Enya thrives at work and in life through self-insight and personal development.
Deloitte is a multinational professional services firm that provides audit, consulting, tax & legal, financial advisory services, and risk advisory to a wide range of clients. Of their 330,000 employees, many will take their first steps as professionals at Deloitte. Research shows that Gen Y sees personal development as a must in the workplace. This also applies to Enya, who sees great value in growing through personal development and using it to build a strong foundation in the early stages of her professional career. Already from her first day, she hit the ground running by putting a lot of focus on her personal growth, gaining valuable self-insight, and expanding her skillset with GoodHabitz’s educational content. Read all about her story!
Learnings:
1. Recognizing stress.
Stress is a natural reaction. Everyone experiences it during work, especially when starting a new job or, as in Enya’s case, her professional career. With the help of GoodHabitz, Enya learned to recognize her stress signals. This is a crucial first step in keeping her stress in check.
2. Using healthy tension to boost performance.
Stress gets a bad rep, but it can also be a useful mechanism. By using self-insight to discover what gives her energy (and what doesn’t), paired with techniques to cope with stress and healthy tension, Enya took steps to find her inner peace.
3. Improving collaboration through communication.
Enya didn’t just stop at our mental health and well-being content. Every colleague has a different way of communicating. By reflecting on her own style and learning about others, she gained a better understanding of the different ways of communicating. This creates a positive ripple effect, creating teams that embrace the unique strengths and perspectives of everyone.
4. Practice makes perfect!
Deloitte has employees from all over the world, making it vital for Enya to master the English language. By testing her current skills, gaining helpful tips, and doing tons of assignments, she was able to turn her newly acquired skills into a (good)habit.
Today is a good day to let Enya do the talking.
‘’I started working at Deloitte about a year ago, as an Executive Assistant. This was my first job, so it was an exciting but also quite stressful time. What didn’t help is that I’m someone who stresses a lot and quickly. It’s something that I ran into a lot, also during my starting period, which caused frustrations and consumed my energy. Moments of stress can feel insignificant, but they can pile up. This can lead to decreased productivity, fatigue and eventually burnout. But these challenges can be tackled through personal development. Everyone at Deloitte has their own Growth Portfolio, which really pushed me to put time and effort into my personal development. My top priority was how to deal with stress.’’
Enya is far from the only professional who experiences stress: our own global research shows that one in five employees experienced strong signs of stress in the past year. ‘’I chose to start the course ‘Oh Yes, it’s stress'. A few hours of reflecting, setting goals, and putting my newly acquired knowledge into practice. It taught me to recognize my stress signals and techniques to channel and deal with them. After the course, I started paying more attention to my breathing. This sounds simple, but it really helps me in my work and daily life. It also made me aware of the positive side of stress: healthy tension. The course made me aware of the fact , that there’s also stress that can help you. Small changes, that have big effects on my daily life and work.’’
After Enya’s first few months at Deloitte, the launch of GoodHabitz assessments took place. These online self-tests provide the insights to lead the way for effective personal development. Enya wasted no time learning about her own personal take on wellbeing, by doing the Work Happiness assessment. ‘’It only took me a few minutes, which was great! The test was a nice way to reflect on the factors that matter to me. After completing the assessment, I received a list of recommended courses. These fit me perfectly! I’m still figuring out my preferred career path, and one of the recommended courses was ‘Do Your Thing’! I’m sure you can guess which course I’ll be doing next.’’
It (Oh Yes, It's Stress) taught me to recognize my stress signals and techniques to channel and deal with them.
Putting the work in teamwork.
With thousands of colleagues, who all communicate in their own way, there’s always room to improve teamwork. ‘’My first step was to reflect on my own communication skills, and that of my teammates. The assessment "Communication Style – What Is Your Colour?" helped me to better understand the different approaches. During meetings, things can get mixed up and even clash. Being aware of the differences and each other’s styles really helps in creating mutual understanding and improved teamwork. One colleague, for example, gave an overview of our team based on the assessment. Being aware of this and mapping it out in such a pleasant way, really helped me to adapt my communication more easily.’’
As an international company, Deloitte has employees from all over the world, making a good command of the English language essential. Enya’s next step was to take these skills to the next level, with the course ‘Speak Business English’. ‘’I apply the skills I acquired daily in my work, and they’re important for my daily tasks. The course presents many relevant examples, such as sentence structure and the right language to use in a presentation. I continuously check the tips and examples from this course to push my calls, emails, or presentations to a higher level. The course is set up in an inviting, accessible, and fun way, which motivates me to breeze through it.’’
Enya has become hooked on working on her personal growth and doesn’t feel like slowing down anytime soon. ‘’I always want to keep learning and developing myself. The fact that you have so many training courses on different, relevant topics motivates me to keep going. There’s always something that matches my interests.’’
"I apply the skills I acquired daily in my work, and they’re important for my daily tasks.''
The road to Enya’s success.
Competency areas that were developed:
Educational content in the spotlight:
- Oh Yes, it’s Stress
- Speak Business English
- Behaviour Change
- Communication Style – What is Your Color?
- Happiness at Work – Oh Happy (Working) Day!
- Team Roles – What Do You Bring to the Table?
Time spent on personal development:
- 13,5 hours spent on learning new skills.
- 9 months of learning.
