By Hollie Hogger
I walked into the office, a million scenarios flashing through my head as my nerves ate away at me – what kind of setting will this be? Will I get along with my co-workers? Will the workload be too difficult? – but a year later, all those fears have long been quelled.
It’s the end of July 2017. I had just finished a media course at college and I was taking a gap year off before university, primarily to get myself more creative experience and save up some emergency funds. I had talked about needing to find a job with my family, and they were understanding and wanted to help me find work. My sister relayed to me that her boss needed someone to help with data entry and, as I’m experienced with tech, it would be the perfect temp job for me to do.
Just a short while later, and I was at the office entering statistics and information into Excel spreadsheets. I was still quite nervous by this point, and I found it hard to talk to anyone in the office, even my sister. But as I got to know my co-workers and the Just Recruitment directors, I began gaining a lot of confidence in my work, which consequently boosted my confidence in character. In between data logging, I would do odd jobs for the marketing team when they needed an extra pair of hands, and I was grateful as it would help me stretch out my creative muscles.
My data assignment eventually finished, and I thought so too would my job. Thinking about it finishing so soon was sad, as I enjoyed spending time with my co-workers, as well as gaining valuable work experience. My unhappy state was cut short though, as I was offered to stay on and continue to work at the office, this time as part of the marketing team and focusing on the more creative aspects of my role! Of course, I was ecstatic as I could flex my creativity even further, and it meant that I didn’t have to say goodbye quite yet.
My role thus forth consisted of a variety of exciting and various duties. Among them was article writing (as you can tell!), creating social media adverts, editing and producing videos, creating, printing and cutting leaflets, adding on to and altering the Just Recruitment website, putting together animated images (GIFs) and so much more.
During my time here, I’ve been able to experience what it’s like to be in an office environment and working as part of a marketing team – and these sorts of experiences are exactly what I was looking for in my gap year. Though I’m sad to go, just like I was feeling all those months ago, I’m grateful for the opportunities I’ve been given... and I will use everything I’ve learnt to go full steam ahead into my career!
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