Being “First” Can Sometimes Be The Worst
At this point in my career, I’ve somehow managed to occupy more first-time or new-to-the-organization roles than legacy ones. I don’t know why; it just keeps happening! Given that, I’ve gleaned some valuable lessons from my experiences being the first person in a role at an organization. I haven’t made up my mind about whether I would enthusiastically recommend someone gravitate towards these types of roles. As the title reads, being first can sometimes be the worst. However, I have a list of considerations and perspectives that may be useful to someone weighing whether to accept a newly created role with an employer.
Do you want to blaze a trail, or continue on a well-laid path?
Taking on a newly-created role is an exciting opportunity to choose your own adventure, in many ways. You can flesh out a job description every single day by leaving your distinct mark on a role—you’re the first one in it, so you are setting a precedent in nearly every way. You can shape the role such that others who come after you will either fit or break your mold. Instead of living up to someone else, you are the only thing this organization—and your colleagues—will know. For me, this has always been the most exciting prospect of new roles: the hope that my contributions will set the role on a particular course, at least for as long as I am in it. In contrast, there’s a certain comfort and pride in taking the baton from someone else in a well-defined, legacy role. To be a steward of the work that’s come before is no small thing, and there may still be some room to leave your unique mark on a role before passing the baton to the next person. Deciding which of these two scenarios, or some third one, is integral when considering whether to accept a new role or a well-worn one.
Does your employer have the infrastructure of support and organizational culture of change you’ll need to succeed?
In more cases than I could have possibly foreseen for myself, I stepped into a new role at an organization that was not quite ready for the necessary change that comes with creating a new role and portfolio of work. A lengthy, detailed job description is pure theory—when the person arrives with their ideas and visions, is the organization prepared to genuinely engage and support them? Many employers are fully occupied with their current portfolios of work or are zipping from emergency to emergency. Organizational priorities can change. New roles can sometimes be, for lack of a better word, sidelined—there’s an assumption of enthusiasm and dedication on the part of the new employee; an idea that they are willing to wait months, or perhaps even years, before their work is taken seriously. In other cases, an employer’s long-term vision for a new role began and ended with the job description. Yet when a new person comes in with their own vision for the role, an employer may not be ready to consider that and might instead constrain the new person in any number of ways. Newly created roles require not just fresh people to occupy them, but also an infrastructure of support and organizational culture of accepting change and evolution. If an employer lacks either of these, newly created roles can be set up to fail.
Are you ready to advocate, educate, and build while doing the work?
There’s a common business saying that goes something like, “We are building the plane as we fly it.” I’ve always heard it in contexts where an organization is trying to remain flexible and agile by doing substantive work while also building up the environment where the work is happening. When starting in newly created roles, you are likely to be eager and ready to get to work on Day One. However, the lion’s share of the daily tasks of a new role is taken up by creating space for that role within an organization. You’ll spend an inordinate amount of time laying the groundwork for your role before executing almost anything. Laying the groundwork can look like like determining where you belong in an organizational chart without stepping on toes; figuring out your management relationships; learning the contours of your work portfolio by trial and error; and so much more. You may also spend time advocating for yourself and convincing staff members that your role is necessary, or educating leadership about the work you plan to do and its inherent worthiness. Earning trust will also take up significant time, as you are not only new to the organization itself—your role may be totally untested. These groundwork activities can be deeply frustrating, especially if you know you have a lengthy to-do list of “actual work.” In this way, newly created roles require a large measure of patience. You might not reap what you sow for many years in newly created roles. Ask yourself, what is worth the wait?
I wish I had known to consider even a fraction of the above before accepting some of the newly created roles I’ve taken on. I should add that I do not believe you can get all of this information up front, clearly, or accurately during job interviews or conversations with prospective employers. These are considerations that may become more germane after you’ve already made a decision. Nonetheless, I hope having these things in the back of your mind can prove useful in making informed decisions about what your next career move can look like.
