It was late 2010, November or December. Probably December, because I remember it being a slightly longer break. Also a holiday, because my parents were at home.
I was sleeping away a warm Pondicherry afternoon, having just arrived from university in Coimbatore on one of those long route buses. Back broken, eyes red, tired beyond belief, I must have conked right off, oblivious to everything, the kind of half-dead sleep only a 23 year old is capable of.
It was evening when I woke up, to several missed calls on my phone. From university, a couple of my professors, and my ex, who a couple of months ago had ended a year-long relationship. I called her back first, and she told me the news: The company which had interviewed me a few weeks before had just announced their results. My name was there.
I had a job. My first.
I remember thinking I was glad it was her who told me, but not telling her that. I thanked her and hung up, called my professors, the placement office, and then came out of my room to tell my parents.
It was a good day at home. My much-smarter younger sister had news to share too. Her offer letter from TCS had come through. We both landed our first jobs on the same day.
But it wasn’t just that. We were also being asked to join on the same day, she for training somewhere in Kerala, and me at the company’s head offices in Hyderabad. I remember this only because it was on my sister’s birthday. April 10.
10 years ago today.
On April 10, 2011, I’d put on a shirt in a hotel room, made myself presentable, and gone out to an office.
Barring a break in 2015-16, I have been continuously employed since then.
I quit that first job pretty soon, bored and disillusioned. I had learnt nothing, had no real skills, and had no idea what I was going to do. But I was a plucky fellow, more interested in having fun than in a career. Knowing that the job was a dead-end, I was enjoying my time in Hyderabad. I walked the old city, had Irani chai, sumptuous biryanis, and amazing faloodas. I found out and frequented the most seedy Hyderabad bars. I also befriended the ticket counter dude at the Banjara Hills Cinemax (it’s a PVR now, I think), who gave me free tickets to Thursday night pre-release shows. I watched everything, including Telugu movies I could understand only partly (Allu Arjun’s Badrinath was terrible, 100% Love was watchable, the song of the season was Prema Kavali’s Manasantha Mukkalu Chesi).
In October that year, I returned home, unsure of what to do, when I was recruited by a rather tall man who had read my blog and told me he’d pay me to write. The offices were two rooms behind a protestant church in a faraway Madras suburb.
I took the job.
What does working for 10 years teach you?
I don’t know if I’m the right person to answer this question. I’m interested in too many things beside marketing, I nurture other ambitions, I also feel that we make too much of this work/career thing. The world has changed.
As someone said on Twitter the other day, the point is not to have money, the point is to get up and be able to do what you want.
But again, working so long does teach you a few things. I don’t mean this as advice, I mostly intend for this to be a record of my thinking. If it helps younger people, I’m only glad.
Play the long game.
Give time to roles, to people, and to your workplace. It’s never as bad as you think, and never as good as you think either. The longer you give something, the better you’ll get at it. The better you’ll get at something, the more confident you’ll become. And confidence breeds success. I did not do this well, I hope you don’t make this mistake.
Enjoy the good runs.
Work is tough. There’s a reason we go to work 5 days a week - to accomplish ambitious things. This takes time and effort and luck. And sometimes, sometimes everything goes well. You find good colleagues, great bosses, and you are good at what you do. These runs are rare. When you have them, enjoy them. Because good things end.
You need to be successful only once.
To gain a reputation, and the confidence to be able to repeat great performance, you need to be successful only once. Do a good job at something, that rep will follow you, take you places. And if it has not happened yet, it’s fine, keep at it. I had two: I was early at Freshworks, did some good work, and had a great leadership run at Wingify. Everything that followed was because of these two successes. Find yours, and let them compound.
Recharge when you can.
I took a break in 2015-16 to work on a book. I haven’t worked on it for a while, and will get to it in time. But that time I spent with myself and in the company of things I loved most refreshed me. My two best work years came right after. As knowledge workers, your brain is your resource. Give it rest, stimulation, and time off.
Don’t get too comfortable.
When you feel that everything is perfect at work, and you feel like you are coasting, sit up and take stock. See where you are leaving gaps, fill them, become more ambitious. I was guilty of doing this, taking it easy. Don’t do this. As marketers, our work is never over. A friend told me yesterday that marketing is never overdone. I agree.
Would 23 year old me have been happy with what I am at 33? I wish the answer was ambiguous. But it’s not. He would have been.
Sometimes we forget that that’s the only measure that really matters.
There’s a bunch of people to thank.
My professor of marketing, Dr Deepak Gupta, Deepak sir to us. He took a lazy, uninterested boy and with encouragement and support, made him dream. My professor of communication, Dr Shobhana Madhavan, Shobhana ma’am to us, for pulling a wayward boy up when no one else would.
Girish, for giving me everything I have today, and for teaching me, among so many other things, kindness and generosity.
Avinash, for selfless friendship and constant support, even when I doubted myself. I wouldn’t be half the professional I am without you.
To my parents, of course.
To the lady, who tolerates me.
And lastly, the campus beneath the elephant mountain, where the morning mist first told me that I could be someone.