How can college students and workers in traditional industries enter the world of operations?

1. Hello Weidong, I am a sophomore at XX University, majoring in XX. I want to join the Internet operations industry after graduation. Besides studying my major, what else should I do while I am in school? Another example: 2. Brother Dong, I work in XX industry. Now the traditional industry is not doing well, and I also want to switch to the Internet industry. After reading your article, I found myself very interested in operations. I want to join this industry, but many companies do not want me because I have no experience. How can I join this industry? Seeing so many problems in the background, I am very happy anyway, because more and more people are beginning to pay attention to the Internet and the field of operations. Today I would like to talk to you about how people outside the Internet industry should "step into the door of operations."

First of all, I must emphasize that I hope you have a basic understanding of the operation of this work and the industry as a whole. Regardless of the current positions in the Internet field, such as content operation, new media operation , e-commerce operation, community operation, user operation , event operation, channel operation, etc. A lot of the work done in operations is actually not much different from what you are doing now. For example, a reader came to me and said that he wanted to do operations. When I asked him about his work, it turned out that he was a copywriter in an advertising company. I told him, your job is operation in a sense. You need to constantly plan content, optimize content, and output content. Your job is content operation. Why bother looking for another job while still working? Another reader said that after joining an Internet company, he dealt with merchants every day, contacted various merchants, handled their various trivial matters, coordinated arrangements, etc. In the end, he began to doubt his life and asked himself whether he was an operator. I said of course you are, you can be called merchant operation or user operation. Although you may not have a similar job title, the work you do is actually no different from theirs! Later, I gradually understood that many people want to do operations, perhaps just because they are attracted by the glamorous appearance of things: exciting activities, content that goes viral on WeChat Moments; they may think that operations work will be much more interesting than their current work, but in fact, most of the work done by Internet operations is nothing more than a lot of boring, tedious and repetitive chores. Therefore, I hope that before you enter this industry, you must be clear that operations work is not more interesting than his job. In addition to the above questions, I often receive many naive inquiries from friends: Brother Dong, after doing operations, can your monthly income reach tens of thousands in minutes? My senior sister earns 10K a month after becoming a product manager . Our operations salaries should also be high, right? Weidong, I also want to join the operations industry. Can you recommend a better company to me? Work from 9 to 6 with two days off a week, just don't be too tired. Regarding the above questions, I would like to say: If you find such a job, remember to tell me, I want to go too. I would like to remind all my friends who want to join the operations industry: If you join the operations industry as a newbie, then from the very beginning you are destined to endure lower salaries and higher work intensity. It is also recognized by the entire industry that the salary growth rate in operations is slow, and high-intensity overtime is also likely. They also often have to bear strict indicators and bear various blames... Are you sure you are mentally prepared for all these?

If you are ready, let’s talk about what abilities you need to become an operator. Many readers asked me: Liu Weidong, I heard that operations require data analysis skills. If I don’t know data analysis, does that mean I can’t enter this industry? Regarding this point, I always say elegantly, dear friend, please rest assured, when you first enter the industry, your leader will definitely ask you to do a lot of miscellaneous work, and data analysis work is basically the leader's job, you just need to develop it slowly in your work. Then again, as long as you have taken high school math classes, I believe you will understand the data analysis skills required for junior operations. At least for novice operators, I think there are many abilities that are far more important than data analysis. There's no need to take it too seriously. So what abilities are very important for novice operators? I strongly recommend that your office skills must be outstanding. Whether it is Word or Excel, it would be perfect if you also have the ability to make beautiful PPT. Because in actual work, novice operators often have to take on the responsibility of handling a lot of miscellaneous tasks for their leaders, so it is particularly important to be proficient in and use these software well. For example, in addition to using Excel to report data, you can also use it to make requirements documents, project schedules, target breakdown tables, etc. Not to mention PPT, you will need to use PPT if you want to plan activities, make plans, and make reports. As an operator, if you are not proficient in using these software, it will be difficult to cooperate with your leaders and colleagues. Your boss asks you to organize a data set, but the form you submit is messy, the layout is chaotic, and there are no additional functions, so you have to redo it; your colleagues plan an event with you, and you have a good idea, but the PPT report you made is so ugly that people have no desire to read it, so your good idea is not accepted by everyone. Therefore, I suggest that in addition to reading more books on the Internet, friends who aspire to work in operations must practice their basic workplace skills more solidly. If you can't even do these office software well, how can you do so many tedious and boring things in an organized manner? And taking a step back, if someone is good at office, his resume for job applications must be beautiful, attractive and logical. When my boss was recruiting before, he would receive too many resumes every day that couldn’t even be neatly formatted and logically clear in a Word document. How can you believe that he can become a good operator after seeing resumes like this?

Of course, I am not advocating the theory that tools determine success. After all, even if you have mastered good office skills and made a great resume, you will still find yourself repeatedly rejected on the road of job hunting. What is the reason? In addition to the possibility that your academic background is not strong enough (many companies still care about academic background), another major reason is that you lack more project experience. I suggest that friends who are interested in working in operations, whether they are college students or workers in traditional industries, must accumulate more project experience and reflect it in detail on your resume. Project experience may specifically include activities you have planned, special topics you have worked on, collaborations you have collaborated on, short-term sales impulses, etc. Therefore, if you college students hope to work in Internet operations in the future, I suggest that you should try your best to find a pure Internet company for internship during your senior year, and the internship in this company must be in-depth enough. I would like to make a special note about the sufficient depth of the internship. I have seen many college students who are interning at Internet companies unable to adjust their mindset, lack a strong spirit of exploration, and are too rigid and dull. Admittedly, many companies may like to let interns do a lot of chores and a lot of repetitive work. But if you don’t want to just be a handyman during your internship, you must try your best to participate in various projects in the internship company and gain more training opportunities for yourself. For example, after doing your own job well during the internship, you can try to ask your colleagues for help and participate in more in-depth work. For example, you can also build good relationships with your colleagues, treat them to more milk tea and drinks, and treat them to more fruits... Of course, these may require you to spend more energy and time after work, but for your operation dream, I think it is all worth it. After all, a person who goes to work on time and goes home on time will never be a good operator.

As for friends in traditional industries, if you want to enter the field of Internet operations, I suggest that you enter the operations industry starting from your own areas of expertise or core skill points. Some people are good at writing copy, so you can try to apply for content operation or new media operation; some people are good at planning, so event operation may be more suitable for you; some people have worked in BD or sales, so it may be better for them to switch to channel operation; some people have been group owners, moderators, and forum owners, and are good at communication, so maybe you can try user operation; some people have worked in marketing, marketing... marketing... then you don’t have to switch to operations, after all, marketing is part of operations... In short, the principle is that as a veteran who has been in the workplace for many years, you must find your core skills, and use your core skills to cut in, which is much better than blindly looking for an operations job. In addition, introductions from friends are also a better way. After working in the workplace for so many years, who doesn’t have some friends?

Despite all I have said above, you may still not be able to find your ideal operations position. After all, this has a lot to do with your resume, interview performance, and personal character, which is something you and I cannot decide. It is often at this time that the opportunity to test whether you can stick to your dream really comes. Are you willing to take the following frustrating and circuitous path in pursuit of your "operation" dream? I can’t get an operations position in a large company. Can I join a medium-sized or small company? The salary in operations is too low. Am I willing to lower my salary requirements in order to enter the industry? I really want to be an event operator, but I have no experience yet. Can I start by working in content operations? All of the above choices will test whether you have true love and determination for this industry. For all the above choices, my answer is: I do. Two years ago, I was just like you. I came to Shanghai from a fourth-tier city. I had no Internet experience and could never find the door to the Internet. I sold houses, ran around the market, and finally found an Internet startup company to get started. The salary was average, barely enough to make ends meet. I worked overtime every day and tackled one project after another. Later, I went to a top Internet company, received formal operations training, and started my own business again... The hard work and patience I put in day and night in between cannot be described in a few words. Finally, I still want to say, when you really want to become an operator, can you peel off its glamorous nature, see through all the hardships it endures, and then ask yourself, have you really made up your mind?