The start of my new job

Do you remember what happened on the very first day of your job? The pictures are somehow blurred. The brain does this probably to forget a stressful situation. To be fair, I didn't really have a stressing situation. Of course, I was excited, but what did I have to do? Nothing special. Mainly listening. Apart from a few nervous laughs in the wrong moments and many new names, most of which I forgot right away, the first day went pretty well. After many conversations and explanations, the first day was already over.
Advisors often write as a tip for the first weeks: "Ask questions. Listen. Observe". So my goal for the first days was to find a way of overcoming the problem of asking "stupid" questions. Fortunately, every new colleague in our team gets a mentor. I really could ask him anything and, in addition, the team leader and the division manager gave me several opportunities to get rid of my insecurities.

But let's get to the content part. It all started on my second day. The mentor is not only there to answer the newcomers' questions, but also introduced me to his daily routine. I was able to accompany him to his project and to attend a kick-off meeting. The "job shadowing" was extremely informative for me as a newcomer, even though the technical contents sounded like a foreign language to me. It was a great start to see how a project is planned from scratch (identifying goals, stakeholders and tasks). In the next few days, I was able to attend several training courses.
Matching with the kick-off meeting I attended, I took part in a project management course in Seeheim, where I gained the basics of project management according to the textbook. During these days, I learned many new methods and innovative tools. Within the three days, we worked through the whole planning process of a project.
Why is this so relevant? As Junior Airline Consultant I will support various projects around the aviation and IT industry in the future and as a member of the DACH team, especially in the Lufthansa Group environment. My colleagues in the EMEA team, on the other hand, advise airlines outside the Lufthansa Group. The tasks of an airline consultant are very far-reaching, as I had to realize when the question "and what kind of project are you doing at the moment" always degenerated into long conversations.

Anyone who has ever worked on projects knows that there are various types of project management: In addition to the classic waterfall method, the agile variant is particularly common in the IT sector. I was able to take part in a training course in the first week and then attend an agile project. Two of my colleagues work there in very different roles: As a project organizer and as a Scrum Master. I find both roles super interesting. About 120 people from more than six teams took part in the workshop.
In short, the idea is that team members set their own goals every ten weeks for the next ten weeks. Errors from the last planning and changes in the environment can be dealt with directly. When I entered the workshop room, the environment and the volume reminded me of a schoolyard. Even though it seemed weird in the beginning, I could feel the determination of the participants and see the first results after a short time. The two very contrasting project approaches have differences, but also many similarities.

My task for the beginning was to find a project that suits me. In my next blog post, you can find out how my first project started and how my time as a Junior Consultant in the Airline Consulting Team DACH continued.

If you would like to find out more about the Airline Consulting division at Lufthansa Systems, please visit: click here.

Until then, Greetings, Paul