Dear Auntie Agni,
I am a 26-year-old depressed boy. I am totally confused about what to do and what not to do. After completing my graduation back in 2016, I entered the professional arena of civil engineering. There I found nothing is right or according to what we were taught in university about topics such as ’Diplomacy in the workplace’, ‘Discrimination’ and ‘Corruption’. Within a short interval of time, I quit my private job and decided to do my post-graduation with my own savings. I completed that last year. Based on my experiences in the past, my soul is not allowing me to enter that profession one more time, so I decided to go for competitive examinations and for that I need some financial support which my family is not ready to provide at this moment. And this hurdle is generating problems for me and coming in the way of achieving my ambitions.

Kindly, guide me on what I should do given the status quo. You can tell me if you find my dream ridiculous.
Depressed Boy

Dear Depressed Boy,
Please refer to yourself as a man. You are an adult. A 26-year-old man. Have you considered a career in teaching? I say this because you seem a little too attached to what you studied in university and are disheartened by what you have observed in the workplace and in the real world. Reality is very different from what we study in textbooks and there is a big debate raging around the world at the moment, about the gap between education systems and industry expectations.

‘I am not happy with my working conditions’

This is the reason why so many leading organisations in the world, such as Apple, Google, Netflix and Tesla, are doing away with the requirement for university degrees. They want to know what you can do for them, rather than what degree you have studied. Soon other organisations will follow suit.

That is not to say that your degree is completely useless. In Pakistan, you still have a better chance of landing a decent job with a degree, than if you didn’t have higher education. However if you want to survive in the real world, please do away with your expectations about how things should be. For now there is discrimination, corruption and a lack of diplomacy.

No, I don’t want to encourage you to indulge in any of this. Just accept that people do that in many organisations. More about this later. For now, I strongly advise you to create a LinkedIn profile, register on job portals and activate your network of friends to start looking for work. Yes, you have to go back to work if you want to study further and have no one who can foot the bill for your next qualification.

Once you land a job, please lower your expectations about how the workplace should be. Think about what you learnt from your last workplace. It is what it is. If you observe people behaving in a less-than-perfect manner, for example indulging in unhealthy workplace politics, just know that, wherever you work, people will not be perfect.

That is not to say that you should join them and do the same. Just learn the art of picking your battles. Not everything is worth fighting or getting into a twist about at the workplace. If something is mildly annoying at your job, let it go. If it is unbearable and diametrically opposite to your principles, think long and hard before you take any drastic action.

The best thing would be to think about your goal — the money for the competitive exam you want to take — and take your decision accordingly. So, make searching for a job your main preoccupation for now, keep your goal in sight, save the money you need, lower your expectations from the workplace and forge ahead. I wish you the best of luck.

Auntie will not reply privately to any query. Please send concise queries to: auntieagni@gmail.com

Published in Dawn, EOS, May 16th, 2021