The beginning of February marks seven years working at the student union for me, and although I quickly became familiar with the annual rotation of our working community, the new year is always an exciting time period. As TREY’s Executive Board changes annually, half my colleagues change with the year too. As a staff member, I have a front-row view to the orientation and growth of our new actives – and I’m hopefully doing my own part in supporting them in this.
Just as the new year is a media-sexy opportunity to re-invent yourself, it’s also a genuine new beginning to many, for example, in new association duties. As a senior association active, I find myself also pondering this in my free time: January is the time of learning new, familiarising and gearing up for the activities ahead. In the heart of achieving them are support, understanding and empathy. I wish my reflections on supporting new actives, to additionally resonate with new association actives, who have just started their year with their new duties.
I’m not the right person to write about orientation from a pedagogical perspective, but throughout the years, I’ve gained a pretty good understanding of the best environment for a flourishing new active orientation. Personally, I work towards establishing the type of environment, which I myself, as an association active, have appreciated: low threshold to ask and receive help alongside having space and time to have conversations. It’s also important to be understanding, of possible mistakes in the beginning and to things perhaps taking longer to get done. I’ve noticed that gentleness and empathy toward others encourage experimenting and attempting, because the other person is always assured that help is available, if need be. I enjoy a great sense of purpose, in my experience, provided by one of my most significant roles in the office, in supporting others. It is genuinely a joy to help.
I have seen eight Executive Boards whilst working in the student union, and the most important lesson I’ve learned is, that it’s always important to give the new actives also a socially clean slate from which to start from. It’s not fruitful to compare actives to their predecessors; the active beginning their work with familiarisation in January cannot be fairly compared to their predecessor, who left the position in December with a year’s worth of work and experience under their belt.
During the January orientations I have repeated time and time again to TREY’s Board that “there are no dumb questions”, and I strongly stand by it. Still, I hear the sentence “sorry, this is a dumb question, but…” – human, as it’s a proverbial muscle memory for many – but nowadays the inquirers are able to stop themselves and start from the beginning without apologies or undermining their own question.
My second lesson being repeated, is that it’s OK to ask for validation – even I sometimes need it, despite having worked in my position for years. It’s actually fun to revise others’ social media posts or to check the pictures they’ve made in Canva, because by providing reassurance, you can reinforce the other’s belief in their own skills, in addition to, possibly offering opportunities to evolve and grow. So, if you have moments in your daily work to offer reassurance and support, especially to those new to association work, the impact might be small for you but be immense for them. The best growth in association work is achieved together, supporting one another. The world is a daunting place at the moment, and by showing each other empathy we can do our part in trying to make it just a slightly brighter place.
– Saana, TREY’s Specialist in Communications and Advocacy who’s enjoyed herself as the Chair of more than one association