One of the most common questions that I get is, "How can I advance my career?" I'm going to try to answer that in a series of short posts to share what I have learned and observed after nearly 20 years in the software industry.
Part 1: Creating Opportunity
The fastest way to advance your career is to develop a brand as someone who is capable of taking on the next level of leadership.
When others recognize you as being ready for the task, opportunity will begin to open up, and you'll find that career opportunity taps you on the shoulder. The more that you become the obvious choice, the less you will need to depend on being in the right place at the right time with the right resume.
The number one way to expand your brand is to solve a problem or anticipate a future business need.
To help myself with brevity, I'm going to refer to both of these as "problems" for the rest of the article. The bigger the problem, the more opportunity there is to grow your brand. The more holistically you solve this problem, the more that demonstrates that you're ready for the next movement in your career.
This isn't going to be one of those articles that tells you to observe and put together a plan. Actually, it's quite the opposite. This article makes an assumption that you've already identified an opportunity, and instead focuses on whether this is a project or initiative that you should actually take on in order to grow your career.
5 Criteria for Evaluating Whether a Problem Can Give You a Brand Boost
1/ Who Cares?
Who are the people who will be most impacted and most impressed if you solve this challenge? Look at the problem in 360 degrees. What would your immediate coworkers think, what would your leadership think, and what would those who work for you think? Aim for something that would at least impress your manager's manager. If it fails this criteria, it's not a career-impacting project, no matter how passionate you are about it.
2/ Is It Someone Else's Job?
In the corporate world, there are things that are black and white: specific responsibilities for you, and specific responsibilities for everyone else. Opportunity lies in the grey areas, between the black and white extremes. If you find yourself leading something that is another team's charter, you'll quickly be slowed down with corporate politics. Aim for a project that's not someone else's job to fix.
3/ Can I Describe Success in a Simple Sentence?
A key aspect of leveraging a project like this for career growth is being able to communicate what you're doing in a manner that would make your mother proud. For example, "When this project is successful, we will have increased throughput of order entry 10%." You will want to advertise what you're doing very broadly. The longer that takes to explain, the less interesting it is. Aim for a definition that either increases revenue or productivity, or decreases cost or overhead, with as few words as necessary.
4/ Will I Be Satisfied Long-Term If I Get Stuck Doing This?
The most frustrating career moves are the ones that don't pan out the way you expect. Take a hard look at this problem and see if you will be personally satisfied if it becomes your full-time job long-term, or if you're only doing it to advance yourself. It's entirely possible that if you do a good job, it becomes permanent. Aim for something that you'd be happy managing for two years.
5/ Am I Ready for This?
This borders on obvious, but do you actually have time to accomplish what needs to be done? Is your personal life ready for some serious disruption? Can your work schedule accommodate more working sessions? Do you have the support of your boss to disrupt the rest of the team? Aim for a lull in workload like seasonality or the beginning of a new fiscal period in order to get the most done in a short period of time.
With this framework, you can be both a good corporate citizen, find meaningful work within the four walls of your employer, and grow your career at the same time.
Until next time. Geoff