Five hundred twenty five thousand six hundred minutes

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 “ Five hundred twenty-five thousand six hundred minutes ! “

That is how the opening song of the musical “RENT” goes. 1 year counted in minutes.

How have we lived those minutes in 2020 ? In my case, I have never applied for a job vacancy and sent out so many resumes in my life. I practically researched companies every day and wrote why I was interested in their business and the open positions. I think I spent my two hundred and twenty thousand minutes writing resumes and researching companies and applying for job vacancies.

Some people told me that a famous astronaut had sent out 1,000 resumes to get a job after his or her flight to the space, and I should follow his/her example. I duly noted the wisdom. Job market in Japan was quite slow from the end of 2020 to the beginning of January 2021. Still, luckily, there were some openings so I could at least try for my chances on them.

Looking around, so much seem to have changed and we needed to adopt to so-called “New normal”. Whether you have a job or lost a job, our environment changed. And personally speaking, I think the world has adopted to the change of communication style very quickly, within the five hundred twenty thousand six hundred minutes. 

I reckon that in many parts of the world have proven that you can actually see people across the world online, such as online meeting, online interview or online chat, that you can actually see faces through the computer screen. Communication by Teams, Zoom or Google meet was no longer limited to certain level of people in a company.

 I did bi-weekly meeting with my job agent on Teams. Normally the agent ask us to visit their office for advice and support. But in 2020, they had to adopt a new rules to use Teams with jobseekers. I felt much comfortable seeing my job agent on the computer screen. Although we don’t see each other at his office, I felt better seeing his facial expression – non-verbal communication sometimes speaks more. Other than that, my friends and I organized end of year parties online using Zoom and Google meet, taking our photograph by screen shots.

As I am writing this journal, I am not sure how this new style of communication will last. I reckon the five hundred and twenty five thousand six hundred minutes in 2020 have been spent to adopt to the new normal, and I think we all did our best. Our workstyle might continue to change after 2021 and we might be using computers and internets in more advanced style. By January 2021, most of my friends were working from home. Will that continue? Maybe we might have more advanced technology in a few years to come after COVID-19 days that could alter our workstyle completely.
And I do hope that we can look back on this change with a smile in five or ten years or so.



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