9781422274859

CHAPTER 1

YOUR FIRST DAY—AND BEYOND

YOUR FIRST DAY Your first day on the job is one of the most important of your career. Everything you do or say will make an impression—good or bad. If you perform well, you have taken the first step to becoming an important and reliable member of your team. If you crash and burn on your first day—or simply fail to make any type of impression because you were shy and stayed in your cubicle all day—it’s going to be hard to change your coworkers’ opinions about you. Have you ever heard the saying “You never get a second chance to make a first impression”? It’s important to keep this in mind on your first day. Janice, a paralegal at a large law firm in Los Angeles, wishes she had. “On my first day at the law firm, I was so shy,” she recalls. “I barely made eye contact with anyone I was introduced to and could hardly get a sentence out.” Janice describes herself as confident and outgoing, but something about being around hundreds

Your First Day—and Beyond

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