Career Starters vs. Grad Students

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Two-Way Envy?

Based on my highly enjoyable, but admittedly sheltered, undergraduate experience, I may unfairly dismiss a return to school as a reprieve from the real world and a convenient excuse to act like a dilettante. However, considering the intense pressure many of my grad student friends are currently under—juggling high-level course work with stressful summer internship searches and paying sky-high tuitions—I wouldn't exactly say they were lounging around the Ivory Tower.

And it wouldn't surprise me if they occasionally experience a flip-flop version of my own dismissive envy. I bet they sometimes wonder how much easier it would be if they only had a single full-time position to worry about, instead of the stress of balancing multiple classes with casting an eye toward securing an internship, interviews, and employment. The truth of the matter is, whether we are students or full-time employees, don't we all secretly want to feel that our schedule is the toughest?

Instead of playing the "who's got it tougher" game and resenting each other's choices, we should realize there are advantages to having friends who don't exactly understand where we're coming from. When a student wants to celebrate a good grade or vent about a setback, it can be far easier to talk to an outsider than to a classmate who may be a wonderful friend but is truthfully also a competitor.

And perhaps this same student will show a more sympathetic appreciation for the working woes of his or her friend than another 9-to-5-er who might succumb to the temptation for one-upmanship: "You think your co-worker's bad? You should see Tina in accounting.…"

Compassion Wins Out

I'm actually finally going to have the chance to see my good friend in the neighborhood in a couple of days. She's having a birthday gathering at her apartment—which I haven't yet seen—and I'm even trying to figure out a time to take her out to dinner next week to celebrate.

Will it actually happen? I give it 50/50. Right now, her evenings are jam-packed with lectures, events, and grading papers for an undergraduate course she teaches, so we haven't yet set a time. I could grumble, or even nudge her into nailing down an actual day, but it doesn't seem fair considering I've done my fair share of bowing out of tentative plans in the past because of my own work obligations.

And who knows? I may someday find myself back in school, frustrated when a seemingly pushy friend can't quite grasp that I can't just shut down my computer at 6 and magically be free. I don't want to have to think to myself that pushy, nonunderstanding friend was once me.

Gerdes is a staff editor for BusinessWeek in New York .