Focusing on the working community, this article concentrates on the newly qualified foreign language teachers' (NQT) experiences and on factors that promoted or prevented the development of professional expertise at the outset of their working life. It draws on a qualitative longitudinal study conducted at the University of Jyväskylä, Finland, between 2003 and 2008. All the study participants were female and they were about 24 years old at the time. The data consisted of the NQTs' essays and journal entries which they wrote on events that had a significant impact on their teaching during their first three to four years of work. The study suggests that by listening to the NQTs' voices in the working community, it is possible to increase our understanding of the conditions of the newcomers' professional development.