wash your hands clean on yourself baby and step down, step down, step down (from your massive ego)

I was hanging out with friends last night in BHS when one friend suddenly asked me what it is exactly that i do in the office, or more particularly if i am the one doing all the clerical work in my office. My time momentarily stopped for 5 seconds - trying to figure out whether to get insulted or not - before i was able to say no, being an analyst does not qualify as a clerical job. Given my friend's propensity for asking naive questions, it should not have come as a surprise at all.

But thinking about it now, i realized that - yes, being new in this kind of job, i really should just be doing clerical work for all the other analysts, for me to have a proper transition and to achieve the normal learning curve needed for me to function effectively in my new job. Heck, at my pace and lack of understanding right now, it would have been a much better idea if they demoted me when they convinced me to cross-post.

The problem is that i have always chosen shortcuts into my career. Yes, it benefited me. But i had readily given up all the learnings that i could have had, had i chosen to follow the normal path. I was a fledgeling when i left SGV because i had been offered a better post and a better salary somewhere else, without considering the fact that i was distorting the statistical average of employees' length of stay in that particular firm. Not that it mattered then, because where i transferred, the job charter and responsibilites were totally different and i was able to effortlessly settle in. I had thought that this would always be the case.

This time though, i had to accept that the graphical representation of my learning progress would follow the normal curve only if i extend tremendous effort. But at my normal pace, it would be flat - which is unacceptable. And the prospect of me excelling in my new job is as bleak as my hopes for a promotion next year.

I wish i had the foresight and patience to waste time learning more during the past two years, even those that i didn't need to use in my job then or stayed longer in external audit for me to have the proficiency at juggling numbers and looking at and analyzing financial statements. Instead of having a crash course on everything, when i should be effectively executing my functions right now. (Instead of having to think about my own incompetence day and night and rattling on about it here).

But in hindsight, maybe i didn't do such a bad job in deciding to fast track my career. I know a lot of people who are still stuck where they were three or four years back, simply because they were too scared to say yes to the challenge of walking out of the unfamiliar and ordinary, because they are too scared to fail.

There, i needed to say all that to get me back into my self-righteousness and arrogance.