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How to survive the probationary period after jumping ship? Here are some things to know

Here are some things to know

By Clemmens CroftonPublished about a year ago 11 min read
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How to survive the probationary period after jumping ship? Here are some things to know
Photo by Thuan Pham on Unsplash

When you move to a new company, there is a probationary period before you become a permanent employee, which is a period when the employee and the company are looking at each other. How can you tell if the company is the right place for you when you are on probation? How can you prove yourself to the company? This article will give you the answers.

Job hopping may be some table for us in the workplace, especially in an internet company, and sometimes it may not be that we want to jump ship ourselves, but because the company is open and gone.

We've summarised the content of writing a CV and looking for a job before, and today we're going to focus on the probationary phase of that.

If you have successfully got an offer and entered the probationary period, then first of all congratulations, you have taken the first step. Then I also want to tell you that this is only the first step in the long march, because you may also "come back to the battle before liberation".

I. Preface

Many people have the misconception that the probationary period is a period when the company unilaterally examines or even assesses its employees. So we work hard and want to get the company's approval.

This is true, but the probationary period is a mutual understanding and two-way selection process!

It is very difficult for a company to tell whether a person is a good fit for the company by looking at their CV and communicating with them through interviews for a limited period. Similarly, as a job seeker, especially for our kind of work experience is not a very long job seeker, in a limited period, it is more difficult to determine whether the company meets our expectations.

Therefore, during the trial period, we need to do two things.

Company

First, to determine whether the company meets its expectations. If the answer is yes, then you can move on to the next thing full-time.

Secondly, to prove that you can do the job.

Secondly, how do judge

Indeed, we do not have the ability or energy to judge the company we are interviewing for.

It is the same as when we fall in love. What attracts us at first may be just one or two points, a look, or a word, and we may decide to pursue her/him (interview). But when it comes to marriage, it takes some time to get to know each other and get along with each other (conversion).

Here are some ways to support your judgment from two stages, before and after you join us.

1. before joining

You can get to know the situation of the company initially by using platforms such as Sky Eye Search, Job Friend Network, or even Zhihu. This includes the scale of the company, the main business direction, whether the legal person has changed, whether there are labor disputes, and the evaluation of netizens, etc.

Through communication with HR and the interviewer, you can learn more about the company's team building, and business development, as well as the company's system and culture. For example, you can ask whether the company pays five-year insurance and one pension and whether there is annual leave, to determine whether the company is reliable.

It is also probably the most efficient and reliable way to find out about the company through your friends in the industry and by using your contacts. If you don't know many people, you can join some local WeChat and QQ groups. After you have been in a circle for a long time, you will find that the circle is really small.

But the son is not a fish, how can he know the joy of fish? What others feel is not necessarily applicable to you. It's more a matter of experiencing and verifying it for yourself.

2. After joining the company

1) Company culture

For example, overtime is a very common phenomenon in Internet companies. Some companies offer overtime pay, time off, or meal allowances, but some companies offer overtime at the word of the boss or leader.

2) Company atmosphere

A normal company will have a role of a "leader" to help newcomers get familiar with the company's business quickly, adapt to the work, and then produce results. This is a win-win situation for both the company and the individual!

3) Career development

There is a classic quote from the FanDeng Book Club that I find very valid (I forget the original quote, it was something like this).

"After an employee joins the company, the first thing you should do is find out when he intends to jump ship. The answer to the question, "If you live for the company, you die for the company, that's all bullshit. The first thing about an employee who knows what he wants is that the person will most likely not be a jerk. Then the company can better place the person in the right position. And finally, when that person wants to jump ship again, they can find a way to keep them."

Make sure you know exactly what you want, it can be money, it can be a springboard, it can be a desire for leisure, or it can be the practice of what you have learned, all of these are fine, but the purpose must be clear.

3. What to do if you don't fit in

If you really can't adapt to a new company or new environment, remember to fall into the "sunk cost misconception".

This concept was mentioned in the series "Designing for Simplicity".

One of the reasons for the increasing complexity of products is that people are reluctant to remove any existing functionality because removing incomplete features or content would result in time and effort being wasted. This phenomenon is known in economics as the "sunk cost misconception".

The cost of creating the feature is unlikely to be recovered, so the only way to determine how useful it is is to see how much extra it costs to keep it.

It's the same at work, if you don't feel joy in it, you lose the positive emotions of achievement and so on, and the negative energy gets more and more tired, which affects your life and your work.

You say you don't want to change jobs, hang in there a bit longer, and even if you survive the probationary period, how long will you last? Waiting for a promotion? Wait for a pay rise? Since the damage is irreparable, it is a good thing to stop and leave in time.

Labour law stipulates: the probationary period only needs to notify the company three days in advance to leave the company can be, formal employees, need to notify the company one month in advance to propose to leave.

The above is a judgment result for the company does not meet their expectations, and seems to be a bit negative ~

If the result of the judgment is that the company meets your expectations and you are willing to continue to stay in the company, then how to prove yourself is the next thing that you need to devote yourself too!

III. How to prove it

Let's look at how to prove that you can meet the company's requirements from 3 perspectives!

1. The perspective of the workplace

The junior managers do the work, the middle managers share the worries, and the senior managers make the decisions! But no matter where we are if we want to prove our worth, we should first work with a closed-loop mentality!

The essence of closed-loop is more of a certainty: what you have explained to others or what others have explained to you will have a definite outcome.

How can this certainty be achieved?

The so-called "everything is explained, everything is done, everything is heard back", that is: feedback on the initiative, the ability to match, and the results of responsibility, these three closed loops.

Communication closed loop: active feedback process, positive feedback results.

A closed loop of competence: matching competence with commitment, neither blindly committing nor hiding from challenges.

The closed loop of results: hold the attitude of being responsible for the results and doing your best.

2. Product leader's perspective

As the saying goes, if you know your enemy, you will never lose a battle. If you want to pass the leaders' tests successfully, you have to find out what aspects the leaders will test and in what way they will test you.

Comprehension of the industry.

Outputting competitive reports or industry reports is one of the better ways for newcomers to quickly integrate into the industry and brush up on their industry knowledge.

Through the report, you can analyze his knowledge of the industry, the pattern of competing products, his understanding of the products he is responsible for, his way of thinking, his familiarity with research tools, his learning power, his foresight, his level of copywriting, his communication skills, etc. A three-dimensional level of display.

Communication and presentation skills.

You can share previous project cases, reading experiences, whimsical ideas, workplace experiences, etc. This is one of the better ways for newcomers to integrate into the team and build their brand.

Through a sharing session, one can get a three-dimensional portrait of the newcomer in terms of his presentation style, personal experience, summarising ability, methodology building, personality, infectiousness, etc.

Capacity for demand analysis and management.

Give him as many opportunities as possible to interface with front-line requirements and let him follow your approach to document, elaborate, understand and eventually translate them into product requirements.

This is one of the better ways to exercise the newcomer's product thinking, to develop his ability to gather and translate requirements, and to know from this how well he grasps them, i.e. whether he can capture the real needs.

Ability to handle things in a negative environment.

Try to let him face complaints and bugs directly as much as possible, and observe his logical and analytical ability, emotional intelligence, execution (ability to handle things), communication, negotiation ability, resistance to stress, sense of ownership, etc. in a negative environment.

Secondly, complaint and bug handling are effective ways to understand the business capability of the product.

Professionalism, dedication,d basic skills.

This one is the lifeline of the newcomer, through small projects (don't be in the assessment period, give him the core project for online, unless it is a big cow) of the independent complete path of tracking, observobserving the degree of grasp in each link, pay attention to three points.

At any point in the process, be bold enough to call out or apply pressure.

At any session, try to be difficult and test your

At any session, try not to offer help.

Through small projects, you can regulate their professionalism and dedication to the project and test their basic skills.

3. The perspective of the probationary employee

The first thing to do is to overcome the crisis of trust with the boss: the discrepancy between "the boss's expectations for the blueprint of the new product line" and "the new PM feeling that he is here to re-investigate and optimize oneoptimizeproducts".

How can you smoothly connect the various departments of the company and even external organizations in a short period?

How can you quickly become familiar with new businesses, even new industries, and be able to categorize and deconstruct more abstractly?

Action list

In addition, the size of the company varies significantly in terms of the requirements of the product position, which also reflects the product position characteristics.

The best state of a PM in a startup is to design a good product on the one hand and to be able t drive the project from the boss's perspective on the other.

In large companies, the product manager is more of an information hub for various departments within the company, with higher requirements for information processing ability.

Fourth, concluding remarks

Well, the above is all the content shared today, and finally give you some suggestions.

The three most important time points of the probationary period: are the first day, the first weare ek, and the first month.

The first day, the first impression you leave on others is crucial.

In the first week, you'll know everything about y

The first month, seriously, you can't pretend for that long. One month is enough to judge the success of a new person. If not, it means that the head of the department and HR are not professional enough, that they don't read people properly, or that they are too novice.

When y, you have a certain understanding of the company's business, remember to find a suitable time to report your understanding and insights to your immediate supervisor or boss, not necessarily face to face, but also in the form of emails or other forms.

The content of the report is not so important, after all, it is new to the business is not so deep insight is normal, the content of the report can even be astronomical, but this action must be for their probationary period and an excellent way to increase points.

Finally, I wish you all a good home!

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About the Creator

Clemmens Crofton

An eye for an eye thought for an obsession.

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