Every 18th of June

I turned 32 this year. Yep, gross right? My vision of my 30s is one that I am mad successful, with my own family and have a huge-ass group of friends that I’ll have a hard time choosing which group I’ll have brunch with. But you know what, that wasn’t the case at all. So I’ve been separated with my husband more than 2 years ago now. I actually think this is the first time I’ve ever formally talk about it. If this thing is even formal at all. Not everybody liked my actions. I didn’t like where my head was, nor my actions. But one thing is for sure – was that I wasn’t happy . And to me, selfish or not, 50% of the marriage life is mine and I want to be whole again.

I lost a lot of people because I’ve hurt a lot of people in the process. I don’t open up very easily, or at all because I always thought that I need to hold on to everything perfectly or else I failed. I failed once in my life, and I thought that was enough in a short lifetime.  Having said that, I tried to move on, or rather I tried to escape from the responsibility and pain. But on certain Sundays, it will hit you (Author’s note: Look up Sunday neurosis). When 2017 began, I started reaching out to people. Some people reciprocated, others’ responses were as dead as air if air had life. At some point I fell abandoned, almost depressed. But I pick up still because the other facets of my life were still glowing. I had a good career, understanding colleagues, I’m an “influencer” and I was practicing yoga.

What changed this year was I stopped reaching out and start letting go. At the end of the day, friendships are a two-traffic. It’s a hard responsibility and yet it is still a choice. Slowly, I’m regaining my confidence and I’m more content and in control of my life. Sometimes, Sunday is still a drag but on most days it’s awesome.

Edited to add some favourite raw photos from Bali :)

Hanna

Hello guys, it’s been awhile. I know I only talk about fashion, beauty and travel in this space. But I'm feeling rather motivated to share some thoughts on the corporate world since I have a full-time job. To soften the topic, let me include some photos from Northern Territory, Australia.

Not shying about my age, I’ve been working for almost a decade. I've worked in the financial services space both here and abroad, and specifically within marketing. Not a career I would have chosen if you ask me, but that's for a different blog post. In all the companies I've worked for, one thing is common in every and any strategy meeting - the need to become more customer-centric. And in the quest to customer centricity, I've seen people development, specifically internal development become management's bottom priority. But, let me outline why it shouldn't be. 

Less change, more time to innovate

As they say, change is an important facet of life. The better you are at adapting to change, the more robust you’ll be. I would agree to some extent that is good, that’s why people take holiday breaks and travel overseas. For the much needed breather and reset. But it’s different when you hire external candidates, you stop the process of producing and you pause to train a new person. The external hire would need to spend a lot of time adjusting to a new learning curve, and with that time – nothing is produced. If you hire internally, you don’t need to start from the beginning (i.e. introducing the company handbook or pointing where the toilets are) but rather you can deep dive directly on what’s important – new ideas!

Internal candidates know what the root cause of the problem is

Apart from saving time on understanding administrative stuff. Internal candidates have been in the rough and know what the problem. Easily, they can offer up at least three solutions to fix the problem The reason why managers tend to look elsewhere for talent is they feel existing employees don’t think outside the box - "it’s not creative " or "it’s too conventional". Truth be told, internal candidates often take the “easiest path” as they have their BAU (grunt) work that needs to be done. Give the internal candidate the chance to work on real projects that requires strategising and thinking at least once a week, and I'm telling you they'll shine.

More cost-effective in the long run
In search of your hard-to-find unicorns, you either need to exhaust the energy of an internal recruiter or hire a head-hunter to find you that person. At that point, the company has already bled money. And again, during that time period, nothing is being produced. Why not spend it on external training and workshops for your internal candidate? A little can actually go a long away.

Most employees believe me or not don’t want to be job hoppers. They’ve built their network in the office, they are personal fans of the brand and they are actually happy. Loyal employees are the best kind of brand ambassadors (and trust me, I work in Marketing :)  The term “home grown” talent is rare especially in the financial services world in Singapore where the job market is very fluid. I look up to home grown talents because I know they’ve swept the floors and probably slept on it too and have rose to levels of management. They worked hard, and they’ve been through the ugly so they end up being good people managers too. They know the ins and outs of the company, they personally use the brand and I bet you, when you start producing under garment in that brand they’ll probably wear that too. I personally had managers who were home-grown, and I loved working with them. Why? Because they understand real hard work, they can relate and empathise, they can be very good mentors. But what I’m really more proud of are the companies who recognize them. They hire fresh graduates with no experience, but with booming potential. They take risks and they invest in them. They hire young jobbers who has a vision and are very driven, they provide them with the resources and tools to succeed. Some companies reason out that employees carve their own path. My take is that it should be 50/50 – employees shares what they want to achieve and the company puts their skin on the game and carve a path for them too.

Love,

Hanna

E-mail me: hannatantoco@gmail.com