My First Week Working in Publishing

Coming your way with a very special blog post this week. I have just completed my first week working in the publishing industry! Some of my readers may be aware but last year, I completed my masters in publishing at Oxford Brookes University and have spent the time since handing in my dissertation working for a whisky distillery as a Marketing Assistant, primarily undertaking content and copy writing tasks. I applied to a handful of publishing roles here and there but always had my heart set on Oxford University Press and had done since learning to read with their Oxford Reading Tree titles as a toddler but I never thought I'd even be realistically considered. An oppurtunity came up and after one interview I managed to land the role so this week I was able to begin my career in production at OUP working on children's books. Here's how my first week went: Monday My week started with an induction on Monday morning, followed by a 121 with my new Line Manager which took up the entire first half of my first day. Essentially, it was a tsunami of information surging my way ranging from how we log holiday through our HR portal to the myriad of discounts and perks available to OUP employees (there a SUBSTANTIAL amount if you're wondering). I had my lunch hour and then realised the beauty of working from home is I don't need to be dressed from the waist down so changed into my pj bottoms and lived my best life reading through the new systems I was expected to get to grips with during my first few weeks or so. Overall, it was a pretty chilled day. Tuesday On my seocnd day I was invited to come down to the office. If you're Oxford based, chances are you have seen OUP in person before but it is fricken glorious. I'd been drooling over it for years and had always been dying to see what it looks like inside and now, I'm in the know. The long and short of it is It's HUGE. We have a gym, library, cafeteria, modern meeting areas/offices, a coffee shop, museum and over 2.5k employees. I met people who have been at OUP significantly long term and told me they still get lost and don't understand the whole building yet.

My day started with being greeted by my staff card which I'll forever be heartbroken over. I have no idea who HATES me in the printing department but I need to have words. It soon picked up when I saw my office space for the first time and met my team members who are all fantastic. I spent the day wondering around on mini tours, shaking a lot of hands with people whose name I have zero recollection of and shadowing my assigned work buddy. My job looks confusing and I'm scared. Help? Some friends I have at OUP took me off site for lunch which was a really lovely day to break up the working day and for sure a tradition I'll aim to continue. Wednesday Wednesday began in a very exciting way, I had a few meetings to sit on where new titles we are working on were presented and we were given a rundown of our performance with suppliers across the globe. Throughout my first week I sat in on lots of meetings with various departments in the education division and spent the entire time trying to strike an equilibrium between my boundless enthusiasm and my rising imposter syndrome. On Wednesday I decided to celebrate getting halfway through my first week without passing out from excitement so I took myself out on my lunchbreak to the Gloucester Green market and had a small picnic of some of my favourite foods available there.

Thursday By Thursday I have to admit, I was starting to miss the office already. I spent the majority of my Thursday completing my mandatory training. This included ethics, antibribery and working through my working from home assessments which, made me feel pretty valued as an employee. They get us all to complete frequent WFH assessments in order to make sure we have a suitable set up and equipment e.g computers at eye level and if they aren't satisified they will order you equipment to improve your comfort and safety. I was falling even more in love with my new job and I still hadn't even technically started doing anything other than observing and furiously scribbling down notes yet as I had to wait for various systems and accounts to be set up in my name.

Friday Friday was a bit of a daunting day for me because I had scheduled a handful of 121 meetings with my new collegues. A lot of them were considerably higher up than me and have worked for the company for decades and with me currently not 'working' on any specific projects i felt a little awkward about what to say. Thankfully, everyone so far has been incredibly warm and welcoming, especially the women I sit with in the office and will be working more closely with. We have plans in the work to meet up for coffee and get to know each other a little better and visit the OUP museum together. Yes, have a museum on site.... Thankfully, I was granted access to a lot of new systems on Friday too so I spent a chunk of my day logging into various pieces of software and trying to begin with familiarising myself with them. Fingers crossed this means shortly I can start to take on some work. Friday evening was very wholeosme because it was my housemates birthday so we had a cosy film night together with snacks and lots of mimosas and catching up. All 3 of us work fulltime in different industries so we can often go weeks without properly crossing paths. The mimosas were for sure needed after an anxiety inducuing week.

The concept of a weekend is entirley alien to me. I broke in the first weekend of not working long hours the way any 20 something white girl would- with a smashed avocado bagel, furious levels of housework and screaming the entire Hamilton playlist horrifically off-key. Can't wait for more. Watch this space for publishing career girlie updates xoxo