You focus your entire energy and time into getting the "dream job" and remain positively excited when you resume on your first day only to discover that from the interview and offer letter, where you now exist, is nothing more than a pimped up bureaucratic sham.
No sweat, you believe that you simply haven't grasped the intrigue of working in this environment, you are positive, so sure that the unsettling feeling in your belly is not because you KNOW that you have made a huge career mistake but it is just the jitters of meeting deadlines in a new work environment and proving yourself worthy of whatever seeming percentage this job offers, compared to your previous employment.
2 months down the line, you realize that you have perfected the art of wearing a plastic smile and sometimes fraternize with colleagues who had hung in there and have become content with their lot.
In 4-6months, you think to yourself, should the probation period be this long? What a drag! Once in a while, you are comfortable sending in a message that you are feeling unwell, even though it really is because you felt like sleeping in late or just staying away from "that office" for the day... you have no iota of guilt over this unprofessional/tardy act.
Sporadically, you glance at you resume, eventually review it and begin to search within and without for another opportunity and whilst you do this, you continue to put up appearances at your current employment, giving your best as it were and being a loyal brand ambassador.
You find it disconcerting when you do not get any immediate response from other employers. Quickly, you begin to consider that for career purposes, it wouldn't be such a bad idea if you remain with your current employer, for at least one full year. Your resume may present you as a flight risk. You sort of find your routine of existence and go with the flow and think to yourself, "˜its not really as bad as my gut tells me".
Out of the blues, you get a call for possible employment, you research the company and are quick to extol all the benefits of this new "˜employer", your current employer pale in comparison, you suffer amnesia in making sure your resume reads at least a year with your current employer.
You start the process, use learning points from your current office to negotiate. However in your excitement, you forget to look closely at the paintings on the wall or the broken fire alarm plug by the elevator, you miss the flickering fluorescent bulb in the interview room and see the well suited panel of interviewers. You inhale the great smelling air freshener and assume that the well groomed staff must wear expensive cologne.
You pay off your old employer in lieu of notice and resume at your new office, only to discover that the chair assigned to you, is held together by some crude appliance, your workspace is right next to the leaking AC (which only works for an hour the entire day) drains into an iron bucket. Of course, you think it must be due to the on-going renovation mentioned at the interview.You surely couldn't have made another mistake, oh no, the seeming increased percentage justifies that,(...it most certainly justifies your move to your new employer).
Its the end of your second week, you dust off your plastic smile and wear it with pride, who knows, maybe one of the openings you applied for this morning, may call you in for interview over the weekend. Who knows hmmnn...?!