From Office B*tch to Office Boss: My Career Bomb Retrospective

Yes, this was during my "Girl Boss" era--shush.

TL;DR: I’m sharing a story about how I overcame a career bomb (with a podcast interview AND transcript you can follow along with) and tips you can try today if you are feeling stuck.

The topic of growth and failure has been on my mind lately, and two influential leaders I admire, Jean Kang and Rebecca Lee Doran, inspired me to reshare a career setback I first discussed in a podcast interview five years ago.

Listening to it now makes me laugh and cringe a little because of how much I embraced the “Girl Boss” movement but the advice shared still rings true today. Let’s get into it!

I’ve mentioned before that I began my career as a project manager two weeks after my college graduation. Being 21 with a PM title, and working in a beautiful office down the street from the beach in an affluent area, I thought I was so cool.

In spite of loving the work I was doing, I quickly realized I hated the toxic work environment I was in.

Eventually, the toxicity I was feeling started coming out of me. I fed negativity back into the work environment by complaining loudly, being needlessly argumentative, and being embarrassingly rude.

It was not until after my one-year workaversary when I had my first performance review, my manager mentioned to me, “You’re an amazing worker but you need to work on your relationships with others in the office.”

Yikes.

That was the reality check that I needed to change. I became a person I never wanted to be— a mean girl; an “(office) bitch.”

Here is the interview with me about how I stopped bitching at work and turned my reputation of “office bitch” to “office boss” when I changed my attitude and mindset, found ways to make positive changes at work, became a better person, and got promoted as a result since that review cycle.

If you click the button above, you will be able to follow an interactive transcript while you listen.

Some things that contributed to my positive career transformation included taking a course on how to be an influential manager, learning how to actively listen, and seeking mentorship from more experienced professionals.

The catalyst for my growth was setting aside my ego and taking ownership of my weaknesses, so I could wholeheartedly take in the feedback received and take actionable steps towards improving.

My career bomb taught me the following:

• Be solutions-orientated. It’s natural to be critical about things we don’t like, especially when your complaint is valid. That doesn’t change the fact there will be plenty of occasions that require you to work collaboratively and cross-functionally with other teams, with a chance you will not always agree with how decisions are being made. Rather than complaining, share solutions. Even if you aren’t working on the same team, the end goal is always the same; success. Whenever I didn’t see eye to eye with someone’s approach, I made sure to come to the table ready with other potential solutions to reach the same end goal for consideration, along with data to support my viewpoints, to better influence the change I wanted to see. On that note,

• Be the change you want to see. You may run into situations where people may not support your idea or be willing to help you. That doesn’t mean your idea is not worth pursuing or you need to settle for “no.” If you want X to happen, take the initiative to make it happen. You may have to go against the tide and do something different. By having the courage to try something new or different, or even marching out alone, you’ll likely influence others to do the same. In my situation, I wanted to be a better mentor and manager for my team than I experienced when I first started working at this company so I organized regular one-to-ones with each PM I managed and took on projects (even if it wasn’t part of my job anymore) when my team reached capacity.

• Own what you can control. There will always be something within your realm of control. That could be how you react to a situation, knowing when to pivot and not pause, learning a new skill, or setting boundaries in place. When things aren’t going according to plan, be willing to have an honest conversation with yourself and objectively consider the variables at play to truly understand what things are within your realm of control. In my situation, I learned to control my reactions to decisions I could not change, continually raised pain points with upper, and worked with them to drive long-term action plans for workplace improvements.

• Give compassionate and constructive feedback. Giving feedback can be honest without being mean or intentionally hurtful. It should always come from a place of compassion because you want them (or a product, or the company, or a project) to succeed. Learning how to give compassionate and constructive feedback increases your chances of actually being listened to and understood. I made it clear to those I was supervising that I was there to support them, whether it was at this workplace or elsewhere. Rather than staying in an “all about me” mindset, I shifted my focus to the team, helping us all navigate a difficult work environment.

Five years have passed since this interview (and eight years have passed since my actual reality check).

I am at a different stage in my career and life but one thing will always remain true: it’s never too late to make a change.

Ciao for now and connect with me on Linkedin.

-Katrina