tempting to say i see in all i see

Change of Environment

Monday, September 28th, 2009

On the last Friday of August, someone called and left me a message to ring him back while I was in a meeting. I took a look at the message the receptionist left for me and was puzzled.

It was a number from Sydney. My usual Sydney contacts were fund managers. I rarely receive a call from them and more often than not it will be me that does the calling. Curious, I rang the number back but no one picked up. So I left a message for them to call me back.

I got back to work and saw the message still pinned to my “to do” board and got curious again. I did what any inquisitive mind of this day and age to find answers – I googled it.

The search results that came back was an executive search firm. Heart thumping, my interest was piqued even more. I began to wonder what could they possibly look for in me, someone with barely a year’s experience under my belt. Then, another thought came into my mind. How the heck did they find me?!

I took me a better part of the morning to figure out while doing some mundane monotonous robotic work. I went to my LinkedIn profile to confirm my suspicion. There it was on the right hand side of the screen a notification stating that my profile was viewed a few times in the last week or so. I hurriedly clicked and saw a few names from the same firm! I thought to myself then, this thing actually works. Tiff was right! (thanks tiffy~)

I decided to give them another ring to find out what was in store for me. The person on the line told me that my details was passed to them by someone in the industry. He then asked me if I’m willing to move or whether I’m happy to stay on in my current company.

I replied him saying that I would be interested in moving on should the right opportunity come by and I asked him whther it was a Sydney based job as his form is based in Sydney. I was relief to hear that it would be a Melbourne based job as the cost and trouble of relocating is high indeed. We discussed abit on what I was looking for and my skill sets for awhile and he said he would forward me a few PDs for me to view.

When I finally received the PDs I was shocked when The Company was revealed to me. I never thought it would be a huge company as the impression given to me by him was of a mid tier business looking to grow. I contacted him again and he managed to get me into an assessment center for The Company the very next day.

The assessment center was very intense. A numerical test and verbal test followed by a group task and presentation has drained me completely. By the time I started on my written test my head was already spinning around in circles. After the written test I had an I interview with one of the many managers that turned up. What an intense way to end a Friday.

I kept self analysing my performance during the assessment centre for the whole weekend and decided even if I did not get the job it would be a very good experience for me anyway.

The week went out without any news and I soon forgot about it as I was swamped with work. The guy from The Firm gave me a call towards the end of the week telling me that The Company was keen to bring me on board and asked for references.

It took me a good long while to get my references in order and another few more days for them to get back to me telling me that everything is in order save to decide which business unit to place me in. Then we had to wait another few more days for the head office to make the decision to unfreeze the headcount. The waiting I had to endure over the past month or so almost drove me to insanity. I’ve had many sleepless nights too going through the many various scenarios on the reasons for the delays.

Then, without warning the long awaited phone call came. Pure joy. I was given a verbal offer of the job the very next morning after the meeting regarding staff headcount. However, the waiting game is still very well and alive. The marathon was on its last lap. Waited I must and so I did. So close yet so far.

I went through a very long weekend waiting in anticipation for the documents to be prepared. I refused to have a premature celebration until I’ve officially signed the documents for fear of jinxing it. I walked into the foyer this afternoon and took the lift up to reception and signed the document.

Two weeks from now I would be working in Mercer and taking on more responsibilities. The amount of challenge I would face in my new job is staggering. Sometimes I wonder whether I’m capable enough to take on this new voyage I’m about to undertake. So far I’ve been able to overcome all challenges life has thrown at me and grew wiser from it. Challenges and obstacles in life serves to teach us lessons, to test us, to push our potential to its limits. So I say bring it on! After all, life wouldn’t be exciting without challenges isn’t it?

Mercer Melbourne - Yes you can actually fly through the square.

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Change of Address

Saturday, September 19th, 2009

What a busy three weeks it had been. Cleaning, tidying and moving. It’s no joke to be moving heavy pieces of furniture down four flights of stairs. It’s also not funny to be carrying heavy boxes down the stairs into the car and climb back up for even more boxes!

It’s intriguing the amount of stuff and thingamajigs a person can collect over a short period of time. The amount of sentiment a person can have on their possessions also serves to further add to the pile of bits and pieces one calls their own. I’m sure you can all agree with me that it is indeed really hard to throw away personal belongings. You’ve to be pretty ruthless to do so.

We often tell ourselves that we might need that certain something in the future and continue to keep them as you might never know when it could come in handy. Then again that certain event that you’ve been keeping the item for might never happen and all you’ve done is waste more precious storage space. On the other hand, how many times have we chucked something out only to realize a few months or years down the road, we find ourselves saying “I knew I shouldn’t have gotten rid of that“.

It is a very human thing to do to collect stuff. Take a look at history. People have been collecting things since the dawn of time. Many artifacts we see today in museums are a direct result of that. Take a moment and think about your own personal collections. Stamps, coins, jewelry, games, alcohol bottles, models… Sometimes people even collect things that are normally thrown away!

While some people collect items that are rare and priceless to display their wealth, most of our collections consists of oddities that has little or no value to anyone else besides the sentimental value we place on it. I would think that for most people, they collect items of personal historical and sentimental value as a link to the past and memories, to remind themselves of the past.

We often look back to the past with the lens of nostalgia, forgetting most of the bad things and only remembering to good bits. While working in a dialysis ward, I’ve met many war veterans telling me their war stories with fond memories and often neglecting the atrocities of war. They collect war memorabilia such as medals and photos to remind them of the romantic aspects of the past.

Then again, many collect simply because they have an interest in it. No more no less. I know a patient who is a bit “Train mad” as his wife calls him. He loves everything about trains. He loves the history, the ride and sound of the train chugging past. He has a huge collection of train models in his house. I have another colleague who is a Star Wars fanatic. He collects all things Star Wars. Heck, he even built his own storm trooper armor!

Sense of completion is another thing that drives people to collect. I read a lot of books. Usually, I would keep buying the same books (and read them of course) in the saga and the entire franchise just to complete the series. I used to play Magic: The Gathering when I was younger. That bloody game nearly drove me to financial ruin in the quest to complete the collection!

And so I stand in my garage looking at the towers of boxes in the corner amazed at the amount of stuff I’ve collected in less than a decade I’ve been in Melbourne and yet at the same time horrified at the insurmountable challenge of reorganizing everything again.

Le sigh~~

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