There’s a joke about the term “years of experience”. The joke comes from people complaining that their coworker is someone with 10 years of experience but is actually someone that has repeated their 1 year of experience, ten times. I actually worked with someone like this.
During my summer break, I worked at an optometry office and joined a staff of 3 people: Dr. Dao, and her two receptionists, Julia and Luke. Julia had been working there for over 2 years and she’s an essential member of the office. Luke had been working there for a year and he’s a college freshman majoring in accounting. I notice that young Luke avoids all communication from patients, even if they are talking to him. He pretends to not hear them and stares at his computer. Actually, all his tasks involve tasks that involve no communication with patients such as scanning in charts, generating fee slips and ordering contacts. I’ve been told he’s been like this for months. Dr. Dao has tried to get Luke to answer phone calls but he refuses. All Luke wants is a quiet desk job and that’s why he’s studying accounting. Dr. Dao is reluctant to train Luke because she’s friends with his parents. She doesn’t want to parent Luke so she just gives him simple tasks like shredding medical documents. But for me, I had to learn everything under Julia’s training. I eventually learn the job well enough so that she can finally take days off without worrying about Dr. Dao.
Looking back at my summer job, I am a lot wiser and would’ve been frustrated if I had to train a junior employee like Luke. Currently I am looking for a junior developer job and I read about what senior engineers observe about their juniors:
- The speed and quality of their work.
- How fast they’re learning and improving.
- Soft skills such as how they react to feedback, and how well they work with team members.
- Size of tasks to be trusted with.
- How do they get unstuck? Do they ask for help when they get blocked?
This list pretty much applies to all jobs. We all start off as newbies. It is just that the right mindset and the willingness to struggle determines whether someone can grow into an experienced mentor or stagnate by repeating 1 year of experience, ten times. I hope Luke realizes that accountants have a very social job.
