Throughout my career, I’ve had the opportunity to work for some great people and not-so-great people. In my experience, job happiness usually comes from how a boss treats you, the atmosphere, praise and challenging work. I decided to do a informal poll of my Twitter followers to see how many people say they love their job. LOVE it. I was surprised by the responses and enthusiasm. Here are just a few of the many positive responses I received:
Do you LOVE your job? If so, what makes you love it?
I’ve been in my new routine for two months now, and I’m loving it. I spend most of my days as Content Manager for WoodIQ.com, CountertopIQ.com and FinishingIQ.com, but I also do other consulting/freelance as well as teaching this fall. I have to say, I love that most of my time is managing web editorial instead of being tied to print. There is so much more freedom with the web. Even though I’ve been a web/content geek for a while, I’m really seeing this more as I am much more focused on it in my daily tasks.
When I started with the NueMedia’s brands, I was taking over for a colleague who decided to pursue other business opportunities. It was a huge risk on my part. I was leaving a full-time pay check to jump over to a privately-owned venture that is relatively new (been around for two years). This was going to be a big change. All I could think about was the risk involved.
I have an eight month old who I still send to daycare a few hours every day because I believe it’s important for him to socialize and learn in that setting. But that also means, I have the expense of an eight month old, plus daycare expense. Which if you saw the news this morning, daycare costs more than the average rent expense. It’s not cheap that’s for sure.
But with this risk, came the possibility of something very exciting. And I kept thinking about that too. I would be able to work part-time, allowing me to spend more time with my son. Instead of seeing him three hours a day because I was working full-time, I could now spend my afternoons with him. I could actually get the house clean, keep food stocked in the house, and do laundry. Who knew that was possible?!
In addition to the perks, I was excited to be part of something that was new, growing and positive. After speaking with the president and CEO a few times, I quickly realized we see the world and media the same way. This is the future. We were no longer tied down by print pages. We could adjust content based on what our readers are ACTUALLY reading because we can see the clicks. We can provide concrete, accurate information on what our advertisers are generating by our visitors. It’s just smart business. And to top it off, this industry is very technical with very smart people writing for the properties. I love B2B because it’s all about business, learning, growing and succeeding. I could learn so much by jumping to this property.
But then again, it was a huge risk. Huge. I’ve had a few bad experiences in the past where I accepted positions that I thought were going to be exciting, and allow me to grow. And then it ended up being a train wreck. The bosses were horrible, the atmosphere was extremely constricting, the management sucked, and I quickly regretted my decision.
I could not have this happen again. For one, I didn’t want to go through that experience again. I had been there twice in my career and it sucks. And two, I had my son and my family to think about. I wanted to move somewhere I would be for a while, that I could grow, learn and succeed.
So for me, I had to seriously consider the risks, the opportunities, and the possible rewards. Two months in and I’m glad I took a risk.
Last fall/winter, I was working three jobs and freelancing with various publications. I had way too much on my plate, and a squirrel took up space in place of my brain. But so far, 2011 is off to a fabulous start. I’ve been working full time as editor of RD+B magazine since September but I feel like I’m just now getting my footing.
I now have the time to completely focus on the magazine, website, social media, content, news, and so on. And it feels great. I absolutely love my job. Did you hear that?! I. Love. My. Job. After a few bad experiences in the last few years, I started to believe that jobs were not meant to be loved – rather things you did because you had to pay the bills. Well, goodbye wrong point-of-view.
I traveled to Orlando in January for one of the biggest tradeshows in my industry. It felt great to walk the show floor, see old colleagues, check out new products, and tweet about them. I genuinely was excited. I even had the opportunity to have some great conversations of how B2B companies should be using the Web. In one conversation, I was asked if I thought every editor should be tweeting. And my response? “Absolutely!” This spurred a whole conversation about Web, original news content, social media and my thoughts on the importance of trade publications. It was fun and exciting to be apart of that conversation.
Now, this week I’m in production with our next issue and I’m again energized. We’ve shortened our articles, added sidebars, popouts with tidbits of information and a few other treatments. All these things allow us to provide more content to our audience – more vital information to them. It also allows for more entry points into each article and more layers to each article. People multitask more than ever so providing all these bits of information will hopefully make our editorial much more valuable and informative to them.
The issue looks so good and I cannot wait to get it into the hands of our audience. And you know what that means? I. Love. My. Job. Of course there are days when I’m overwhelmed and stressed because there is so much going on. I’m either traveling to another state for a seminar, or going down to the Chicago office for a meeting. But no matter where I’m at, I love the people, industry and content. To me, that’s pretty freaking cool.
Today I read a blog post about the life of a freelancing mom, and how her work isn’t often viewed as work by her man. That struck a cord with me. Not because my man doesn’t view my work as work – he does. But because I too am a freelancer and I find that too many people don’t consider my job a job. And it’s infuriating. Since I’m relatively new to the freelancing world (since May), I wonder if this is just part of the job. Other freelancers: Is this common practice?
Previous to freelancing, I worked Monday through Friday in a cubicle. I was at my desk by 8 and out after 5 depending on deadlines/work loads. I worked the traditional job that already had an established reputation of being a real job. But now as a freelancer, I’m learning quickly that not everyone understands what I do. Seems simple to me, but apparently not to them.
As other freelancers know, we work when we have work. If someone emails a job, we’re on it. Otherwise, we’re busy getting other things done – like running the house. Cleaning, laundry, grocery shopping, etc. At first, the transition to this lifestyle was overwhelming. How do you manage to basically do two jobs with no schedule? But now that I’ve been at this a few months, I love it! And I’ve learned to take advantage of the jobs when I have them, and advantage of the downtime to manage the house.
Generally, I try to work in the mornings because I’m really motivated at that time of the day, and do chores in the afternoon. But sometimes that doesn’t always work. Freelancing means you do jobs when you get them – which can sometimes be at 8 p.m.
On Friday last week, I decided to treat myself. If I finished all my work, I was going to head out to the public pool for the afternoon. And I did. And I enjoyed it. But when people hear that I spent my Friday afternoon at the pool, that misconception rolls through their head, “Must be nice not to have to work.” But I do work. And sometimes I’m working at 8 p.m. while you finished work four hours earlier.
Maureen Alley