Eight

We were having dinner at Chili's when my brother's girlfriend asked me, 'Ate, how long have you been working?' And that's when I realized that I totally forgot all about it...yesterday marked my 8th year working at Accenture. My 1st and so far, only job. Whew! Imagine that...8 years...I never imagined I'd last this long. Who would have thought that I, a Marketing Management major, would find a career in IT?!

Only 4 of us batchmates are still in the company and we can't deny anymore that we are indeed old. There was this statistics thing that came out last month and it showed that about 97% of the current headcount of our Manila office were hired after us. Wow!

We fondly remember those days when we were still in MSE and Philam where our bins were so big that we can fit into it (seriously!), Christmas parties were just held in the ballroom of hotels and we can all fit, we knew everyone in the project, there was still the concept of communities and we all looked forward to the quarterly community event where we get to leave work early and have a big party (not to mention having all of our leads leave us behind when they have their community event...hihihi), when PFFs were way easier to make than the AOs that we have now...oh, and Joe Forehand was still the CEO!

A lot of things have changed since then and we've adapted to the ever changing times. I've had multiple projects, handled several teams, met a lot of people, been onshore several times...and I'm sure that a lot will still happen in the coming months and even years.

Who knows what's in store but one thing is for sure, I'm thankful for having a good job and for all the opportunities that came my way. And most importantly, I'm thankful for all the people I've worked with and those who are still around until this day...they've definitely made those stressful work days bearable and at the same time, they've become a big part of my life. We are not merely co-workers, colleagues or just officemates...but we've grown as friends who go beyond tech designs, reviews and coding.

Eight years is indeed a long time and I just hope that what's up ahead will be as memorable as what the past years have been... :)