Today is the first last day of work I’ve ever had.
Before my current job, the only other job I’d ever had was at Starbucks. I worked there for 6 years through high school and college and I loved every single second of it. (If Starbucks could match my salary, I would sling lattes all day, every day.) After I graduated college, I wanted to move to Chicago so I put in a transfer request.
I was placed at a new store in the city. I was still applying for full time roles, and while I was between stores, I was offered a position as a Recruiting Coordinator at a tech sales company. I took the job and cancelled my transfer request. So while I technically did quit from Starbucks, I didn’t even know I was working my last shift when I was working it.
After 5.5 years in recruiting, I am painfully aware that this is my last day at this job. While Starbucks taught me that anything is possible with enough hard work and caffeine, this job taught me that if you’re not moving forward, you’re moving backward. It’s that relentless passion for improvement that pushes me to always be better today than I was yesterday — in work and in life.
The hardest thing about leaving anywhere — a city, a school, a job — is the the people you leave behind with it. And these people are simply the best (Hi guys!!). How do I know? Because not only did they let me pick what we had for lunch at my going away party, but they came anyway even though I picked Subway!
It’s been a great ride. It’s been ridiculously fun and intensely challenging. I’ve been pushed to my breaking point, and that point keeps getting further and further away. I’ve learned that every chart needs a so-what, that there’s no such thing as too many nested IF/THENs and that everything looks better in Arial 10.
Today is the end of one era, but the beginning of the next. And just like we’ve always done, we’ll celebrate today, but then we will wake up tomorrow ready for the next challenge.