Eight Ways to Propel Your Career

Young aspiring managers in the workplace often ask me for advice on how to accelerate their careers, looking for some magic formula that will land them a promotion or a new job. My response always comes in the form of questions to which there are no simple or easy answers but require a great deal of self-reflection and self-awareness. It’s all about choices and figuring out what’s most important to you.

First, discover your passion. Are you passionate about what you do? Are you excited by your chosen field of endeavor? Some people chose a major in college or pursued a career because of pressure from their parents or societal norms. While others may not have even made a conscious decision about their career; they were offered a job, took it, and inertia took over. If your current job doesn’t excite you or pique your interest, then what does? What are you curious about and eager to learn more? If money were not a factor, what would you really love to do? What kind of work would offer deeper meaning to you?
Second, examine your values. What’s really important to you? Family? Flexibility? Money? Status? All of the above? What happens when these come into conflict and which values get compromised? When your values are in conflict, you can choose to act in alignment with what’s most important or choose not to. If you say family is important, do you work every evening and weekend instead of spending time with the children? If your current job causes you to be at odds with your values, then it may be time to re-evaluate your choices.
Next, identify your strengths. What are you really good at? Sometimes, people don’t recognize or value their strengths because they come so naturally or because they are not appreciated in the current job. For example, are you skilled at dealing with different personalities and handling conflict? Are you detail-oriented and can easily find discrepancies in work products? Are you good at coordinating and organizing large groups of people? Look for jobs that would be the best fit for these kind of skills. For those areas that are not strengths, are there other people with complementary skills that can help? If a particular skill is critical to your career goal, can you learn it through additional training and/or practice?
Learn the Business. Research has shown that successful executives worked in various parts of the business throughout their careers—both staff and line positions. Through experience, they gained breadth and depth about how the business works. Don’t be afraid to move laterally—or even down—to learn about another part of the business that intrigues you. Often, if you move to another position in a new department, you can negotiate to maintain your salary.
Be your own self-advocate. Communicate your career goals to your manager and any others who may be able to influence it. Let them know that you are interested in other opportunities. Don’t wait for someone to tap you on the shoulder to apply for a position. To learn more about other possible opportunities, conduct some informational interviews and express your interest. Show initiative by volunteering for challenging stretch assignments. Offer to provide a service or complete a task that is above and beyond your current responsibilities. If you feel that you have been overlooked for a promotion, speak up and state that you would like to be considered the next time. Don’t whine and complain; suggest a way in which the selection process might be made more transparent in the future. If you believe that some discriminatory behavior exists, seek the counsel of HR or a trusted member of management.
Cultivate sponsors as well as mentors. While mentors are important, a sponsor can actually become your champion and open opportunities for you. How do you find mentors and sponsors? Obviously, a solid track record of outstanding performance is key. Your exceptional performance and willingness to take on additional responsibilities should help distinguish you from the crowd. You also need to make others—particularly your boss—look good. A sponsor will nominate you for positions if you can be relied on to perform at an outstanding level and make him/her look good.
Build Relationships. When you are considered for promotion, do you have organizational support? What would others say about you as a colleague, a team player, a leader? Likeability is an important intangible quality. While everyone in the organization is not necessarily your close friend, have their experiences with you been consistently positive? Do you spend all of your time in your office, working through lunch, and avoiding others to get your work done? If so, you’re probably not getting to know many co-workers, and they’re not getting to know you.
Above all, believe in yourself. The biggest barrier to career advancement is not being confident about your own worth and the skills, knowledge, and experience that you have gained. Women, in particular, have suffered from ‘imposter syndrome,’ fearful that others will find out that they’re not as skilled as they thought. This lack of confidence can sabotage careers by being unwilling to take on challenging assignments, by rejecting offers for lead roles on special projects, and by ongoing thoughts of self-doubt. Remember, perfection is an illusion. Everyone makes mistakes; it’s what you learn from them that is important.

Finally, be careful what you wish for. Often, the goal of earning a lot more money doesn’t bring the meaning and fulfillment from work that you seek. You may gain a deeper sense of well-being in your career if you are pursuing your true purpose or calling and living your life in alignment with what you value most.