I continued my work career at a start-up, this time in the morning hours. After the shifting schedules, I can finally start work at 8:00 AM and end at 5:00 PM.
A start-up has its challenges. With a few of you in the company, you have a lot of roles to fulfill. That means taking a lot of time to finish what's needed.
It was a new environment. With the workplace we had, we shared with other start-ups. But then, we eventually had our own working space until we worked at home due to the lockdown. From an almost quiet atmosphere, it became filled with frequent chats with workmates while balancing workloads. And overcapacity becomes the norm. Extending some work hours becomes a thing.
My main work was as a QA Automation Engineer. I created automated scripts to simulate manual functional testing of a product. I also documented Test Case Scenarios for upcoming functionalities, reviewed and updated Documents on Product Behavior, performed Manual Functional Testing, and updated tooltips within the Product for customer usage.
Towards the third year of my stay, I became a Support Specialist. My role is to perform root cause analysis of actual customer issues and propose a workaround if needed. I still do QA Testing Activities to an extent.
If there are important lessons I've learned so far, here are some of them:
1. leadership mindset
Each of us is empowered to lead in the role we do. At first, I didn't feel it as I didn't see myself for it. But I gave it a try, and it became my learning ground. I learned to balance gentleness and toughness with my teammates. I learned how to look for ways snappily for an urgent need. And I appreciated these more as I grew in my role, which took years. In everything I do, I should lead and manage them to success.
I didn't recognize this value back then. I was familiar with following orders left and right, and not contesting them. So when asked to lead, it's done out of duty. There was no thought of sharing a different perspective or becoming a solution-maker. I now see the need to activate this in everyday life. Every day allows you to lead in situations you can carry through.
Leading is both an opportunity and a responsibility. It's challenging, but the thought of having the chance to direct the path ahead is rewarding.
2. growth mindset
For a start-up setup, this is the real thing. It's about learning, scaling up, encouraging innovation, thinking, and foresight. It's also collaborative work and feedback.
My role has target, threshold, and stretch goals. As far as capacity goes, you can do what you can do. In a practical sense, setting limits is needed. But in a character development sense, it's taking the extra mile. And it's in that character development sense that I needed to look at the most.
It's accustomed to me that I stick to my comfort zone. But doing so makes you stagnate. I couldn't achieve the big goals I wanted. I don't feel like wanting to go through the process to get to these, which was prevalent in the first four years. But when the lockdown came, it became my turning point. I found myself again in self-motivation to work better. And given that I've known my role for a long time, I grew into it more. And thankfully, I redeemed myself from it.
I'm still getting used to having pain with me in growth, but I know I can move further. You'll eventually learn that the scariest thing you can find yourself in is staying where you are and not moving at all. We are creations of growth and change, so we should embrace growth.
3. flexibility mindset
Anything can happen anytime. Agility is the way, so we display adaptability and flexibility. It's evident in the work environment, from the roles we fulfill to the Team Members.
Team Members can be juggling at times. They have their vast experiences and their temperaments that come along. Some can be comfortable working, while some would need a lot of patience to deal with them well. With the many teammates we met, we always had to keep our ground and our heads up in anything.
It made me think of the flexibility I have. It's not that strong, I admit. I had my times of pain with the people I deal with. From there, I had my anger moments, which caused the quality of my relationships to lessen. I got myself to the point where I almost lost my livelihood. And it's all because I have so much difficulty getting to terms with the dynamics of my social relationships.
Some questions remain unanswered, but I have to move forward with that reality. I have to get my head in making choices and decisions in growing maturity. It's struggling for me, but I have to do this. It's a way to expand my world so I can understand life better. But soon enough, I'll be alright, and this becomes easy for me.
These key lessons are my life points at the moment. As of today, a new era is beginning, and I'm uncertain how this will go. But I have hope that it'll turn out well. As long as I have my leading mindset, I can take a stand against anything that comes with it. It's all about working right so the business can continue flourishing.
And with the run so far, I'm more than thankful to the people who have deeply impacted me to be where I am now. And from here, we'll see how the next few years will turn out.
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