Like most twenty somethings, typical conversations since leaving school go as follows: “How are you? How have you been? What have you been up to?”. For some people, these are pretty straightforward questions. For me…not so much. Especially that last one. That’s not because I haven’t been “up to anything”, but rather, because I’ve gotten the opportunity to explore quite a few different jobs and interests. For some, switching jobs more than once in a short period of time is frowned upon. But I would argue, how will you ever know what you’re meant to do if you don’t get out and explore? In fact, my recent adventure in “job hopping” has helped me learn more about myself than I thought possible.
I’ll start at the beginning. My initial life plan had me pursuing a career in law. But you know what they say about making plans and God just laughing. While in school, I interned at a small law firm. Though I was learning a lot, I found that my heart wasn’t in it and so I left after a year.
I remember the day after I left that firm, walking around campus, unsure of what I was going to do next. So I did what many college students do when they’re having a rough time; I decided to engage in some retail therapy.
Being on a college campus, options were limited unless I wanted to have a spree at the bookstore. I stumbled upon a new store called “Peppermint Park” and decided to walk in. As I was shopping, I made conversation with the one store associate on duty. We bonded over the store playlist, and I asked her about the company and what had brought her working there. She explained how it was a new venture and that she was doing most of the work alone while her manager was out of town.
I looked around the store, and a strange idea struck me. I said, “You know, since this is a new store, if you guys need a social media intern or something I would love to apply”. It seemed like a silly idea at first, but the more I thought about it, the more it interested me.
This was right around the rise of Twitter and Pinterest, and being an active social media user myself, I had seen how brands had made use of it to expand and knew there was a lot of potential for this store to do the same thing on campus.
Much to my surprise, Ana (the store manager) was all for it! She said she would have to run it by her superior, but she was excited about working together. I left and came back the next day to find out that I was officially hired! And thus, my foray into the social media marketing world began.
I didn’t know too much about clothes, but being the quick study that I am, I was able to adjust quickly. My duties included pricing and inventory, establishing and maintaining. social media accounts, as well as coming up with campaign ideas to execute to increase awareness and foot traffic in the store. Being that it was a small store with a small staff, I had to learn how to work on multiple tasks at once, as well as be able to work independently and take initiative, in this aspect it was similar to my job at the law firm. However, the major difference in these two jobs was that I got the opportunity to flex my creativity while coming up with social media campaigns. This was also the part I enjoyed most about working at Peppermint Park, and why I believe I was very good at it.
Unfortunately, sometimes there are things outside of your control, and good things don’t last. After just under a year, the primary owner of the store had decided to sell to a new owner. That new owner decided they wanted to start completely from scratch with a new staff and sadly I had been let go. And because bills wait for no woman, I had to find something new. I couldn’t find any open social media intern positions, so I decided to work in the office of my parent’s company while I worked on the next steps in my career.
It’s been a few years since I’ve worked at Peppermint Park, but I learned a valuable lesson: sometimes you have to take a risk to find the job that’s really right for you. Even though my time there wasn’t extensive, it was the first time working at a job where I enjoyed what I was doing every single day. I never would’ve learned about this other side of myself had I stuck to my original plan and stayed at that law firm. I’ve learned my lesson about sticking to a “plan” and being open minded. I’m sure God is having a good little chuckle at my expense, but I don’t mind.