Why and how to manage your career. Career growth through connections

From the first words I would like to note that not everyone needs to manage their career. Firstly, because there may be no intentions for forming a career; secondly, because someone is already managing this process at their own discretion. For example, the internal personnel service of the company or the person to whom you are “attached” and accompany her in moving from place to place. And there are also situations in which the “pointing” finger, determining where your place is now and what you should do, is the owner of the business. There are other cases when talking about conscious and purposeful management of one’s own career is somehow off topic.

Career management is by no means for everyone. Moreover, independent career management throughout life. After all, at a minimum, this requires inner confidence that how life turns out largely depends on oneself.

Initially, the need for career management arose in those countries where the concept of “living on credit” existed; accordingly, there was a need to calculate risks and plan how debts would be repaid. And also where there were problems with the labor market, high competition for each position and the need to meet high standards. That is, questions arose: How to earn the required amount on time (to be able to pay off debts on time, as well as maintain a decent standard of living)? How to meet current market requirements and always be at a premium? How to become the owner of competitive advantages and be protected from possible job loss? How to choose those areas of activity where the demand for professionals has already appeared and will grow, but the supply on the market (and, accordingly, competition) is not great?

In other words, the question of career management arises when it comes to significant money, a certain quality of life, risks (the likelihood of losing the achieved level), scarcity (feelings of incompleteness, lack of something) and competition (as a threat to personal well-being).

As they say, first a person wants to “become one of the people,” and then - to remain among them and enter the circles of “the best of people,” despite the fact that at each new level it becomes more and more crowded - there are fewer and fewer places in front, and in the back New thirsty people are constantly breathing and there is absolutely no desire to go down. Accordingly, questions arise: How can you protect yourself? How to simplify your further movement? How to make the most of your resource? At what point should you stop what you have achieved to prevent a possible fall? And also, how to wisely invest money in yourself in order to keep yourself in good shape in the market and get the maximum return from your investments? Strictly speaking, business career management is just about all of this: about knowing yourself, your resources (strengths and opportunities for growth), your disadvantages and limitations, the ability to compare (compare yourself and your capabilities with other people and what they can), as well as the ability to analyze the market and see oneself in this market.

And also about: What do I PERSONALLY want in life? And how can this be achieved while spending the most money and getting the maximum return?

If these questions resonate with you, then business career management is for you. And if not, then I really don’t know why you need career management...

It only remains to add that business career management is actually not a service that exists on the market - it is a certain LIFESTYLE - FOR YOURSELF and a worldview system. After all, managing your business career means building your life according to your own rules, in order to achieve your own goals.

In general, I invite you to the position of manager of my life - if it is currently vacant.

“How to direct the complete absence of directing?”
Stanislaw Lem (b. 1921)
Polish writer and philosopher

Big bosses hire career development specialists to help their direct reports overcome their shortcomings, right? And since you are a great boss, you don’t need this coach.

It is this type of thinking that limits the potential of many entrepreneurs and the organizations they run. Part of the problem for many leaders is that they don't have mentors ready to help them improve their abilities. Everyone needs guidance, and sometimes that can come from a career development professional.

Entrepreneur Beth Sears helps her clients maximize their potential, which in turn can help them increase their profits. People don't turn to her when things are going well (even though it's not a bad idea to do so), so the first thing Sears asks leaders to do is “look at their role in this chaos. Sometimes they are ready to do this, but when a critical situation comes, many try to blame someone else, not themselves. If they are not ready to look at themselves from the outside, then even the coach will not be able to help.”

The best companies, Sears says, have a culture that makes people feel safe to say what they think. Why do you want this too? “When you have open access to truthful information, then you have everything you need to make decisions. If your people are closed off and not willing to share their thoughts, then you are left guessing.”

One client said that the problem with communication came from his people - they did not want to tell him anything. So Sears began interviewing his direct reports. And what was the result? They all unanimously asserted that “he (the leader) was completely indifferent” to what they wanted to say.

And even this information that she conveyed to her client was not enough for him to stop denying his guilt. This is what he responded to this revelation: “Well, Beth, I have to tell you that I am a fast learner. When I understand what is happening around me, then I don’t need all this additional information - I already understand everything perfectly. I tell everyone to move on." Four weeks later, Sears was done with that client. Here's what he said: “You know, my former coworkers told me I wasn't a good listener, and at this job I'm told I don't listen to others. My wife also says that I don’t listen to her.” The problem extends far beyond work.

And like this man who can't listen, many Sears customers have problems at home that spill over into the work world, and conversely, troubles at work spill over into their personal lives. “You have no work and no personal life,” she says. “You have a life. Very often, people bring their problems from home to work, where other employees take someone's bad mood personally. I help them see how all this affects their work."

Can this self-reflection and coaching guidance pay off in the long run? Of course, because when you solve a problem at the top level, then it pays off in real money. “When people feel safe and they know that they are respected and valued, then they will go through thick and thin for you. You don’t have to agree with your employees on everything, but you do have to acknowledge them.”

Sears notes that today's workforce is not a loyal one. They have parents and grandparents who were very dedicated to their jobs but ended up with nothing but layoffs and no money. If you don't know how to communicate with your employees, if you can't make the workplace the way your team members want it to be, then they will stay with you until they find a better job. And where will this take you?

Of course, it won't hurt a business owner's ego if they know who to turn to for advice to improve the atmosphere and level of engagement in the office. A career development specialist can help you with this.

Susan Lucas, inc.com
Translation by Tatyana Gorban

Have you ever encountered leaders in your life who do everything themselves and are still very proud of it? Such a manager comes to work earlier than everyone else and leaves later than everyone else, taking some more work home with him. When he hears the word “vacation,” he makes big round eyes and says that if he leaves work even for one day, then “these idiots will ruin everything, and I will return to nothing.” Most often, such a leader can be found in a small company of up to 50 people.

Such organizations are usually unable to grow further, because the leader is not in the strategy, but in the fields, “rolling up his sleeves” and running in place. It is interesting that the manager himself, in the daily hustle and bustle, often does not see problems in his management style.

So, how do you understand that you are a one-man orchestra and you urgently need to do something about it? Our four characteristics will help you with this.

Infantile employees

The employees on your team are infantile, unable to make independent decisions and take responsibility. And all because all decisions are made by the owner or top manager, freeing the team from the need to make decisions. And this greatly relaxes the team, relieving it of responsibility for the result.

Assess whether your employees come up with new work initiatives, strive to improve their results, how they explain their failures and whether they take responsibility for them. An alarming signal is that if you don’t have a team as such, there is no one to delegate to, because most likely there are only linear employees, not stellar ones, and there is no top management.

The director orders business cards and distributes salaries

The man-orchestra cannot leave the company even for a day, because at any moment something can happen: business cards, pens will run out, payment from the supplier will not arrive, payroll day will come, you need to sign a contract with the client. And he does all this himself.

Because of this, it is not effective - there are too many small things to do. Look at the list of your daily tasks and see how many of them are small or those that can be completed by a person with a specific specialization. For example, accountant, secretary, social media manager. It's bad if your focus is blurred. Ultimately, deadlines will be missed somewhere, something may remain unfinished, and something will be overlooked.

The company shows no new results

It happens that companies do not have a strategic leader who can show the path of development and inspire the team to new achievements, but there is an “operational” leader who is bogged down in current tasks. At first it may seem that this is stability. But with such an owner, it can become “the beginning of the end.”

After all, a manager who is inside the process and mired in current processes may not notice trends and may not have time to react to the arrival of new strong players on the market. Assess whether you have adopted strategic planning? Is there a plan for a year or three? For ten years? Do you monitor the market and competitors?

The idea of ​​cloning arises

The manager comes to the idea of ​​how nice it would be to “clone himself” and begins to look for someone just like him. To be able to do everything. It is difficult to find such a person, and he will be very expensive, but it seems to the owner that there are no other options. As a result, a replacement may be found, but he may not be able to cope with the entire range of responsibilities that the owner is trying to transfer to him. Because he wants to convey everything at once, without dividing it. And in the end, this is simply dangerous: if he is fired, it will be difficult to quickly replace such an employee.

If you notice yourself in these characteristics, it’s time to urgently change your approach before the ship of your business sinks.

I once met an old friend of mine. Beautiful, smart, spectacular and very successful woman...lonely. Well, or free - here everyone will offer their own epithet. We started talking about the school-institute and smoothly approached the question of life choice. It turned out that we are like two poles of this issue: me with my feminine happiness and diapers, she with her career and travel to resorts. Needless to say, we secretly envy each other, because each one lacks exactly what her friend has. So what does a woman need, what does she want?

First of all, the planes...

A careerist will certainly give preference to her own realization and search for a place in the sun.

Such women will almost certainly tell you that:

1. You need to pursue a career after college, while you have the strength to do so and faith in them has not been lost. Youthful maximalism and a certain naivety also have its advantages: young girls strive much more strongly to reach the top in their work, because for them this is fundamentally important. They are not afraid of failures and criticism, since life experience has not yet imposed this fear on them. They are ready to start with a very modest salary and listen to not entirely correct statements addressed to them from their superiors. A woman with life's baggage will most likely turn around and wave.

2. A young, purposeful woman depends on herself. At the same time, no one depends on her yet. If your first job is really bad, you can tighten your belt and start looking for a new one, but in the meantime, sit on a forced diet and without a new lipstick.

3. When no one depends on you, you can safely go to great lengths and work overtime. I myself remember how I could return from work late at night and cheerfully return to it in the morning. It is not surprising that many try to hire just such a woman for a leadership position, because she will not immediately want to go on maternity leave at the first opportunity.

4. Consistency is everything. Yes, yes, it is consistency that is important for such natures. First, a diploma in school, then successful completion of a university and a good job. Well, then, when I’m ready, I can think about my family and relax. But there is another way, when it is not possible to find a worthy man for one reason or another and work replaces family evenings by itself.

5. I can invest in my business and nothing will interfere with it. And I won’t be able to achieve all my dreams and goals without some financial investments.

Agree, everything is quite logical and really correct for our modern society. And I myself would say that such a decision is correct in any judgment, if not for several pitfalls:

Appetite comes while eating and with the growth of one’s influence, the growth of material wealth, the desire to plunge into the world of diapers and pacifiers, to simply engage in one’s favorite hobby, gradually dulls (whatever one may say, success always has two sides, and not every man will risk being successful and offer such a change of role to an independent woman);

Sometimes you never manage to meet the very man with whom you want to give birth and it’s not scary to quit things for a while, and now we’re celebrating 35...and giving birth yourself at that age is also a big risk;

And for me, the most terrible development of the scenario is the option when a woman has already achieved a certain income, and she needs a man at least a step higher, but over the years our demands and skepticism only increase and the hope for love fades.

The main thing is to have time to live

Such women will probably tell you that:

1. After the birth of a child, I am full and accomplished. Yes, there is an opinion that in a women’s team all married (and God forbid, lucky!) colleagues are enemies of single/single employees. As arguments from her, you will hear about complexes, the inability to conduct work affairs calmly and measuredly due to the inability to organize her day (and she has already achieved a lot in this!).

2. I can invest everything in my child, and only then move on to my career. Yes, of course, until about five or six years old you really mold your baby, and after this milestone it will be difficult to make any fundamental changes in his formed personality. And it is precisely this fact that women put pressure on, putting family first.

3. You won’t earn all the money, so you can’t waste your youth on reports and summaries.

Again, we have a whole carload of “buts”. It is important not to go too far here. There is a whole mountain of pitfalls:

Finding the right moment when it’s time to get down to work is very difficult (the child is sick in kindergarten, then he needs to be prepared for school, and purely psychologically it’s difficult to get away from the usual measured rhythm), often this is the most necessary and convenient moment for everyone. and it doesn’t come;

The longer we stay at home or on maternity leave, the more difficult it will be for us to go out into the world, and there are two reasons for this: after maternity leave or a long break, communication with employees and superiors is more difficult (we lose the habit of business dialogue, arguments and listening to criticism addressed to us), and even younger employees without families will always try to get ahead of themselves and, most likely, they will succeed;

No matter how much you walk through life and learn new things, sooner or later you will have to get to know everyday life, just like everyday work.

So what to choose: family comfort or self-realization as an individual, career heights or a combination of making money and doing what you love? For me, the answer came naturally when, at the peak of my career, I discovered two stripes on the test and a huge bouquet of flowers at home from my husband. And I sincerely wish for you that, first of all, in life there is harmony with yourself, then you won’t have to make a choice as such.

In my work, I constantly come across employees who dream of achieving career growth. Unfortunately, not everyone succeeds in this and it does not always depend on the person, but, nevertheless, making a career is not so difficult if you follow certain rules.

The author of this article received his first management position at the age of 20, while the rest of the team was much older and had more experience and education. After that there were many ups and downs that taught me a lot.

This article is intended primarily for those who want to become a leader and manage people.

Why do you need career growth?

Before talking about how to achieve career growth, I really want you to answer the question for yourself: why do you need career growth? The fact is that the answers can vary greatly: some want to earn more, some like to command, and some are tired of working as subordinates. Only a few become managers to achieve new knowledge, gain experience and achieve new ambitious goals. The main difference between a manager and a subordinate is motivation; a manager cannot be solely focused on achievement. If you don’t quite understand what this means, I recommend reading about it, it will also be useful to you in managing people.

I would like to deliberately upset those who want to become a leader, because they will not have to do the work of a subordinate, for example: selling, going to the fields, etc. Even if you become a leader, you still won’t succeed. If you don’t like your job, you need to change it, that is, go to another field of activity. There is nothing worse than doing something you don't love.

A young girl worked for me as a salesperson for a long time, I saw that work was a burden for her, she was not happy, and conflicts often occurred with colleagues and customers. She was a veterinarian by profession, and she kept complaining that she liked it, but the veterinarian was paid too little, so she was forced to work as a salesperson. She also often said that animals are much better than people (i.e. buyers) and stuff like that. I helped her get a job in a private clinic, where she earns more than me, since she treats purebred animals. A person is satisfied and happy because he is doing what he loves.

What is the difference between a leader and a subordinate?

So, you have decided that you need career growth, then you should, first of all, understand how a manager differs from his subordinate. I’ll make a reservation right away that I will not consider professional qualities, such as product knowledge, sales experience, work results. Of course, if you don’t know how to work and fulfill your duties as a subordinate, no one will promote you. So, the main differences:

Motivation to work

As stated above, this is motivation for work. If you need to be “kicked” all the time so that you deign to do your job, then, excuse me, you shouldn’t expect a promotion. Sometimes I hear from subordinates something like this: “... if I worked as a manager, then I would not be late and would work well...”. No one will promote you with the expectation that you will change. Motivation to work always comes from how much you generally like the work and how interesting it is to you. If there is no interest in work, you need to change it, and not look for career growth. You must show by your behavior that your work is interesting and important to you, when your immediate supervisor sees this, he understands that he can rely on you and add greater authority.

Look for opportunities, not reasons

There is a saying: “The strong look for opportunities, the weak look for reasons.” This saying can be elevated to the life credo of any leader. It is from your reaction to life’s difficulties that you can understand what kind of person you are. And how much you can be trusted. Remember, if you often complain that you can’t do something or don’t know how, in general, you constantly come up with excuses for why you didn’t do the work, then you can forget about career growth.

Don't be afraid to take responsibility

There are often times when you are asked to do some work that is not within your scope of responsibilities. You don’t need to give it up right away, first evaluate what it can bring you. Maybe within the framework of this work you will be able to prove yourself and show off your best side.

Many people do not take responsibility because they are afraid of disgracing themselves or failing the job. There is always a risk of making a mistake, everyone makes mistakes and there is no need to be afraid of it. Career growth is guaranteed for people with an active lifestyle.

Self-PR

When one of my former managers was invited to a new position, he said “in the first months I will do self-PR, I need the new management to notice me.” It is very important to be noticed; the problem is especially acute when there are many subordinates and there is a lot of competition for the position. They will always pay attention to someone who is famous, whose name is well-known. One of the self-PR tools is the initiative mentioned above. But this may not be enough to “stimulate” career growth. The best PR option is to earn some kind of encouragement, for example: to become the best employee, etc. Remember - you should be noticed, or better yet, well known from a positive side.

Discipline

Whatever you say, disciplined employees, and people in general, inspire much more respect and sympathy. Constant lateness, systematic failure to fulfill one's duties can nip the possibility of career growth in the bud. In addition, it is the key to successful personal development.

Know your worth

Develop yourself

Career growth through connections

One of the common opinions of employees is that career growth is possible only through connections and nothing will happen to us mere mortals. In fact, this is not the case at all. In market conditions and high competition, a highly qualified employee is a very valuable asset and there is always a demand for him. It is important for you to show that you are such an employee, and the employer will definitely give you a chance.

Is education necessary for career growth?

Another common opinion is that you need to get some kind of special education and you can’t do without it. This philosophy begins to be propagated to us from childhood, but those who graduated from universities with a degree in management can tell you that this education will not give you serious advantages. In general, personally, in all my practice, I have never seen a graduate without experience in this field being hired for the position of an ordinary manager.

Of course, higher education is one of the requirements for employment, but I know a lot of good managers who do not have a diploma and they are hired very well. For me personally, higher education is a good school of life for a person, but it is not such a significant factor in deciding whether to take a manager or not.

How to quickly climb the career ladder?

So you got your first management position; for sales people, this is usually a supervisor. Naturally, after working in this position for some time and gaining experience, the question arises, what next? I want to take a new step up the career ladder. In fact, in order to develop successfully in your career, you need to work quite a lot on yourself. Managing people is an art and it can be honed throughout your life; there is no limit to perfection. Therefore, read literature, go to trainings, get a second education. To move up, you not only need to demonstrate all the business skills described above, but also have life experience and experience dealing with people. From experience, I can say that to grow from a supervisor to a store director or head of the sales department, a year of work is enough. It is important, first of all, to show good performance results and demonstrate growth. But if you have the desire, you will always succeed.