By MELANIE LEE

DISCUSSED: The Existential Angst that Comes About From Trying To Tell People What You Do

I wonder what these gals would say about their jobs.

The worst party I’ve ever been to happened just after I graduated from university. I found myself sitting in a circle of mostly strangers and we had to go round introducing ourselves and talking about “what we did”. How such an inane activity resulted is anybody’s guess, but there probably wasn’t enough booze to make me forget how a certain Bob happened to mention that he was “studying numbers and reports all day, but it’s a MNC so it’s a GREAT stepping stone [insert dazzling smile]”.

The sad thing is that ever since then meeting new people followed a dynamic similar to this lame party game (except, thankfully, never again with such a large group). And while I’ve always stored a set of impressive-sounding answers at the back of my head to give of the impression of being remotely capable, the cat somehow gets out of the bag.

Case Study #1: At Chi-Chi Event For Free Food

Random Lady: Oh, so you do this at so-and-so. That must be so fun!

What I should have said: Absolutely. It’s a great environment and I’m fortunate to have been offered such a rare opportunity to learn all the ropes from the ground up.

What I actually said: It’s all right, but I’ve actually been getting some really bad acne and sinus because I’m allergic to dust from the warehouse, so that’s a real bummer.

Case Study #2: At Excruciating Corporate Bonding Session

CEO: What do you want to do in five years’ time?

What I should have said: To have harnessed my fullest potential and to have applied these core strengths to bring the organization to new heights.

What I actually said: I guess I have to wait and see with this kind of economy? I mean well…hey, is it true you like barbeques?

I really hate making small talk about “what I do” because the expected cheerleaderish “Yay! I’m in a fabulous job because I’m awesome!” routine disturbs me at various levels, namely:

• a)    The idea that you present the best side of yourself by highly embellishing your job description. For example, if you have to make coffee for your boss every morning and send his jackets in for dry cleaning weekly, it’s not minion servitude, but among your “key administrative responsibilities”.
• b)   The tendency of getting framed and framing others based on occupation, which means getting to know people as they really are becomes a rare occurrence. This is why our friends from school are so precious to us – they knew us before we had namecards.
• c)    The fact that answering this question with so much consideration means that that you probably have sold out to some extent: you already see the job as an extension of yourself.

I’m not advocating that we avoid talking about work altogether because let’s face it, the job now takes up most of our lives. But perhaps we can avoid the smarmy trappings of “What do you do?” with these alternative work-related queries when meeting someone for the first time:

1. 1. What’s the screensaver on your office computer?
   This will definitely provide interesting, if not obvious, revelations on the person’s priorities. For example, my friend who loves diving has a huge photo of himself underwater and devouring a live shrimp.
2. 2. What’s your favourite office snack?
   While a seemingly trivial question, it gives a good gauge of food preferences and whether you guys are compatible enough to have a meal together sometime. You might even learn more about the other party’s food allergy history.
3. 3. Where do you plan to travel to when you next go on leave?
   This allows one to switch the topic to travel, which of course, is a much more interesting and light-hearted topic to delve into.


Rather than ramble on narcissistically about "what you do", prancing around singing ring a ring o' roses may prove to be a more cohesive affair during networking events.

Who am I kidding though? The what-do-you-dos are here to stay. And I am still struggling to find a way not to dread this question so much.  The thing is, I don’t hate work (most of the time) and I’ve actually become pretty immune to the bullshit replies. At the end of the day, the key reason why I really, really, detest being asked, “What do you do?” is because I don’t really know what I’m doing.

By “doing”, I don’t mean the actual job scope per se (can I just say my PowerPoint presentations rock?), but what am I really doing with my life. It’s amazing what accumulated amounts of sleep deprivation and pen twirling at meetings does to one’s level of self-awareness; I usually can be kept pretty happy tippity-tapping passive-aggressive work e-mails all day. However, when someone asks me, “What do you do?” it immediately jolts my subconscious to ask, “What am I doing here?”

The most emotionally draining “What do you do?” experience I had was when I met a career consultant who decided to give me a 15-minute complimentary coaching session after hearing some of my blasé work-related remarks (refer to two earlier case studies). “But Melanie, you MUST know that everyone is destined for SOMETHING. You need to create a PERSONAL VISION on how you want to make your mark in this world.” We ended our conversation with me practically in tears – not because I was particularly inspired, but because he kept pressurizing me to come up with a “growth plan”.

Convention dictates that we need to be doing something purposeful and preferably directed towards bigger and better achievements. This is probably why people go through such pains in coming up with an impressive repertoire when answering a simple question like “What do you do?”.  It’s to prove that you’re someone who’s progressing nicely along in life.

But this game plan doesn’t really work for me – life seems way too organic for such a structured path of  “doing” and my “personal vision” constantly evolves according to circumstances, or new encounters with ideas and people.

In a sadomasochistic sort of way, the “What do you do?” question is probably good in helping me take stock of whether a job is aligned with what I think is important in life at that point in time.

However, I’m still looking for ways to lessen the agony of answering you-know-what. I’ll try to see if I can get away with this: “I’m a human being and I process life’s uncertainties for a living. It has its ups and downs, but it’s been quite a ride so far.”

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Melanie Lee comes from Singapore, the infamous breeding ground of workaholics. She respectfully requests not to be queried on her current occupation.

She last wrote about what the Sound of Music taught her about life.


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