I started my career in early 2007 as software engineer with a small company in Bangalore. I got this job after 5-6 months on struggle, so this was very special for me. This company was into web portal development for US clients. Initially we went through some basic trainings, internal and external both. We were kind of getting various kind of wisdom for personal life and various expert advice on professional life. It was a good learning phase.
In this series of getting trainings and soft skills, once we had a session arranged with one of the senior managers, who had around 20 years of industry experience and was a old timer here in this company. He gave us 3 important life mantras, which I still remember and feel that are very relevant now also.
These 3 mantras or lessons were – take ownership of your work, open to communicate and keep learning. Let me elaborate these 3 lessons, and how I look at them.
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Take ownership of your work
This is an important life lesson and applies to everywhere, be it work or personal life. It is something not just do things for the sake of doing, own them. Own your work, own your life. You just can’t go with the flow and leave things on destiny. You need to take charge of your life and work.
At professional side, own your work from end to end. Take responsibility of whatever you do. Take ownership of success and failure. You just can’t sit on fence and watch it. You own your career growth; your professional development and you’re learnings. So, if you want to succeed in your career, you must take charge of it.
Take extra responsibilities in work, help others, stretch yourself. Be proactive in doing things, keep your bosses updated on what you are working, even before they ask. Try to add value by bringing changes and improvements in your day-to-day work. Overall taking ownership of your work is showing willingness to contribute and make a difference, not just doing formalities.
Open to communicate
This is another important lesson for professional life. I see it in two ways, first being open to communicate and showcase whatever you are working on. Make people aware of your work, promote your work appropriately. Another way, being open to discuss new idea, accept differences and be approachable. You should have openness of mind in accepting different people, cultures, thoughts. Also, should have a desire to include others and being a team, not just try to be successful alone, think of team’s success.
Keep Learning
Last but not least important lesson is keep learning. As we are seeing how technologies are changing rapidly and how it is important now to keep yourself up to date with current market trends. Learning and unlearning is become inevitable. You can’t stick to one technology or role. You need to keep evolving. Idea is the value addition is continuous process and if you are not flexible and agile in learning and capturing market, trends soon you would be obsolete. This is also a kind of part of owning your learning and keep upgrading yourself.
These 3 important lessons I learned very early in career, and I feel these lesson is more relevant today, than ever before. To succeed in whatever you do, you need to own it completely, dedicate yourself. Be approachable and open to communicate and make sure you are working and including people along with you in your journey. Also learning is like sharpening your tools to make sure that you are relevant in the market and still master of your game.