Have you grown to love a job that you initially hated?

[Happenchance]

Has anyone grown to love a job that they initially hated? What made you change your mind about it?

Just under 3 months ago I started a new role within my current organisation. Almost straight away it felt like I'd made a mistake and I've really struggled to motivate myself to do my job.

Almost straight away it felt like I'd made a mistake and I've really struggled to motivate myself to do my job.

No, but I have been in this position ^ and wish I'd left sooner than I did.. sorry if that's not helpful though!

Thanks @covetingthepreciousthings, I appreciate the honest reply. I feel like I should give it longer because it's a secure job and it's not the best time to be looking for another.

@Happenchance what is it that you don't like about your job? Does it not live up to your expectations of what you thought it would be or is it completely different from the job description? Have you changed careers and realised you preferred your old career? Sometimes it takes longer than expected to settle into a new job... new colleagues, work place environment and maybe a longer or more stressful commute in the morning or even a longer work day...

[quote CityCommuter]@Happenchance what is it that you don't like about your job? Does it not live up to your expectations of what you thought it would be or is it completely different from the job description? Have you changed careers and realised you preferred your old career? Sometimes it takes longer than expected to settle into a new job... new colleagues, work place environment and maybe a longer or more stressful commute in the morning or even a longer work day... [/quote]
It doesn't live up to my expectations. It doesn't help that I don't think that I am being trained properly.

I don't prefer my old role but feel that it was a mistake to take a different role in the same organisation, rather than leave the organisation all together.

In that case you should have a conversation with your manager if you feel you're not being trained properly as that's crucial to performing any job effectively, You need to raise this now to protect yourself professionally- basically if parts of your job aren't done correctly for a period of time the first thing any manager will say is why didn't you say before now that you weren't being trained properly?

I'm five months in to a job I know wasn't the right move. I'm no longer crying on the commute but I still don't like it. It has given me the chance to finally work out what I do want to do though and I'm preparing for this now which hopefully means I'll be able to leave after Christmas, I'm learning a lot though and getting lots of transferable skills so even though I still don't like it I can see some positives, around three months was bleak though - I don't feel as negative about it as I did then .

@CityCommuter that's a good point about covering myself. It's difficult because I will effectively be telling my manager that the person that I am shadowing hasn't been doing their job properly, so I haven't been able to observe what to do.

There is another new starter who feels the same way so I may have a conversation with him and suggest that we approach the manager together.

@Thirtyrock39, how did you work out what you want to do? I feel like that's the holy grail for me right now.

Yes.
I started a job back in November. I absolutely hated it for the same reasons as you, no one had the time to show me what I needed to know in order to do the job effectively. It was awful as I knew I was doing a shit job but I also knew it wasn't my fault. My self confidence was rock bottom.

I gradually picked up what I needed to and 8 months on I absolutely love it, more than any job I've ever had. I know I'm good at my job and get a real sense of satisfaction from it. But my god, it made me miserable for the first 3/4 months.

I'm a healthcare support worker - have always wanted to be a nurse but didn't think it was doable with shifts, student loans etc so was resigned to being a hcsw but this job has made me finally decide to apply for a nursing course-I'm basically doing shifts now and there's no other way of progressing career wise, my old job was easy but I'd done everything I could and there was no option of moving up a band, this job is really stressful and challenging and I don't feel valued so it's just made me really think what I want out of work after spending weeks trawling job adverts and trying to work out what to do

I hated my last job from about the 2nd week. I learned very slowly to tolerate it somehow for 18 months and left when I found a better role.

Sorry if this isn’t what you want too hear but it didn’t ever improve to anything other than vaguely tolerable. I shouldn’t have stayed so long - I have hangover bad habits from the job from hell that I am struggling to change.
My behaviours in my new job are very affected by my old job. I thought staying for 18 months was a respectable amount of time but really I don’t think future employers would be too put off had I left earlier.

@Happenchance just be careful that it doesn't come across that you and the other new starter are 'ganging up' on your mutual colleague. Keep the conversation calm and professional at all times to avoid appearing as 'office gossips / complainers'...

@Thirtyrock39, I'm glad you've decided to take the leap. Good luck with your course!

@mrboingboing, it's really demotivating not being given the tools to do your job. I suffer with imposter syndrome as it is.

@Twickerhun I'm sorry that you had this experience. I do wonder if I've brought some of the baggage from my previous role into this one. I started this role on the same day as a few other people who were totally new to the organisation. They were all eager to get started whilst I was already sceptical about the role because I was familiar with the organisation, so knew how disorganised it is.