How I Made Peace with the 9 to 5
Are you literally one annoying email away from quitting?
I know why you’re here. You’ve been thinking about it. So, have I.
It’s been haunting you, clouding your judgement, and numbing your brain. It’s so risky, but so simple. You could lose everything, or you can have it all. You have even fantasized about typing that email. Not to send it or anything. Just to see what it might look like. You long for the day you can finally say it out loud. I quit!
I hear you; I’ve been there.
Like most monumental mistakes, my worst corporate job did not have a warning sign. I had researched the company and prepared very well for the interview. I presented myself with confidence and even made some light jokes to break the ice; a couple of weeks later I got the call — I was in.
I was ecstatic. I couldn’t believe I was joining this company. Over the span of 5 years, my previous workplaces included a small office, a startup that didn’t quite start, and a warehouse on a literal dirt road.
Never in my wildest dreams did I think I would be joining one of the biggest corporates on the planet (No matter where you’re reading this from, it’s likely that at least one or two of our products are in your kitchen).
My happiness was short-lived.
My first few months were amazing. The office was huge with an open floor plan and large panel windows. There were coffee makers everywhere, bean bags in the break room, and in house store filled with all our company products just for us employees. People dressed smart and looked all sleek and professional. I loved going to work every day.
Five months in, a raven came bearing ominous news.
There was going to be a restructure. That’s corporate lingo for “We’re about to do some cost saving by dropping some serious dead weight from this boat”. From the moment of the restructure announcement, I could feel the tension in the air. Everyone was jittery, and no one was certain they would be spared. I was tense as well; I had literally just joined a few months ago.
Was my novelty an advantage or a disadvantage? I mean if they fire me only five months after hiring me that would look ridiculous, right? Or does it make more sense to let me go because there are surely more established employees with more extensive experience? I tossed and turned.
Over the course of the next month, people were re-interviewed, after which they either remained at their jobs, moved to other departments, or left the company entirely. Then it was time, I got the email for the re-interview date. It was my turn.
I entered a small brightly lit meeting room for an audience with HR personnel and my manager. The meeting was brief but confusing.
“Unfortunately, your current position will be cancelled in the new structure. But we see your effort and we want to keep you onboard regardless. So, feel free to apply to any of the new vacancies that opened up in other departments. You will have an interview just as a technicality, but other than that rest assured we are not letting you go”
They should have let me go. Because I was about to make the dumbest and most misinformed decision of my life.
I scrolled through the new vacancies posted on our internal company webpage and applied to a couple of different ones that aligned with my previous experiences. I’m going to pause here to give you the life-saving advice I wish someone had given me.
During your job application process, do some snooping. Find out who is working on the same team or in the same department and ask for their honest review. Don’t depend on the job description and only the hiring manager to give you the full picture.
Ask how they feel about their manager, what time they get off work, how often do they need to answer calls or emails after working hours, what they like about the job and what they hate about it. In fact, if you can, call them outside of office hours. That will make it less awkward for them to be candid with you. It’s less likely they will say something bad about at the position while literally sitting there on their desk with their co-workers possibly overhearing this conversation.
I was swiftly accepted into one of the two jobs I applied for. The only research I did for that job was a quick read of the job description and a 3- minute chat with the hiring manager who expressed his excitement for me to join his team. I was eager to have one foot in the door and be done with all the drama of the past month.
The drama was far from over. I took on my new job and was quickly buried beneath an avalanche of emails. Requests, complaints, demands that needed to be met. It turned out this job was vastly different from what I had expected. It was a job in operations, the pumping heart of the company. And much like a heart, operations didn’t sleep.
I was new to the job, but there was no room for error. I was putting out fires left and right and any mistake meant loss of sales. Any blunder was a missed opportunity. Blunders would then, no doubt, be followed by an escalation email. An escalation email turns into a competition as to who can copy (CC) in email form the most intimidating names the company had to offer to witness this horrible turn of events.
There was an imbedded culture of finger-pointing. It was more important to find out who messed up than it was to clean up the mess. On top of that, my job landed in a middle ground where I wasn’t high up enough on the ladder to call all the shots, and not low enough that my decisions were inconsequential. I hit the sweet spot where your good work flies below the radar, but your mistakes are showcased like a circus.
I was stressed all the time, my blood pressure was spiking, and I started getting random headaches. A couple of months in, I was done with it.
I arranged for a call with my boss who was working remotely and demanded to be moved. Not asked, demanded. I told him that it was perhaps my fault for not having researched all the aspects of the job before I applied (and perhaps it was his fault that he didn’t fully let on the exact nature of the job beforehand) but either way, I wasn’t going to be crucified for it. Move me or I quit.
He was understanding and he offered me a compromise, a job that was still in operations but with a different set of stakeholders. Their operations were much more streamlined and generally less stressful. The hours improved, I made good progress, and I could finally unclench my jaws. But I was never impressed with the company the same way again. I had shattered the facade of courtesy and welcome packs; and behind it was actually a street fight.
I owe everything to that stand that I took. If I had feared for my job, or just accepted the status quo, I might still be crying at my desk till now.
The term “9 to 5” lumps a whole bunch of jobs under one grey umbrella, but the truth is not all 9 to 5’s are the same. Not even under the same company roof. While one job almost killed me, the other gave me stable income at no cost to my mental and physical well-being.
With the reasonable hours, I started to explore other things I can do with my time after work. I picked up on old hobbies, signed up for some classes, and started a small side business.
A lot of independently owned businesses start that way, as a side project. When they take their own shape and form, their owners ditch their 9 to 5s to pursue further growth. And while mine hasn’t taken off quite yet, I moved to a job that at least gave me the time to try.
When your 9 to 5 actually turns into a 9 to 9 and the mere thought of going to work gives you a knot in your stomach, it’s time to make some changes. Now.
Perspective also matters, I now regard my 9 to 5 job as a source of income to pay for all my other interests not as a job that defines me. While some jobs consume all your time and provide self-fulfillment (doctors and teachers spring to mind), other jobs like data analysis for example might not exactly leave you beaming with self-worth. But they do provide a much-needed stable income in a highly volatile economy.
When we burn-out at work, we curse the 9 to 5 jobs that are sucking the life out of us. But we forget that we always have a choice. A choice to look for other less exhausting jobs, to confront our managers with our state of dismay, to turn off our phones after hours, to truly disconnect on our holidays.
And above all, a choice to quit the minute it becomes too much for our health to handle.
