Dr. Seuss once said that, “a person is a person no matter how small” and this is a simple fact that is lost on most. In our interactions with different people we often see a title, tribe, gender, class or any other classification we humans have come up with in order to separate ourselves from others. We rarely just see a person and this may not be entirely anyone’s fault because social conditioning is extremely powerful in spite of our best efforts. As it is, a person is not just a person and everyone has a story of how they came to be from childhood up to the point in life at which you are meeting them.
An integral part of anyone’s life is the early days of your career or craft and how the experiences of this time shaped the kind of professional or artist you have morphed into. Many start out with internships at companies or practices and most are usually paid in experience especially in the creative industry, save for a few good companies that give a small stipend. Most interns and apprentices are barely able to make ends meet and in Kenya, they have been known to make mandazis, sandwiches and other snacks or paraphernalia to sell at the office in order to raise money for fare and general survival. This is however not the experience of all interns and apprentices because some are lucky enough to have parents and guardians living in the city who can foot their bills thus allowing them the latitude to solely focus on their work. Many have horror stories from their internship/apprenticeship days centering around the treatment they got from seniors. Unfortunately, some are still living out this nightmare in their current workplaces.
...remember that you were also an intern or junior at some point and treat people how you would want to be treated. Thank you.
It is to be expected that an intern/apprentice will make mistakes in the course of learning the ropes, but some seniors’ damaging behaviours when addressing said mistakes are totally uncalled for and have long-lasting negative effects. These damaging behaviours range from lack of boundaries, exploitation, extreme criticism, use of insensitive and harsh words, put-downs and general hostility towards juniors. These seniors rely on coercive power to get by and are generally feared by the juniors, but no meaningful learning interaction can take place in such environments. Most interns and juniors just bury their heads in the sand rarely speaking up for fear of reprisals from the seniors. Such seniors are often labelled as bitter mean-spirited people; but to be fair, we can consider the possibility that most of them could be traumatised from their own awful experience as interns and juniors and are just doing their part to keep the cycle of toxicity alive.
Given the recent outburst on Twitter where a senior advocate was complaining about an intern taking a cab instead of walking to the client’s office, the resultant backlash the senior, and by extension, the law firm received. It is safe to say that unnecessary gate-keeping and less-than-stellar treatment of juniors and interns is still alive and well in 2022. Granted that how employees relate at work still remains a problematic issue it need not be this hectic!
To all the seniors in whichever field, industry or discipline you ply your craft in: the dispensing suffering is not the badge of honour you think it is, just correct your juniors nicely; you won’t faint imagine! It won’t take anything from you, in fact, it is good for your heart. No one has a monopoly of knowledge, even if you are self-taught, someone still had to do the work of putting that body of knowledge together for you to learn it for yourself. No one is self-made, we are all helped, it took people to get you here. Please be humble, remember that you were also an intern or junior at some point and treat people how you would want to be treated. Thank you.
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