motivation – Andrea Huang

July 30, 2017July 30, 2017

Departure: How to Leave Gracefully

Monday, July 31st will mark my final day at my very first full-time job as a legal clerk.

Leaving is never easy, even when it is on your own terms. I love(d) my job at this law firm I’ve devoted the past two years of my life to. This particular job has given me so many life lessons including (but not limited to) how to multi-task, be self-sufficient, and prioritize; how to communicate effectively with coworkers and with clients that have debilitating mental/physical impairments trapped horrible situations like homelessness or living with a terminal diagnosis. I also developed a higher appreciation for TV shows like “The Office” & “Parks & Recreation” realizing office archetypes do exist in real-life (lol.)

Let’s be real– not many people stay at their very first job for the rest of their life, or their second, or even their third. Only the lucky ones do. It is only natural for someone to accept a better opportunity in their lifetime and move on. Sometimes people don’t even have the luxury of departing on their own terms and have to leave because of other external circumstances. Departure is simply unavoidable at times and the five stages of grief may be experienced by you, and your workplace. When facing departure, people often fall between two sides of a spectrum– anticipating the departure, or making the best of it.

In this blog, I will be speaking about my own personal experience which not everyone may agree with, but I believe is a right thing to do.

Anticipating the departure, in my opinion, is what most people default to. You’re excited to get out of your current job and move onto the next. You absolutely cannot wait because maybe your new job offers a lot of things your old job couldn’t satisfy. It could be more pay, more responsibility, or simply embody more personal interest. The downside of this mentality is that people most often “give up” or “stop caring” about their current job and scrape on by with minimal effort until their last day because what are they going to do? Fire you? You’re leaving anyway, who cares! There is nothing wrong with this mentality since I’ve stated before most people default to this. It is natural to just let go and make your old job responsibility your successor’s problem.

The issue with this way of thinking applies to the 80/20 rule or Pareto principle. Most people are familiar with the 80/20 rule as it applies to business/economics which states 80% of your outcomes comes from 20% of your input. As in 20% of product/hard work accounts for 80% of your financial gain. However, this blog isn’t about business or economics– it’s about personal life choices. Here’s how the pareto principle may apply to “anticipating departure”:

Perhaps you were initially unsatisfied with your current position which motivated you into finding a new opportunity in the first place. You were 80% satisfied with your current position but for some reason, the 20% of what you lacked shifted your priorities and motivation one day. So you began seeking the missing 20% in the form of a new job opportunity (i.e. pay, self-interest, etc.) Maybe this next opportunity is absolutely perfect and end up being your forever-job. That would be the absolute best case scenario. However, as with all unknowns– there’s a 50/50 chance that it might not be since nobody is a fortune teller. The 80/20 rule is a double-edged sword in the sense that what you gain from the 20% you initially seeked, you are now lacking in the 80% job satisfaction that you had with your previous job. That would be the absolute worst case scenario. (Click here to read “Change & How to Embrace it” where I mention evaluating best/worst case scenarios for new situations.)

It is no secret that I think too much and why I’m such an excellent tetris and chess player. I am constantly planning 10 steps ahead for every move I make because I’m a crazy person. Fun fact: my AIM username back in the day was ObsessiveFreak89 and I have been obsessively planning my life since the age of 5. Every plan has a back-up plan, and every back-up plan has a back-up, back-up plan. It is the sole reason I never burn bridges, I just temporarily close them. Always. This is a lesson I learned from working in entertainment because you just NEVER KNOW who you will run into and be working with next so, might as well always do your best so no one has a reason to hate you.

I chose to make the best of my departure.

I gave my job two months notice rather than a two week notice knowing full well that my job is very specialized, highly technical, and meticulous. It wasn’t like I was moving across the street, I am moving across the world so I felt a well-deserved heads up was warranted so they could find a suitable candidate to take over my position. I worked ahead so that the workflow for my successor would be light, giving them time to adjust and learn the job. (Three months to be exact…I mentioned I was a crazy person, right?!) I do law stuff so it’s downright next to impossible to get everything correct in a day (or two weeks) no matter how smart you are– that’s just reality. I created a detailed instruction manual with screenshots because I literally have four bosses/supervisors that all do things differently and it would be difficult for anyone to keep up with their individual wants/needs especially with two of them working remotely in another city. I came in early to double check my replacement’s work done the day before and reviewed any mistakes I caught with them once they came in, using that time to answer any questions they may have had. I also stayed late to finish any work my supervisors only entrusted to me because of its level of difficulty.

The best advice I ever received was to not worry about things I have absolutely no control over, so I recognized everything I did have control over, and tried to make things better and easier all in the interest of the company, unprompted.

Of course, I prefaced this blog by saying I’m speaking from my own personal experience that everyone may not agree with. I’d be lying if I said I wasn’t stressing myself out with superfluous work during my last days in the office. Even still, I genuinely believe that this is the right thing to do if you want to leave gracefully. I’ve made jokes around the office that I might return from Taiwan wearing nothing but rags and soot all over my face groaning, “Please take me back…”— because anything is possible. I don’t know what will happen in the next stage of my life, but either way I’m excited! I made the best of my departure by making leaving on good terms my priority. This is in no way a #humblebrag though some may see it as such– I’ve been doing this with every single job I’ve had to leave in the past and I always heard the same thing from co-workers, “You’re leaving! Who cares!”

I care. Too much, sometimes. I wished others did as well because honestly, it is just good practice/great work ethic. Not only will you leave your company in good shape, you will have many people within the organization willing to vouch for your good work and want to be listed as a reference. Even without the potential of references, it should give you a peace of mind knowing you did all you could to do something good, especially if you were an integral part of the organization. The world is a small place, so make good where you can!

As long as you continually to do your best, you’ll never fail. Even if it doesn’t work out, always depart gracefully.

July 25, 2017July 30, 2017

The Upside of Being Told ‘No.’

There are two main types of people in the world. People who get discouraged from being told “no” and people who become motivated from being told “no.”

I am the latter, and I have been since I was a child. I have been performing since I was very young. I was in competitive gymnastics and dance; was learning music and acting; and went to Saturday school for mathematics and Mandarin Chinese. Being a small child involved in too many things, raised in an immigrant household with parents born in the 1950s– you bet your bottom I was being told “no” a lot. I learned early on that “no” was discipline. “No” meant that I was doing something wrong– that there was still something left to learn and improve on. It didn’t mean I was worthless, stupid or incapable of improving. “No” to me, meant I am supposed to know better, do better, be better.

When I attended graduate school for administration with a focus on nonprofit organizations, I learned that it is much easier to turn a “no” to a “yes” than a “yes” to a “no.” So it is no wonder why “no” is a more frequent answer in everyday life than “yes.” It is for that very reason that I never take “no” personally, or as a definitive answer. A person who says “no” to me today, can say “yes” to me a different day. This is truth especially in theatre. I’ve left countless auditions with a no, but greeted with a yes from the same director for a different, more suitable opportunity.

When I completed graduate school I spent approximately 5-months stuck in a postgraduate depression. No one ever told me that postgraduate depression was a thing. It was something that consumed me and I had to discover and understand on my own, completely blind. My graduate program had set me up with a lot of real-life hands-on experience that I wouldn’t have ever obtained on my own like creating a cultural food program literally from the ground up called “Taste of Taiwan” for Asia Society Texas Center with money granted from Taiwan Economic and Cultural Office. I assisted the rebranding and transition of leadership at Queensbury Theatre, formerly known as Country Playhouse, implementing a strategic social media marketing plan which more than doubled their online presence by the time my internship was over. Real, nitty gritty groundwork that resulted in legitimate success and fruitfulness which wouldn’t have happened if it wasn’t for my hard work and my passion to succeed– to surpass all the “no” that has thrown in my way throughout my lifetime. Still, after graduate school I began feeling like a small worker ant. Who cares if I did any of that? Did any of it even matter? I had been called the “poster child” of my graduate program– an overachiever who had been fortunate enough to never know failure. In the end, it all amounted to nothing.

After graduate school, I worked a thankless job in press media making $12 an hour with only 12 hours a week. Within that limited amount of time per week, I had to come up with three articles and a comprehensive list of events. No really, I had to come up with at least 150 new things to do around the city every single week. Did I mention I was also an editor? I drowned more than I swam. I needed an out without going back to retail and food. I refused to go back to those types of minimum wage jobs with a master’s degree even though I technically made more money waiting tables than I did being an editor. I finally landed an interview with a Fortune 500 company.

This was it. This was the place I wanted to be. A social media marketing manager for a company that made a computer software aimed for people who wanted to get into real estate. A baby company that had just started less than 5 years ago at the time. They were focused, on the road of success– and I was convinced I was going to get it. I landed the initial interview, and passed the second round which tested my skills in HTML/CSS; writing marketing blog posts; and email campaigns that will bypass spam filters. (Since we were selling something, email servers automatically sort that stuff out because of keywords used. I had a brief stint working for a third-party contracted by Google so I was already too aware of these things– but, I digress.) I passed the second round and found myself going to the third and final round of the interview. If I pass this, I got the job, I thought to myself over and over again on my way over to their office location. I got to meet the CEO of the company who was pretty young, probably in his mid-to-late thirties. The interview went swimmingly until he asked me– “Why should I hire you? You’re fresh out of graduate school with no real-world experience.” I froze and stumbled around for an answer. I had “real-world” experience from my graduate program but, the CEO would have none of it. He didn’t care about my brief stints here and there coordinated by my university– that was something I had to do to graduate, not something I accomplished on my own accord. He didn’t care about the marketing strategies and theories I knew because he knew the real results– the advantages and disadvantages of everything from doing it all in real life. How do I compare? What have I contributed to the world outside of what I’ve done in school? I word vomited all over his desk afraid that if I gave the impression of being hesitant or naive, it’d surely end me and the interview.

You just need to take a leap of faith. There’s nothing I can’t do that I put my mind to. I always want to improve, to be efficient, and the best. I’m an overachiever, and there’s no obstacle I cannot overcome.

Ageism is a real thing in this world and there’s nothing to combat it. To this day, I don’t know the “correct” answer to a question regarding lack of real-world experience. This is exactly why postgraduate depression is so real and such a heavy burden. When a student graduates, they are often in debt because of student loans with no “real-world experience” to help them land a decent job to pay the loans off. They start questioning themselves, their ability, even their intelligence. Even after spending thousands of dollars on a fancy piece of paper that says they know something, people too frequently disregard it anyway! I never got that job…they opted for someone with more experience (predictably, so). However, around the same time I got another gig working a play for a theatre company.

Theatre is humbling work. I could never make a living off of it unless I devoted my entire soul into it– and even then, I might not ever make it. A typical non-equity theatre job pays around $600 for three months of work, so you really have to love it to not mind the low pay. I’ve accepted it a long time ago. Theatre is not my hobby and I get offended when people try to say it is such. It is my life-long passion and my one true love. It is the only thing that makes me genuinely happy. It was through this theatre gig as a random crew member, changing the set in-between scenes for a show, that eventually led to my first full-time job as a legal clerk at a law firm for the next two years. I was referred by an actor– whose day job was a paralegal and his company needed a VERY immediate replacement. I dropped everything, applied, and pretty much quit my job as a part-time editor as soon as I was hired on.

“No” isn’t the end of the world. Often times, it leads to something better. If a potential employer/partner is not willing to take a “leap of faith” on you, take a leap of faith on life and realize maybe God has other plans for you. Maybe you were meant for something else, something greater. Maybe this “no” is diverting your path to somewhere else– somewhere you were destined to go, with more happiness and self-fulfillment than you could ever imagine on the other side. Even though I didn’t get hired at the Fortune 500 company, I feel like I wouldn’t have enjoyed it as much as I ended up enjoying my full-time job as a legal clerk. I would’ve been making more money, but I would’ve been essentially a salesperson rather than doing what I really love to do (which is helping people; hence, studying nonprofit.) Though being a legal clerk still had nothing to do with the many years I devoted to studying theatre for my higher education, it still managed to lead me back to my true passion in the form of a job opportunity– becoming an English/Theatre professor at a university in Taiwan. I definitely would have never received such an offer had I not sacrificed a couple of years getting some “real-world experience.”

Combat every “no” you get in life with a “yes” of your own because YES, you can make the best out of every single situation. Every “no” brings in an opportunity to show the declining party that they were wrong about you, that it was a mistake to pass you up, that you are more brilliant than anyone could ever anticipate. Remember that it is easier to change a “no” to a “yes” than it is to change a “yes” to a “no.” “No” is NOT and will NEVER be a definitive answer. Never get discouraged by a “no”. Always become motivated, stay focused, and show the world your worth.

Go out knowing better, doing better, being better.

July 17, 2017July 30, 2017

Change & How to Embrace It

Change can be a scary thing. The fear of the unknown, the uncontrollable, can render a person into a sheer ball of anxiety dipped in depression wrapped up in a fragile foil of insecurity, self-doubt, with the overweighing sense of isolation. I know this feeling all too well– having experienced it before.

In 2002 in the middle of my 7th grade school year, I learned that I had to leave the only home I knew in Fort Worth, Texas to Beijing, China. If moving wasn’t hard enough, I was about to make my first move by leaping over the Pacific Ocean into another country, another world– a world I never knew or had a taste of. A country with a completely different type of government. A country that embodied a completely different culture, spoke a different language. Though I was fortunate enough to be raised bilingual in Mandarin Chinese, I had always identified as an all-American gal. I was scared. I recall crying myself to sleep every night for the next three months. I would get publicly upset when my father would bring up his big promotion at going-away dinner parties– my father has always been popular, so there was more than one dinner party I’d burst into tears and pretty much ruined the vibe. (Whoops, I was a child. What’d you expect?) Then, the time finally came.

I remember sitting on the airplane en route to my new home on the other side of the world, past the prime meridian and into the “future”. There was no turning back– so finally I began a list of things I wanted to achieve as a 12 year-old entering a brand new world. Though I no longer have the list with me, I recall writing it on a napkin that came with the peanuts and beverages. I wanted to be more kind and have more friends because I was very unpopular in my Texan middle school. I wanted to be more outgoing, since I always defaulted on being shy and quiet. I pretty much wanted to be everything I wasn’t in Texas– and this was my one and only chance to.

Change can be a scary thing– but it is inevitable. In order for there to be growth, you must welcome change. And while my first major change in my life (moving to China) was borderline TRAUMATIZING…I’ve since become addicted to it. Looking back, the life I lived in China is one of the most invaluable experiences of my life. College, graduate school, “real world” adulting I’ve experienced since China– still doesn’t compare to my life during 2002-2008. And, just because I don’t live in China anymore doesn’t mean there aren’t more adventures in life left to take. How will I ever know my next best experience if I never welcomed change?

The static, predictable, and safe lifestyle has become boring for me. And maybe that’s why I have always been drawn to theatre. Who will I play next? What will I learn, do, and see next? Theatre/Acting is driven by the unknown. Will I land this audition? Will I sink or swim? What will the reviews/audiences say specifically about me? You never know. So here are my tips and tricks on how to face change and embrace it.

1. What’s the worst thing that could happen?

This applies to any situation. What’s the absolute WORST THING that could happen? Think about it. Write it down. Feel it out. Put your anxieties on paper and REALIZE IT. It’s okay.

If you’re going to an interview for your dream job, what’s the worst logical thing that could happen? They say no. Interviewers laugh at you.

If you’re moving to a new place, a place you’ve never been before — what’s the worst thing that could happen? You don’t make any friends. You lose your job (or can’t find a job!). You wind up homeless.

2. What are you going to do about it?

The best advice my father has ever given me in my entire lifetime is: Don’t worry about things you have ABSOLUTELY no control over.

If you interview for your dream job– they say no and laugh at you on your way out, can you control that? NO. So, what can you control?

You can control how conduct yourself at the next interview for a similar opportunity– figure out what you could do better next time, how to strengthen your credentials. You can control how much harder you keep looking for that special, amazing opportunity. If you can find it once, you can find it again. That is in YOUR control!

You’re moving to a new place you’ve never been before and you don’t have any friends, can’t find a job, and you’re stranded and couch surfing– what can you control?

You can control how much social events you go to and how much effort you put into trying to make friends– all of your friends at one moment in your life was a COMPLETE STRANGER! Go out, have fun, even if you don’t feel like it. You only get in return what you put out in the universe (true story). Can’t find a job? Keep grinding and looking! The reality most people struggle with is no matter how great you are, how smart you are, how CAPABLE you are– the world owes you nothing. So don’t expect the perfect opportunity is going to fall right in your lap! Again, you only get in return what you put out. Keep applying for jobs even if they are “stupid”. [I worked 10 years in retail and food– I KNOW WHAT IT’S LIKE! TRUST ME.] Something is better than nothing. Legit homeless? Go home. Your original home. Somewhere where you have people that will love and support you while you get back on your feet. I’ve known plenty of people who moved great distance away because of an opportunity then all of a sudden– their job doesn’t work out and they can’t find anything better. They find themselves unexpectedly going back to where they started. There’s always a place you call home. Go back to it. There is no shame in that; there is only the shame that comes with never trying. You are ALWAYS in control of your situation. In life, you can only count on yourself. Your parents will pass, your siblings may move, your spouse may pass/leave, friends are constantly coming and going. The only constant relationship you have from birth to death is the relationship you have with yourself. So look out for yourself, never let pride get in the way. There is no such thing as failure.

3. What’s the BEST that could happen?

Alright, pessimism and cynicism aside– let’s focus on the positives. Figure out what are the best things that could happen. Write it down. Rewire your brain to LOOK FORWARD to these things. Moving to a new place/starting a new job is exciting!! You get to reinvent yourself!! You get to learn something new!! You’ll meet new friends, discover new interests, gain new experiences. YAAAS!! After realizing your worries, combat it with something positive– something to look forward to. It’s all about the state of mind. Were you unpopular? A subaverage worker? NOT ANYMORE!! You, in whatever type of change you’re facing in life, have a rare opportunity to reinvent yourself, better yourself, transform yourself. So WERK IT!!! DO YOU, BOO-BOO!!! WEL-COME-DAT-CHANGE!!!

When all else fails, and you feel like it’s just you against the world…I’m here for you and I have enough belief that you can make the best of your impending change. Don’t believe me? Comment down below and tell me your story. Let’s be friends.