New company - week 1. Onboarding, first contacts, and side actions

This week, I started a job at a new place and thought I would share my first impressions of such a move.

Onboarding

Critical step of getting new employees up to speed, the onboarding process is much more async than I would have thought. This is a surprise and I have to admit it works quite well so far. Of course, the amount of information to swallow is massive and a very large percentage of it is in a "new" language. Once again, Mercado Livre is just for Brazil, otherwise in Latam, it is Mercado Libre as it comes from Argentina. More about the language below.

There is yet a lot to do between courses, information, and so on but my main takeaway on this as EM (Project Leader now, but it is just a naming convention) has been to act as a sponge and try not to get scared by the sheer amount of new things. It feels odd at first to switch from total control over a daily routine to "not knowing anything". So I think I just need to be patient, learn, adapt and organize myself from week one.

Buddy and leader

The buddy concept is a key element to ease the newcomer into the place. I received one from the very start and it is a great thing to know that I am being supported directly by a close peer. This is someone that welcomed me in person, already taught me quite a few things, and will keep on helping me in the days to come.

My leader's presence has been great as well, with one main idea: "take it slow and enjoy". Indeed, no need to rush when getting into a new company as a manager. I will not be 100% operational nor performant within a few weeks. Knowing people, projects and processes take time. So dive in but breathe. And if you are a leader, maybe a senior EM, receiving a new direct report, make sure this coworker does not try to jump straight ahead into the job. Make them comfortable, build for the long term.

Team and peers first contacts

Even if the onboarding process is taking a large part of my time, I already got presented to my future team and some peers for a quick hi. I booked a few direct meetings with them to present myself, tell a bit of my story, and start networking. One message I want to make clear from the start is that I am here full of energy with a lot to learn and need to adapt myself to the new context.

Side actions

With the input of my leader, I started to read the book "The First 90 Days" by Michael D. Watkins. I will get back to it in an upcoming post about books I think.

I am also actively looking to start Spanish classes. Mercado Livre comes from Argentina so Spanish is part of the daily routine. Excited to add a new language to my skill set.

Closer to my daily EM work, I also started a new document "Daily highlights and impacts". On this , I log important things I or my team start, solve or deploy, interviews I perform, events I host, and so on. Very early yes, but why not start straight ahead? This is super useful for quarter Self Assessments for example.

Finally, I purchased the paid subscription of The Pragmatic Engineer (opens in a new tab).