I've wondered that too. Last month, I started a job as a Controller. When I told one person in the field whom I respect that I was interviewing for this position, her reply was “You're not qualified.” That shook my confidence a lot… She has never been a Controller and has worked throughout her career in large businesses (international, thousands and thousands of employees, etc.), and this position was at a smaller company (college with approx. 200 full-time employees), so I tried to convince myself that my future employers and I knew more about what the job entailed than she did and that, if after discussing it with them, I felt like I could do it and they offered it to me, then that should be good enough. However, even though I told myself that, I still was shook up by it…so one night I asked my dad (who has become something of a career-mentor) what he'd do if he was offered a job that he might not be qualified for, and he basically said, “If they'll give it to you, and if you think you've got a shot at it, then with hard work you can figure it out.” It might mean working 12 hours for an 8-hour job, then coming home and researching and learning off the clock for a few hours, but it can be done.
I've now been working as the Controller for a month. Truth is, I can handle it, no problem. There's things I have to learn, but that's true with any job. I have the knowledge needed coming in and I have the work ethic to quickly gain the knowledge needed after arriving. For someone with 1 year in public and 1 year as a clerk, this is a HUGE step, but with confidence and hard work, anything is possible. The funny thing is that so far, I haven't encountered any major “problems”, because accounting is kind of the same regardless of your position, just bigger numbers in some jobs than others; however, if I'd have listened to that lady's advice and the self-doubt that it created, I would've turned the job down and still been a clerk – capable but lacking confidence.
So, grit your teeth, and believe that you can do anything you are handed to do…then do it!
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