10 Essential Work Items For The Newly Hired Graduate

Entering the adult world and the workforce is equal parts exciting and terrifying. If you want to feel prepared for your first day on the job, these essential work items can help you walk through the door in confidence. These items will keep you organized, fashionable, and professional. Plus, they help you develop a routine that will surely lead you to success. They are just the tools but you’re the mastermind building the perfect future.

1. Bag Or Purse

Having a professional-looking purse or bag makes you look and feel empowered. It’s one of those essential work items that is truly a treat for yourself and a great investment. In order to determine the perfect purse or bag, you’ll need for your first day on the job, consider all the items you’ll need to take with you on your commute and to the office. Are you carrying a laptop, a planner, a charger, and a wallet? You might need a bigger bag with a dividing insert to keep everything organized and chic.

If you’re a minimal traveler, you might only need a small shoulder bag to tote around. If you prefer a backpack style, that’s completely acceptable but just make sure it’s not the Jansport stained and torn bag you’ve been carrying since highschool.

2. Lunch Box

Just because you’re making money in your new adult job, doesn’t mean you need to spend it every day, especially on lunch. You’ll quickly learn what it means to have the ‘we have food at home’ talk with yourself when you review your debit card transactions. A lunch box, which comes in plenty of modern and trendy styles, serves as an essential work item for any newly hired graduate entering the adult world.

Preparing lunch the night before and packing it into your cute new lunchbox will make your morning calmer and more enjoyable. When lunch rolls around, you won’t have to splurge on a meal or force yourself to starve to save money. Starving yourself is never the answer. Coming into your new job with a packed lunch will show your boss and co-workers you’re prepared, collected, and ready to grow as an adult. What a powerful message to pack into such a small essential work item.

3. Blue Light Glasses For Screen Time

At nearly every job on the market today, odds are you’ll be spending a significant amount of time in front of some sort of screen. Our generation is lucky enough to see the consequences of extended screen time and have access to tools that help counteract the development of ailments later on in life. If you’re one for fashion, blue light glasses will minimize the damage to your eyes and expand your wardrobe.

Make a statement in your eye ware and an unspoken one to fellow co-workers that you care about your health. This essential work item will make for evenings that lack headaches, dry eyes, and overall fatigue from extended screen time.

4. Note Pad Or Notebook

On the first day of your new job, a lot of new information is going to be thrown at you. This essential work item will become your saving grace in the first few months of your job as you use it to integrate into the culture of the company. Use the notebook to take notes in meetings — remember those note-taking skills you learned in college — time to put them to use, write down acronyms or jargon you don’t understand, and most importantly any questions for your supervisor or mentor.

While a vast majority of companies provide standard legal pads or notebooks, bringing your own on the first day means you can take it back and forth between work and home to review your day in a less stressful environment. Using the company provided writing material might be best served to be kept on your desk as a place to write down to-do lists or daily reminders for yourself. This would be a work item that will solely live on your desk.

5. Watch

If you wear an Apple or similar style watch, this might be a catch-22. While it serves many amazing purposes, you don’t want to be using your watch to check text messages at work, open notifications, or any other purpose than checking the time. This could prove difficult if checking your watch every time it vibrates is an unconscious reflex.

Going to stores like Charlotte Russe, Charming Charlie, or Forever 21 offers cheap but fashionable wrist accessories. It will prevent you from becoming distracted by technology throughout your workday. This essential work item helps strengthen your time management skill, which is essential for success in both personal and professional life.

6. Deodorant

It might not be the first thing you think of when making a list of essential work items, but you’ll be thankful to have this on hand when the time arrives. Maybe you’re getting a quick workout in on your lunch break, maybe it’s hotter in your office than you were expecting, maybe you’re extremely nervous, maybe your new co-workers just invited you out for drinks after work. Whatever the case may be, having a handy and portable deodorant makes any of these occasions easier.

Your professional look extends past the clothes and gets right down to the basic hygiene professionals expect from employees and co-workers. Plus, it’s a human courtesy to not offend other patrons with and unintended nose attack. Deodorant helps combat smell as opposed to body spray which will just try to mask the musk.

7. Water bottle

When you’re not constantly moving around and sitting sedentary, it can be hard to remember to occasionally sip on the all too important H2O. Placing a stylish water bottle front and center on your desk will not only have you reaching for it more frequently throughout the day but will also have your new co-workers complimenting and starting conversations with you.

It’s an essential work item that will maintain your health and keep you energized throughout your workday. Some offices offer complimentary coffee, sodas, or other beverages, but water should be your primary drink throughout the day. You’ll want this essential work item even away from work because if you haven’t already gotten into the habit of taking a water bottle with you everywhere, you will soon.

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8. Planner

You would be surprised how many essential school items make the transition into essential work items. A planner proves the importance of keeping track of tasks and meetings. Often, your work will have its own management systems such as Microsoft Outlook or Google Calendar that makes your schedule editable by others and tells them when you’re available. However, you’ll want your own planner, be it paper or digital, you can carry home with you.

It’s important because you’ll be able to review important work deadlines, meetings, and tasks at home and it will help you decide to say yes to activities. Additionally, you can review it either in the morning before work or the night before to prepare for the day and not feel frazzled when you show up to the office. This is one of the essential work items keeps you from losing your mind and focused throughout the day, week, and months.

9. New Outfit

When you dress confidently and professionally, you perform better. It’s science and there are plenty of studies to prove the statement. You’ll want to walk into your new position feeling confident and prepared to tackle the day.

Target, Marshalls, Forever 21, and plenty of online stores offer professional clothes suitable for a recent college graduate budget. While you may already want to buy some new clothes for your new position, you’ll be able to justify it as one of the essential work items knowing it will help you perform at your highest level. Be sure to check with HR before your first day and see if they can provide you with company policy in regards to the dress code.

10. Travel Mug

If you’re a tea drinker, coffee connoisseur, or protein shake professional, having a travel mug makes your morning beverage portable for your commute. It will save you time in the morning and won’t leave you feeling like you need to inhale the drink without actually enjoying it. Plus, as one of the essential work items makes you an environmental warrior because you won’t be stopping and getting a daily morning coffee in a single-use cup.

As you walk out the door, with your lunch, purse, and travel mug in hand, you’ll feel ready to tackle your first day. Your boss and co-workers will be impressed and first impressions are everything.

What else do you think are essential work items for the newly hired graduate? Share the article with any of your newly hired graduates to prepare them for the first day on the job.