Starting a new job can feel overwhelming.
It's a huge jump from placement to full time practice and for many of you there will have been a gap in between the two.
It's important to take it day by day and week by week, so over 4 episodes of the podcast I am going to guide you through week 1-4 in your new role as a social worker. (This will also help you if you are a student on placement too!)
Reflect on how you are feeling
You may not have time to complete a reflective journal every day but it doesn't mean you can't reflect.
How are you feeling in your first week? Can you identify how that is impacting you?
Learning through listening
Sitting and listening actively is learning. You will pick up on so much by just being in the office and soaking up the conversations happening around you. This is where theory translates into practice.
Create a toolkit
While you are looking through policy and procedure start to book mark the pages that you will
need to refer to in a hurry. It might be the process for strategy meetings, or the flow chart for assessments in Working Together (2018) but whatever it is make
sure you add all the links into one folder on your computer, or save the key information to your desktop to save time in the future. You'll thank me for this one!
Build positive habits
The best time to start building a habit is now. Eating lunch away from your desk. Going for a walk to break up your day. They don't have to be big things but they will make such a difference to your day. Just because other people in your team are eating at their keyboard and working overtime doesn't mean you should.
Write yourself a letter
You are starting your journey in social work and it may be a rollercoaster of a first year. Writing a letter to yourself now, that you will get in a years time is an amazing reflective tool.
You can handwrite it and keep it somewhere safe or use a website like this one; FutureMe: Write a Letter to your Future Self.
To listen to more episodes of the podcast: