The pure joy and horror of creating your own job

I am currently living ”a fairytale-come-true”-worklife situation, where I dived in to coolest company and freest culture with a license to create my own job. Hurray, I thought and danced with joy. But then I also realized what a huge responsibility this is. What should I focus on? What are the expectations? What do I even want to do?

So far I generated few guidelines for myself for the following weeks:

DO

• Create a mission for yourself and the main objectives for your efforts. Build your own OKR′s with a timeline for the first half of the year.
• Yes is more. Be open to new ideas and perspectives, because you might be needed somewhere you did not perceive as possibility before. For me, for example, this was design related issues.
• Create learning goals and dedicate some of your time building up your optimal learning curve.
• Have fun and ask. Networking inside the organization is the most essential affair when navigating the landscape of creating your own job, finding projects and steering your focus. Getting in touch with the clients helps you see their point of view and their future demands.

DON′T

• Get confused with all the hurling information and suggestions, and try to be everywhere and everything at the same time.
• Stay too isolated, or inside your own head with your questions and worries. You also need feedback to know are you heading for the right direction.
• Build too much pressure for yourself in the first weeks. Creating profound understanding of your role, needs of the organization and your own motivational sweet spots just takes time.

To support me in this journey towards the best and most meaningful job in my career so far, I have comprehensive understanding of my self (of my values, motivation, strengths and weaknesses) and developed self-reflection skills bolstered by open and future orientated company culture and lots of discussions with different people. What will I eventually learn and achieve here, is yet an unfold mystery to me, but I can definitely say that I am full of joy, enthusiasm (and thrill) while taking the adventure of creating my own job, here in the wonderland of Vincit. To get it right, I need feedback and cross-checking of my ideas and orientation. From my colleagues and our clients. 

Mari Jokiranta, company psychologist

Writer is future minded work and organizational psychologist diving in to the organic organization culture of Vincit (www.vincit.fi). When it comes to developing business and people at the same time, you got her attention and efforts. Mari is part of the Vincit business development operation Redcell on the mission of creating meaningful and successful future for business and individuals.