September came around and it was my first day at the Formula 1 team…I proudly hid the Silver Fox (my beat up old VW Polo) in the far corner of the company car park, packed with a vast number of high end sports cars, ready for my first day as an Operations Graduate on a 2 year scheme, ready to set the F1 world alight! It was fair to say the day hadn’t started particularly well, as I rushed through the car park towards the entrance. I was still living over 50 miles away from where the team were based and although I’d left in what I thought was plenty of time, there had been a crash on the motorway which had used the entire buffer time I’d allowed myself for the journey. So there I was, day 1 and I turn up 10 minutes late, not my finest moment but luckily the induction session hadn’t started yet and as I walked (jogged) in there were some familiar faces waiting in reception. It turns out that a total of 5 graduates, including me, were taken on that year from the assessment centre, 4 guys and 1 girl. As I glanced at the faces of the successful few, I had a mixture of feelings; in my opinion, some of graduates deserved to be there based on their performances at the assessment centre…and others…well let’s just say amazement and disbelief are 2 words that aren’t quite descriptive enough for the feelings I had.

The girl of the group, who out of the others was probably the strongest performer at the assessment phase, leaned across and whispered two things, firstly “I was beginning to get a bit worried they hadn’t offered you a job, I thought you presented really well.” That made me laugh, but not as much as her second comment “How on earth did HE get a job?” which made me laugh so hard I had to walk away for a bit.

The induction session was a pretty standard exercise, nothing much to report except we found out our placement schedule over the next 2 years. As the session finished, the responsible manager for each graduate’s first placement came to collect us, in my case it was the Head of Quality, who turned up last therefore leaving me feeling as if I was the last one picked for the school team.

There was no desk for me to sit at in the Quality department so I was led to an area along the corridor and right round the corner where an empty desk was available in the IT department, this was due to a guy being off on long term sick, “You can sit here” said the Head of Quality. “I only found out you were coming to Quality last week so I’ve being trying to find a desk and I need to think of something for you to do”.

It was at this point that reality struck home; it maybe took me quicker than most and some never quite grasp the situation, but graduates are the lowest rung on any corporate ladder. They have no divine right to respect or authority in a company; this is something they have to earn through proving themselves and slowly gaining credibility, not through professional networking, but through bloody hard work. This may be a bitter pill to take to those who see themselves as the wonder kid on the fast track to corporate royalty, but in my opinion, the quicker this is realised then the transition from student to graduate to executive is a far smoother, considerably easier and perhaps most important of all, a far more enjoyable journey for all involved.

Wow, I’ve just read that back and that last bit seems quite harsh, but actually, it’s probably the best piece of advice I can give anyone going through this process…succeeding at a graduate assessment centre does one thing…get’s you through the door, you should see it as nothing more than that otherwise you might find you’re creating a long list of people who you systematically piss off.

Oh, and the other key points to draw out of this is that during the time between accepting the role and day one…firstly, drive the journey at rush hour a couple of times, I got away with it, but there’s nothing worse than rocking up late on your first day. Secondly, take a bit of initiative, give the company a call a couple of weeks before starting and find out what your first role will be and also if they’d be willing to send out any information that would normally be given out  during the induction, I did this when I moved company and amongst other things they sent me a long list of the 3 and 4 letter acronyms they used. If they are well prepared you might also be put through to your first manager…I’ve found out recently that talking to a new manager prior to starting is a really useful thing to do. Try it…what do you have to lose?

I’ll write a bit more about what happened later on my first day, but hopefully this enough to be going on with.

“NTG”