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Blindsided? Yes. No interview is ever a perfect mirror of what will happen in reality. This sounds like some disconnect no one predicted. It happens. Be flexible, be curious. Take advantage of your time and start getting familiar with your agency. There are other sources of information in addition to the training class.
This sounds like a great time to read historical and managerial background info about your agency, read about the types of tasks the agency will be asking you to do. Your interview obviously gave you some idea about the tasks you would be responsible for...go online, start googling those terms, and read whatever you can find about them. Go online, look up your agency's websites and start reading the links and the topics that pop up. Why they do what they do. Ask if there are administrative procedure/policy manuals you can look through. Ask whether there's an administrative library you can get familiar with. Most offices have a "reader file" comprised of recent official correspondence received and sent that any staff can read through. Files of newspaper or magazine clippings and articles written about the work your agency does. Read them. Use your mind, get creative. Dig. When questions come up in your mind about the work use your new pens and notebooks and write them down to ask during your training. Don't just sit there staring at the wall waiting for someone to tell you what to think.
No im just not sitting there i have made the adjustments it just took a couple of days. Im reading up on all the policies snd procedures from the manuals inside the agency. That way i will be extra ready for the classroom training.
Just completed my second week for a state government job and was thrown a curve ball once I started the job. During the interview we were told that there would be 12 weeks of training inside the classroom and the remaining 9 months will be on the job training. Well since I started a few of us are still waiting for class training to start so when we sent to one of the offices where we would be once the classroom training is over. They dont have anything for else to do so we are just being paid to show up and read until the class training starts. None of us saw this coming at all but we are dealing with it and just waiting to be notified about class training. Anyone else start a job and get blindsided by something unexpected?
BTW: I bought several notebooks and pens and folders like I was back in college thinking I would be in classroom training.
Not sure anyone can expect to not have any 'surprises' in any new situation. In most cases - people simply didn't know it would be an issue for you. Or, you didn't know enough to ask that question. A few years ago, I asked about enrolling in the 401K plan a few days after i started (something we talked about during the interview as they have a generous matching and bonus structure). Come to find out, you had to work there 6 months before you were eligible. I've never heard of this - but they've been doing this for decades and simply though it was the norm in general. Thus, neither side felt it needed to be discussed during the interview.
You start a new job, you often bring some of the expectations from your previous experiences. By the same token, those have been there have established their own set of norms. Invariably - there will be areas/situations where the two don't overlap. That's just the way it is. The more flexible one is to adapt, the better they can come out of it unscathed.
all the time. good interviewers will try to disclose what they can and answer your questions honestly, but you can't expect them to cover everything, holding your hand through everything like you're being potty trained or something. You're presumably an adult or at least a teenager, learn to adapt and cope with new situations.
Hate to see how you deal with the "sink or swim" treatment. lol
Sure, I've done that. Bored while waiting to be granted access to the computer systems, etc.
You'll get there. Yes, it's boring. But frankly, I thought this thread was going to be about something like you being asked to do vastly different job duties or work different hours than they initially told you. If they're willing to pay you to sit around and do nothing, and presumably it's going to end within a reasonable amount of time, what's the real issue?
Quote:
Originally Posted by moneymkt
See I knew nothing about the government being unorganized lol
Oh dear. You do have a learning curve coming up, don't you?
Quote:
Originally Posted by gunslinger256
your situation is likely better than the normal situation many others experience. Put to work with no training at all.
This too, where they just throw you in assuming your coworkers will train you, and you have to hope that you have coworkers who have time, are nice enough, and are competent enough to teach you how to do it the right way.
Just completed my second week for a state government job and was thrown a curve ball once I started the job. During the interview we were told that there would be 12 weeks of training inside the classroom and the remaining 9 months will be on the job training. Well since I started a few of us are still waiting for class training to start so when we sent to one of the offices where we would be once the classroom training is over. They dont have anything for else to do so we are just being paid to show up and read until the class training starts. None of us saw this coming at all but we are dealing with it and just waiting to be notified about class training. Anyone else start a job and get blindsided by something unexpected?
BTW: I bought several notebooks and pens and folders like I was back in college thinking I would be in classroom training.
Sounds about right. Paying people for sitting around doing nothing. Bet it's Illinois.
... I was asking one of the permanent workers a few questions about the position and her response was...."I can't tell you because I will get in trouble"
You didn't say what kind of position it is, but this kind of indicates you are in a holding pattern awaiting background check. Not uncommon in the government but also not what many outside the gov love to comment on. Even ignoring things like classified information, which is a whole 'nother world, gov workers have access to people's and businesses' private information, financial, medical, PII, HIPPA, law enforcement history, contractual information, and a host of other things the public doesn't want floating around. So it's normal that you wouldn't have access, nor would a current worker tell you those things until you had been background checked and access verified.
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