough. I don’t think he’ll ever read this (and goodness if you’ve found this, well here you are) but I do feel incredibly lucky to be in a team that really is encouraging and with zero politics and just very supportive. Fingers crossed I can keep adding value and pushing the team forward. Here’s to the last four years. It’s been a wild ride.
