Getting Ahead

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There are 5 steps to getting ahead at work:

Step One: Figure out what you want

  • Following your ego is usually a bad idea
  • Don’t do it for the money

Step Two: Make a plan

  • What are the intermediate steps?
  • Don’t be linear
  • Take control – no one else is in charge of your career
  • Manage your reputation

Step Three: Reach out to people

  • Network
  • Ask for Feedback
  • Volunteer for high-profile projects
  • Get outside your silo
  • Network outside your organization
  • Keep your boss in the loop as much as possible

Step Four: Beware of others who may want to keep you where you are

  • If you’re generating results, they’ll want to keep you there
  • Talent hoarding is a real problem
  • Never trust anyone in HR
  • You need to be in charge of your career

Step Five: Help others

  • Karma
  • Delegate lots
  • Be a teacher
  • Build great teams around you

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Getting Ahead

Learn the 5 steps to getting ahead at work.

Listen to the ‘Getting Ahead’ podcast:

: Download Podcast (MP3)

Getting Ahead Podcast Slides

Take a look at the ‘Getting Ahead’ Cheat Sheet

How to Get Ahead — Don’t Be an Idiot

Every now and then Jed or I will be sitting across the table from someone who will confide in us that he really wants to be promoted into the next job.  Sometimes, he may not know what that next job is, but he really wants it.  “How do I get ahead?”, he may ask of us.  This got me to thinking:

Boot-licking – Constant, shameless, thorough and quality bootlicking.

Eliminate the competition by quietly and carefully sabotaging their every move.  If you think they might be higher in the standings than you for the next role — take them out.

Sewering Your Boss —  Maybe if you make her look stupid enough, they’ll fire her, and put you in her role.

Constantly Champion Your Own Virtues – If people don’t know how wonderful you are, it’s about time you told them.  Don’t be afraid to repeat, ad nauseam.

Sorry – I seem to have lost my inner-monologue.

It’s frightening how many people think that one or more of the above will work.  We see it time and time again, even if people don’t fully admit to employing some or all of these techniques.

There is no doubt that occasionally a boot-licker will slip between the cracks and have some success for a limited period of time.  Maybe even a year or two.  However, there is always a reckoning.  This is not to say that the most qualified person always gets the job – organizational politics are a fact of life that people need to accept.  I don’t know of any organizations that are pure meritocracies.

But people who attempt to prosper by insincere means most often meet their demise with the same level of intensity as they played the game.  What comes around goes around – even though it may take longer than many of us might like.

So how do you get ahead in your career?  Start by not being an idiot.  If you can’t manage that, you’re not going to get ahead anyway, so you might as well cut your losses now.  (Oops – there’s my inner-monologue again).

If you want some other ideas, download our latest podcast on How to Get Ahead – Wily Manager Style.

In the meantime… let’s be careful out there.

Micro-Managing: A Great Way to Get Fired

OK – we’ve all done it.  Decided to do something ourselves because its easier and faster than holding the appropriate person to account.  Maybe you’ve even done it with your children.  Micro-managing – the gift that keeps on destroying.

Every manager has been warned against this, so let’s look at why it happens, given the most common excuses most managers give for doing so:

It’s faster to do it myself.  It probably is faster… the first time.  But if you look at the amount of time it will take you to teach or correct someone else in the execution of a task, versus the amount of time it will take you to do it on an ongoing basis, the answer is clear.

I can do it better. You probably can… for a while.  However, if you insist on doing every individual task yourself, you will become quickly overwhelmed, and will end up doing some (high) proportion of those tasks poorly.

My people aren’t capable. If this is the case for any amount of time, you are clearly not doing your job as a manager.  It is your job to develop people.  Occasionally you truly don’t have the right talent, in which case you have to make changes to your talent bench.

I need to keep close to the details. Actually, you probably don’t.  As a manager, it is not your job to be expert at everything.  It’s your job to create experts, and be able to ask some semi-intelligent questions of them.

If I don’t do all these tasks, I won’t be useful anymore. Listen to yourself.  If you’re that insecure in your role as a leader, you need to examine whether you should be in a management role at all.

The bottom line is that micro-managers sap the productivity out of organizations by failing to capture the discretionary effort of their employees.  They don’t develop people, which is a primary function of a leader.  They also limit their own career mobility by trying to make themselves indispensible in the role they are in.

Micro-management is a self-destructive behaviour, and a great way to get fired.  Then you’ll have lot’s of time.

Help! I’m a Micro-Manager

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What’s Wrong With Being a Micro-Manager?

  • You are creating unnecessary work for yourself and others, and therefore wasting resources
  • You could be negatively affecting turnover
  • You are destroying discretionary effort and thereby reducing productivity
  • You will burn yourself and others out

How People Become Micro-Managers

  • They were great individual contributors, but never transitioned to being a leader
  • They have perfectionist tendencies
  • They are insecure in their role as a leader
  • They are control-freaks

How do I Address This?

1. Clearly Define Expectations

  • Put written performance agreements in place
  • Define the boundaries of people’s jobs and determine what level of authority they can have

2. Experiment With Giving People More Authority

  • Define outcomes; allow people to determine methods
  • Start small if necessary
  • Ask for progress reports

3. Leadership Development

  • Find ways to improve your ability as a leader.
  • Dedicate time to focus on leadership issues as opposed to the detail or the work

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