How more has meant less for me...

With my new busy lifestyle, I barely get time to reflect on everything that I do in a day. But when I find myself lying in bed trying to get to sleep at night I do think about how much I accomplished that day. From agency work to coursework, to seeing my friends and spending time with my family, my days are pretty packed these days.

This reflection got me thinking about how even though I’ve taken on more work, I’ve now adapted a good work-life balance and becoming an apprentice has helped me to do so.

At first glance, you may think that taking on more work will leave you more stressed and definitely busier. But I find it is busy in a good way and that I now have more social time than I ever have before.

Now, before I explain why taking on more has meant less for me it’s important for you to understand what an apprenticeship is to fully understand my reasoning behind such a bold statement.

An apprenticeship is a type of education which allows the student to be in full-time work whilst studying at college. The full-time work placement has to directly relate to the framework being studied at college. So for me, I work in a marketing agency as a marketing assistant, but then study the Level 3 Digital Marketing framework at Northbrook College. Most employers who take on an apprentice do it for the future prospect of having a qualified professional work for them once they have completed their course.
In my case, once I have completed my college diploma, I will become a team member specialising in digital marketing. I already do this to an extent as if we win a contract that involves running social media, Google My Business or anything else digital - I automatically play a key part of the contract by completing most of the daily tasks that are involved in making that happen for the client. My other team members mostly deal with other aspects of marketing such as PR, visual work, website development (although I can then manage a website once it is created).

Attending college as part of my full-time duty at the agency does mean I get paid to go (or at least I don’t lose money for going).
Having this kind of relationship with the college means that I can get all of my coursework completed either at work or in the college.

Which brings me to why I find more work is actually less for me.

I now spend 40 hours a week either in the office or at college, which means I get a total of 40 hours to do both daily tasks for the agency and complete college work.
Having this much time means that I can get all of my college work done outside of my home life. There’s no revision required for the framework I am following, it’s all written and evidence-based.
The lack of exams allows me to just focus on getting the work done and although there may be classroom assessments, they are easy enough to complete and are based on the units I have already written up.

So I am basically just typing up research - which I practically do already so there’s not much difference there.

What I’m trying to say is that although in theory I am taking on double the amount of work, I actually have more structure to balance work and home life so I don’t feel college work encroaches on my social life. I can still go out with friends, go on days out or weekends away in the full conscience that all my work has been completed at work.
When I was doing my A-Levels I constantly felt like I should be revising or writing something up or doing something to work towards the end result. Whereas now, I have full faith that I have done all of that in the workplace or at college so that burden of a feeling has dissolved.

Becoming an apprentice is hands down one of the best things I have ever done, for my mental health, wellbeing, and future.