The Decline of the "Good Students in the Workplace": 31 Types of "Original Corporate Traumas" Experienced by Young People

 

This is the "Confession Room for the Youngsters" column. There's no priest here, but a quiet "confession seat" is reserved for you.

We're collecting the innermost thoughts of young people, encouraging them to reveal their deepest yearnings. Sincere expression itself is full of power.

This is the 4th issue of the "Confession Room for the Youngsters". Let's talk about your traumas from your first company.

 

The most touching love words in the world: "I can listen to you talk about your traumas from your family of origin." But, have you ever heard of "traumas from your first company"?

The first company you join after graduation is the first stop for you to step from campus into the workplace. However, the process of socialization in your first company is often not smooth. In the early stage of their careers, young people who have just graduated from college still have simple illusions about the workplace environment. They don't know the difference between social people and students, the difference between the interpersonal environment in companies and schools, and how to define a "normal" workplace. In the "first company", every young person stumbles and gropes like a newborn baby in a new world, and thus may suffer from wrong guidance and "mental kidnapping".

More and more young people don't develop a sense of attachment to their first company. Instead, they're left with long - lasting shadows. It's the season for graduates to enter the workplace again. The "Institute for the Youngsters" has launched a collection of stories about "traumas from the first company". More than 100 friends resonated deeply and told their stories to the "Institute for the Youngsters". Of course, there are also opposing voices: "Young people are becoming more and more delicate with each generation. Working is not starting a business. There's no need to get too emotional."

Whether it's fake pain or real trauma, please judge for yourselves. Let's rediscover those broken moments left in the first company.

 

 01 

@Xiaoping

My first job was as a pharmacy clerk. I was constantly suppressed there. For the same thing, it was right the first time, wrong the second time, wrong again the third time, and right again the fourth time? And then came the scolding. Going to work was like going to a funeral. That was really how I felt at that time. I doubted my ability every day and wondered if I could do anything well.

 02 

@Gaogao

Every time before sending a message to a client, I would carefully check it several times. I was also very nervous when sending the message, afraid of making a single mistake. (But actually, no one cares. I once had my leader throw things because of a typo.) I dared not ask questions. I would struggle with myself for a long time before asking a question, thinking carefully if the leader had mentioned this before. Once, I forgot something he had said and was severely scolded...

 03 

@Tiegang

One weekend, I was in my rental house in Liangxiang. I received a call from my direct leader, asking me to call a Didi for him to pick him up from home and take him to meet someone in Xiangshan. I also had to keep in touch with him at any time, asking him where he was exactly and where he would get on the car after the meeting. Why did such a simple thing have to be remotely operated by someone far away on the other side of the city, making it so complicated? I guess he just wanted to save his own money, let me pay in advance and then get reimbursed, and show his superiority as a leader being served.

 04 

@Q_Qiao

It's a family - owned company. The boss's sister and brother - in - law manage our department. They know nothing about the business. The people below not only have to do the work but also train them. They scold people every day, not only scolding us but also each other. They throw keyboards and cups. The company even partitioned a small room for each of them. The woman even shaved her head to show her determination to focus on performance. She's such a drama queen! The company also promotes a so - called family culture, shouting about being a big family every day, but not paying well. Then they want to fire employees while saving money, finding all kinds of ways to make things difficult for you. No one dares to leave work on time. If you leave, they'll make sarcastic remarks. It was a huge shock to my young mind. It was so scary!

 05 

@G Rider

I want to tell my colleague I'm dealing with to transfer to a human operator.

 06 

@Sunshine Beauty

I joined a startup company in 2015 and worked with the boss for 3 years. At first, it felt okay, but later I increasingly felt that the boss was PUAing me. He always questioned me on weekends why I didn't look at my phone, which made me constantly stare at my phone later, afraid of missing any messages. I always felt that the boss was "monitoring" me at work.

 

 07 

@Axin

The starting point of the trauma is not "an outburst one day", but "being constantly drained": When problems arise, it's never about "how to solve them" but "whose fault it is". There's no accountability process, but every time there's a problem with a project, I'm the first one to be interrogated. No one directly blames me, but every time there's an accident, they always attribute it to "you didn't synchronize".

I'm not being discussed about the work content, but about my personality. Labels like "lack of professionalism", "sarcastic", and "emotional" don't help me grow. Instead, they're emptying my confidence in work. When there's a problem with a project, there's never a solution in the group chat. There's only emotional venting and moral superiority. No one says "what should we do next to remedy it". There's only "how could you do this". You want to focus on the matter, but they always take it to a personal level. You talk about logic, but they throw out rhetoric.

 

 01 

@Lalala

The first company has a rule: If you're absent from work, one - third of your salary will be deducted first, and then the normal deductions will be added (late arrivals are deducted according to the late - arrival policy, and leaves are deducted according to the leave policy). Absence means not having full attendance. Being late, leaving early, various types of leave including sick leave, and leaving the company before the end of the month are all considered absence. At that time, the young supervisor sitting next to me endured a stomachache for an afternoon without going to the hospital because the cost of taking sick leave was too high. Almost all colleagues who left the company had one - third of their last - month's salary deducted because few people left exactly on the last day.

 02 

@Anlan

I joined a 996 company at that time. It exploited employees without end. The business trip arrangements were so absurd that I had to get up at 6 am, visit multiple companies in between, and arrive at the hotel at 9 pm. The atmosphere of not treating people as human beings was really despairing.

 

 03 

@Crazy Bean Sprout

My first job after graduation was in a big company. In theory, we had one sick - leave day per month. About three months after I joined, I had diarrhea and asked my leader for sick leave. He said no and asked me to provide proof. I thought to myself, do I have to take a photo of it for you...

 04 

@Friends Who See This Will Never Work Overtime

My first company is a design institute in a first - tier city. Overtime work for drawing in design institutes is notoriously horrible: One all - nighter per month, "leaving work after 11 pm" for two weeks in a row. After an all - nighter of drawing, I'd take a shower the next day and go for a presentation. It's normal for me to work two days and then take one day off. I'm used to it. After a few years, I left. My monthly salary was 8,000 yuan in the first year and dropped to 5,000 yuan in the third year. The pay was getting less while the overtime was still the same, incredibly high. I could do better in other jobs.

Later, I switched to another industry. I only worked overtime until 10:30 pm three times in three months, and I could basically leave work at 6 pm for the rest of the time. My salary didn't drop much compared to before, and my leader even felt sorry when I had to work overtime and came to comfort me, which really shocked me. A colleague in my current company asked me: "Why don't you complain at all when you're asked to work overtime?" I replied: "Working until 6:30 pm doesn't count as overtime." I used to draw all night long. I cherish my current life very much. There's a saying in the architectural field: Anyone who has worked in a design institute will be satisfied with any other workplace, and they'll definitely be the ones who can out - overtime others in the new company.

 05 

@No Nickname

The first company only has one day off per week. It's guaranteed that you won't rest on Saturday, and it's not guaranteed that you'll rest on Sunday. Once, I finally got to rest on Sunday and didn't work overtime on Saturday. I went home directly at night. Just as I got on the high - speed train, the team leader called and asked if I could come in on Sunday to handle a work task that wasn't completed properly.

 06 

@Lilian

The company has an overtime culture. Overtime is seen as a sign of a positive work attitude and high work saturation. After I completed my work tasks, the leader said I didn't work overtime and lacked team spirit, and then fired me. Not working overtime has become a sin. The company only looks at overtime hours, not at the work completion rate.

 07 

@Xingchui

There are not only traumas from the first company but also from the first industry. The auditing industry can turn normal people into super - exploited workers. I became a project manager at the age of 25. For four consecutive years, I worked more than 3,300 hours per year. The craziest week on record was 140 hours. There were always quick - acting heart - saving pills and painkillers in my bag. The leader PUAed me every day and constantly urged the progress. The number of staff was getting smaller and smaller. I was used to working alone from dawn to dusk, but there was always more work to do. There was no way to escape this whirlpool except to quit.

After I left the company, I joined a new one. I still couldn't leave work on time without a guilty conscience. I could always find something to do for myself. When I occasionally had a weekend off, I'd constantly scold myself in my heart for being lazy and couldn't do anything. I'm trying to see a psychologist, hoping to get better one day.

 

 01 

@PotatoDoudouzi

There's a female video - editing supervisor in my first company. I'm a designer, but she asked me to help with video editing. Her reason was that we're a team and should stick together. If they couldn't finish editing, then we should all work overtime until it's done. One time, after working overtime too late, a colleague in the same department was so hungry that he ate the spicy strips on her desk. The next day, she went crazy, shouting and asking who had touched her things. At first, I thought she had lost something valuable. It turned out to be spicy strips, a kind called Dadaorou. The final result was that the colleague apologized and sent her a box of spicy strips by express delivery that same day.

 02 

@Shiji Niangniang

My last work experience in Shanghai was in a very small startup company. Although I knew it's better not to go to small companies, it was really hard to find a job, so I thought I'd just make do. Unexpectedly, a female colleague has a foot fetish (she secretly took pictures of us in the company