How long does it take to feel confident and independent at a new job?

It usually took me about three weeks, the first week you’re a bit overwhelmed ,the second week you’re figuring out on how things are done, and by the third week it’s pretty much hair straight back type thing, at least for me.

I would imagine it’s very personal. For me, I’m a pretty insecure person in general, and haven’t always felt that I’m great in my field, so I expected it to take a very long time. I had a three month long internship as an undergrad where I was never comfortable. I’m in my first full-time job now, have been for almost 9 months, and I’d say I felt reasonably comfortable within the first….2 months or so. Since then I’ve been slowly getting more comfortable but even now I wouldn’t say I feel extraordinarily confident and independent. That might just be the nature of my field, though (computer science). Things are always changing, and straight out of college there is so much that I don’t know, that my coworkers might have more experience with. But I also have gotten to the point where I feel I have a bit of authority over the parts of the codebase that I’ve had my hands in most deeply.

I just feel like I have a headache and overwhelmed, a bit discouraged. I go home with the questions in my mind on things I didn’t know how to do and a list of things I still need to get done.

I basically just changed careers and went from really knowing my stuff to not knowing much at all. Been 6 months and just now starting to feel comfortable but not really comfortable. I am an expert in my old field but I was at a dead end and was constantly stressed out and leaving probably added years to my life. it was that f’ing bad Nothing like a new adventure though. Learning a whole new thing has broadened my horizons in ways I did not expect. Hang in there, those feelings are normal.

When I started the job I’m in now, about 3½ years ago, they sent a guy in to train me. He told me I had 3 days to get it and he was an arrogant ass. There was a girl there from another site that did my job. She turned on him and said that’s bull, it will take a good 6 weeks to be getting comfortable. He said too bad, she has to know it before I leave. I drove home crying and wondering what I did by taking this job. It really did take me at least 6 weeks and probably more. I would rather ask questions and do it right than to guess and do it wrong.
Good luck, but I think your good work ethic will get you through this tough time quicker than you think.

My rule of thumb is two weeks to get past feeling completely overwhelmed and being exhausted every night, and six months to get on top of it. Of course there’s room for a lot of variation there; a retail job and a software engineering position are going to be different experiences. But settling in takes a while regardless.

I always told trainees that I’d rather answer the same question a hundred times than have them guess and guess wrong. That doesn’t mean they’re not allowed to make mistakes, and minor mistakes don’t matter at all. It does mean they won’t get snapped at for asking the same thing again. It’s hard to take everything in the first time you hear it. Advertisers know this.

My take on this is that they would not have hired you if they did not see what talents and confidence you conveyed during your interview. Believe in yourself. I know the eggshells you are walking on being new but also know you are there because you were deemed capable of doing the job they hired you.

I drove my boss crazy with the 4 times daily questions and finally he took me aside and made a motion like he was taking off handcuffs and told me I was free to just go do my job as he knew I could do better than I thought I could. It was the best thing he did for me and yes I made mistakes as he knew I would but it allowed for a greater payoff for all involved.

It depends on the job and the particular learning curve. My last job it was a couple of months, and even six months into it new things came up that I didn’t know what to do. About half of those I could figure out on my own, and half I had to ask.

In jobs that were very similar to former jobs I’m 95% competent in a week. It really depends.

My trick for note taking and tracking tasks is I use a steno pad. I use the really small sticky notes to create tabs on the steno at the bottom so I can easily refer back to a topic. Daily I flip back in my steno pad to make sure I have done all my tasks I wrote down that I need to do. I draw a line through things when they are done.

I have trained many people, and I almost never got tired of them asking questions. I’d much prefer they ask than spin their wheels for hours being basically unproductive. Two weeks isn’t a lot of time. It’s normal to still have some questions.

@JLeslie wow I wish I had known that sooner!! Would’ve made easier to find my notes lol

I write everything in the steno pad. Make sure you write the date on the page too. Sometimes you can kind of remember about what month or day you wrote something down if it’s something from a while back. I use a highlighter in my notes too.

Multicolor sticky notes are helpful. I knew the orange tab was the list of everything I needed to do when a new job was created. Don’t rely just on the colors, write on the tab “new job” or for you it might be “new employee.”

@JLeslie I guess I can still kind of tab where I made notes and stuff. Thanks for the idea.

You definitely can go back and tab. If your notes are on stray pieces of paper you can staple the notes right into a steno or notebook. Get them all in one book.

I’ve had a few very independent jobs in a row with extensive on-the-job training. I felt like an idiot for 3 months, felt uncomfortable for 6 months and felt a lack of confidence for a year. After a year, I was doing pretty well. After 4 years, I started to get bored.

It’s exhausting and humbling. Hang in there, you’re doing great.

@Cupcake thanks!! Lol that sounds about right. I think it’s easy to forget what it’s like after being comfortable. This is the most detailed position but worth it because of the benefits, short hours, etc.

Thanks everyone. I’ll keep referring back to this any time it gets hard. Monday’s are always bad for some reason. Today was easier by a bit.

You should never be afraid to ask questions on a new job, I have had to train new people and always encouraged them to ask questions.
A small note pad is always a great idea, especially if the boss wants something a certain way, then a supervisor says something totally different .
Hang in there, I am getting super sick of my currant job, and scares the crap out of me to think of starting a new one but for my mental stability, I might not have a choice.

It’s difficult going from a job where you’ve been there, you know what you’re doing and you’re confident to a new job where you’re clueless and you have to ask questions and need a lot of guidance. You may also feel not so useful when you’re needy. Over time, you’ll find you’re more independent and asking less.

It’s also helpful when the supervisor and management gives you encouragement and tells you that you’re doing well and they’re happy with your work.

Some jobs are easier to learn than others. I don’t envy people who do things like cashier, because we may take those jobs for granted but there are a lot of steps and procedures, and when the public is impatient and looking at you, you’re on your feet all day and you’re making a minimum amount of money, it’s probably rough.

Is t common to expect mistakes here and there from a new employee? As long as they learn and don’t repeat?

Absolutely.

Yes, mistakes will happen. Use good judgement on when a mistake would be a disaster, and make sure to ask for help. As long as mistakes are fixable, it’s just important to acknowledge them and correct. Some jobs are riddled with possibilities for mistakes. My last job I made many mistakes even a year into it. Thing is, the person before me made mistakes after three years. My boss at times entered the same type of data I did, and he made mistakes. We had triple checks for some things, and we felt like if we found a mistake the system was working. We handled a ton of data, so even .5% mistake stats were very noticeable, and felt constant. Other jobs I have had, mistakes were not so acceptable.

I usually don’t make much mistakes but this week I’ve been making careless mistakes that could’ve been easily prevented. Stupid little mistakes like forgetting an extra letter on a name like Quinn NOT Quin…and I have a bad habit of checking it after. So I do catch my mistakes but some systems I have to contact my mentor on who to ask to fix it.
I entered the wrong benefit on a person’s profile today but caught it the second I submitted. Reason is I had two profiles up at the same time. My mentor said it happens sometimes to all of us so to prevent it from happening often to close out one you’re not working on.

I think my job is common for mistakes, which is why we walways have two reviewers but I feel sick to my stomach when I do make a mistake. It could be daylight savings time messing me up or me making one mistake and freaking out being tense which made me mess up more this week.

Now I’m triple checking my work. This isn’t a good week for me, lol. I never had so much data and systems to work with before. Different aspect of my job… I think I need to relax and just double check…

^^Here on Fluther I make a lot of typos and feel badly I’m not more careful, but it’s Fluther. At work I’m much much more careful. You will be too now that you see how easy it is to make a mistake. Slow down and edit/double check what you are doing. Most people here wouldn’t believe I’m usually the person in the office, and definitely for my husband, who edits and reads documents. My boss looked to me for spelling, his was really bad. LOL. He told me a story that while in college a particular professor marked down harshly for mistakes, not just content. He was annoyed at the time, but says it really served him very well in his career.

@JLeslie I respond on my phone here a lot so it’s easy for autocorrect typos. Too much work to correct it on here when it doesn’t cost you anything lol. Maybe good practice? Haha

My posts are filled with typos mainly because I use a phone with auto correct turned off. I usually only have a few moments or so to check in and respond so I don’t usually proof read until after the 10 min limit. Nothing to feel bad about.