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Ask HN: First month job anxiety. Am I actually an impostor?

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Re: Ask HN: First month job anxiety. Am I actually an impostor?

#31
I had this exact issue straight from college into MS. My team was built off a ton of legacy and getting ramped up on all the engineering systems and testing made it take about a month before I could even make a check in. Velocity is very low at the start in my case. I was there to support new engineers who were completely disoriented in the same way. I was able to start working effectively after a few months and my anxiety was coming in an out as i was getting exposed to new engineering systems that required brand new ramp up. On my team I was sensitive to new people getting lost and received lots of favor on my team as we grew.

Don't let it get to weeks where you are not accomplishing anything. Escalate your issues sooner than later, get to know the right engineers so you aren't moving to any individual too many times. Sometimes there are just hard roadblocks and you don't want to get in a position where its been 2 months and you are stuck on something without showing that you have been actively trying to get over it.

If things are really bad, you may consider moving internally to reset your reputation and maybe land on a team where things don't require so much ramp up in order to contribute.

Welcome to FANG.

Re: Ask HN: First month job anxiety. Am I actually an impostor?

#33
Really scattershot opinions

> I’ve also spent maybe a week more than I should have on a fairly simple feature, just from fighting with my tools and trying to figure out where to put a few sparse calls in the codebase.

Automate your tool setup so that you can start from day1 (ok day 2)...

> it doesn’t seem like I have all that much to do.

Spend this time to read as much code as you can, including PRs from your peers.

> Now I have to make meetings, ask people for information, decide that something needs to be done and tell another team to do it, etc.

This is the _really_ valuable space in SEng. An army of offshorers can do programming. Software engineering is when you add people and time. Figure out how to motivate and sell people on ideas, figure out how to recruit allies in initiatives etc.

Re: Ask HN: First month job anxiety. Am I actually an impostor?

#34
Oh man.

I moved to the US to work for Pivotal. I spent my first 6 months thinking: they're going to sack me. They realise they made a mistake. I am useless.

Slowly it faded.

Every once in a while I will be in a situation where I am thrashing. Guess what I start thinking? Right: they're going to sack me. They realise they made a mistake. I am useless.

I've worked on about a dozen products now with various languages, user-facing-ness, technical novelty and so on. Every. Freaking. Time. I join a team I flail and I feel like I'm a drag on all of these brilliant people and that I am going to be fired ...

The difficulty with mental health is that you cannot find an objective yardstick that your emotional self will accept. The brain is just not made that way. It's the ultimate clusterfuck spaghetti code, hacked together over billions of years with multiple competing subsystems that flop into temporary control of things before oozing away again. You are unaware of how totally everything is in your head because the man is behind the curtain and you're paying no attention to him.

This Is The World, the you that thinks it's you thinks. I Have Always Been An Impartial Observer, continues the part of you that is anything but impartial and about as observant as a drunken brick tumbling down a hill.

These are terrible struggles. Anxious me is convinced all the awful things will happen. Depressed me is convinced that none of the good things will ever happen. Feeling-kinda-OK me knows, of course, that everything is going to be fine and wow would you look at that sunset, what a beauty...

The various flavours of my self which seize custody of my life at various times are all equally, totally convinced that they are the keepers of the true truth, that the other truths are false.

It helps to see that you cannot get out of yourself. That's the secret. When you know that you are not a single unitary thing, you get a tiny bit of perspective, a tiny bit of leverage over any of yourselves. You can say to the anxious self: yes, fine, doom and gloom, but for the moment let's just suspend our disbelief. You can say to the depressed self: yes, fine, it's pointless and even breathing is a muffled insult to your suffering, but let's go see the therapist and psychiatrist anyway. Because we've been here before, we'll be here again, and we can manage it.

One last thing: start getting treatment. You aren't alone, anxiety and depression are treatable and seeking treatment is important. Especially since, because you are smart, you will be able to invert anything positive anyone says to you -- other than a seasoned professional who understands the deep dynamics that conceal you from yourself.

Re: Ask HN: First month job anxiety. Am I actually an impostor?

#35

Sounds like you've been set adrift in a canoe without a paddle and you're trying to keep up with the other canoeists. You need to ask your colleagues to pair with them, and your management to encourage the practice. The amount of institutional knowledge you need in order to thrive should be more fire hose than eyedropper. The reason people fight with their tools? The tools suck in terms of instructions and the only w…

I don't know why, I felt warm reading this. Thanks!

Re: Ask HN: First month job anxiety. Am I actually an impostor?

#36
Thanks for your post, rericks. I am feeling exactly the same way... I am so anxious about that that I have doubted what else could I do in life... But we should hold tight. In 3 months, you will know much more about parts of the system, you will be an expert of some of its facets. By then, you will be an example of the phrase "Fake it 'till you make it".

Re: Ask HN: First month job anxiety. Am I actually an impostor?

#37

Thanks for your post, rericks. I am feeling exactly the same way... I am so anxious about that that I have doubted what else could I do in life... But we should hold tight. In 3 months, you will know much more about parts of the system, you will be an expert of some of its facets. By then, you will be an example of the phrase "Fake it 'till you make it".

And thanks, again. I will spend a better week-end, knowing I am not the only one, and that it has an actual "name".

Re: Ask HN: First month job anxiety. Am I actually an impostor?

#39
I believe you may be overthinking it and that is taking its toll on you. You don't know what you expect and you're making judgement based on what you're observing your colleagues do.

Here is my advice to you:

Step 1) Get a mentor. Someone who's been there for a while and get how the system (both people and machines) work and can provide guidance and point you in the right direction when they're stuck. Make good use of the time they give you and use every opportunity to thank them. Most bigCorp have some sort of mentoring program in place. If no formal mentoring program, ask your boss or your boss' boss for help in finding a mentor.

Step 2) Befriend your teammates. Forget about all the technical mumbo-jumbo and try to get to know them as human beings. Ask about things they do outside work, weekend, music they listen to, things they are passionate about. Don't force it though. Be friendly and have as a goal to build a connection with these people.

Step 3) Befriend people that sit in your close proximity (and are not part of your team). Having someone to chat about work related issues in the context that you're not going get judged for your actual work is again worth its weight in gold. Be curious about other people and share what you're passionate about. It does not have to be super-long boring. You just need to find one other person that really likes you to bootstrap you in the social environment

Step 4) Your boss. Figure out how to make your boss successful. No, I'm not joking. Your relationship with your immediate boss is going to make or brake your experience there. Constantly ask for feedback and offer to offload your boss on various things if you have the ability to actually deliver. Don't be a kiss-ass, but do your absolute best to make your boss successful.

Closing words: working at a big corporation can be a daunting experience at first. It's going to be a while for you to figure out how internal tooling and systems work. 3-6 months is not unheard off when it comes to ramp-up time. What you want to do is constantly ask questions and learn how that shit works. Invest the time (and slack) you are give now to seed your future growth. Also invest building connections with other people and discussing things that currently challenge you with them - don't be afraid to be vulnerable and admit when you don't know something. Most people are nice and actually try to help you if they can help you and are worth their effort (in the sense that they're not gonna explain the same thing 10 times to you if you don't put any effort into it, but they will explain something to you if it means that next time you'll do it on your own without bothering them). Forget about pride. Be humble and use your "beginner's mind" to your advantage.

In the grand scheme of things we are all impostors.

Re: Ask HN: First month job anxiety. Am I actually an impostor?

#40
Don’t worry about if you’re good enough. You passed the interviews, you’re fine.

You are not an imposter. Everyone feels the same at most stages...just getting hired, once you settled, etc.

This isn’t a platitude, 80% of what people do at FAANGs, Ivy League schools, etc. is chest-puffing.

You are not an imposter.

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