From college to the working world, the transition to copywriting can be a big one. No matter if you attended the best program in the country or your local college, there are things you won’t learn in school. Now don’t get me wrong, school teaches you a lot of life skills. These include skills such as time management (submitting the discussion board post before 11:59 pm), responsibility (paying rent on time), and independence (learning how to cook). But it doesn’t mean you’ll go into your first career job knowing everything. If you’re about to start your first job and feel like you’re not exactly prepared, this one’s for you.
Finishing college is a major accomplishment and you should be proud of your degree. Even with the diploma in your hands, it's normal to not feel 100% confident in starting a big girl/boy job. So let’s talk about imposter syndrome, defined by Merriam-Webster as “a psychological condition that is characterized by persistent doubt concerning one's abilities or accomplishments accompanied by the fear of being exposed as a fraud despite evidence of one's ongoing success.” This might not be you, kudos to you! But if you are anything like me, you’ve experienced this at least once before. How do you get over that feeling? Remembering that no one expects you to start a job with full knowledge of what and how to do things. This is why onboarding exists in companies. There has to be a transition in which you learn how the company operates. You learn the specific processes to follow and get situated with the expectations of your role. You should know that you possess soft skills of great value that go beyond the knowledge you acquired in school. These skills help you be a hard worker, team player, and responsible adult. Most importantly recognize that starting a career comes with a lot of making mistakes. Before you beat yourself up keep in mind that these are learning opportunities that allow you to improve as you go.
I will say there are many ways college prepared me for my career. In school, I had many group projects, typically randomly assigned groups. At the time I might have been a little upset at the professor for not letting us choose our own groups. However, looking back at it, I am very thankful for learning how to work with different types of people. This translates into the agency life in which we at Tribu have the opportunity to work with partners, from all different industries, personalities, and availabilities. Additionally, there are some things you’ll just have to learn as you go, and in my opinion, that’s the best way to learn. During my month here doing copywriting at Tribu I have learned a lot! I’ve learned about the power of AI, the lifesaver that is Grammarly, and how to use other valuable platforms such as Asana and Brandwatch. Now I don’t blame my college for not teaching me these platforms because they are specific to my job here as a content marketer. But as I mentioned, it’s all part of the learning process.
Finding the perfect job for you might take a few years, or you might get lucky and find the perfect fit right away. For example for me, it took me almost a year to find this copywriting position at Tribu in which I feel that my skills are constantly challenged, and am pushed to continue to grow every day. However long it takes, make everything a learning experience and enjoy every moment. Curious about what working in the fast-paced agency world looks like? Check out more of our Tribu blogs!
