One of the challenges involved in starting a new job, is that when you feel as though you are struggling, it can be difficult to ask for help. This article will discuss the mental blockers to asking for help, which will lead on to the next where we explore how you can ask for help in the right way.
When you take on a new professional challenge, there is a sense of pressure to succeed, which comes not only from your own pride and aspirations but also from the expectation of those around you. Many of us feel that asking for help is a sign of failure, or that it exposes our shortcomings. Sometimes it’s this fear of appearing vulnerable, or of displaying less than 100% confidence, that can make it difficult to ask for help.
Naturally, being in a new situation can catch you off-guard. It takes a while in a new role to get to grips with the basics – unfamiliarity can hold you back from achieving even some of the more menial tasks. Imposter syndrome might creep in, feeding off your understandable inability to perform with 100% efficiency on day one. When your confidence is vulnerable, asking for help from others may impact your self-belief. As counterproductive as it is, it can seem safer to keep quiet and muddle through.
Expectation versus reality also plays a part. Even if you have done the same job before, it will be different because you are doing it somewhere new where structures, people, expectations, and set-up may be very different. You might start a job with a positive mindset, but quickly feel that you have taken on too much. Or the opposite, it may turn out to be more junior than you thought and lacking the progression opportunity that you were hoping for. You may require training for elements of the role and need to get up to speed quickly or find that your focus is not on your area of interest / expertise. If you are drowning in work or struggling to find your niche, asking for help can feel like you are only highlighting your struggle to others.
When you join a new team, you’re likely to be surrounded by colleagues who are busy with full schedules of their own meetings and projects. Even if the company has taken care to plan a thorough induction and have pre-arranged meetings with key stakeholders, you probably realise that not everyone will have time for ad-hoc requests. It’s easy to feel like a drain on your colleagues, and so you find yourself arriving at the same outcome – keep your head down and work it out for yourself.
However, every single one of us knows what it is like to be new. It’s frustrating, awkward, and humbling. It’s also normal, understandable and to be expected. Your colleagues won’t mind taking the time to explain, recap or demonstrate something if it helps you become a fully functioning member of the team faster. In the end, by not asking for help you’re doing everyone a disservice.
During your probation period, speed to performance will be a key measure of your success, and although a huge chunk of that responsibility sits with you, there is also a big part of it that rests on the shoulders of your management and your peers. The more they enable and support you, the better equipped you will be to demonstrate your worth, start contributing and relieve the pressure created by the vacancy that you’ve filled.
Remember that they were new once too, and probably had the same questions when they first started. Consider the fact that you may even be raising a question that nobody has ever thought of; if this leads to some form of process improvement, efficiency drive or positive change, you can count that as a significant win all round. Sometimes it’s the freshest eyes that spot the most glaringly obvious of problems.
