Coffee and I are old friends (coffee is older than me of course) and I do a lot of thinking over coffee. With this in mind I decided to start a little concept called thoughts over coffee which I'll be doing from time to time.
Over my professional career I've had to come up with strategies to push forward, become better, learn more skills, hone the ones I have and generally to continually improve; it's in my nature to want to that as a human man and it has made sense to do it in my career as well. Staying in place, not moving forward is tantamount to going backwards compared to others who develop, grow and progress - not something I'm willing to accept.
Here's the first of two installments on some skills I've learned and used to accelerate my career and to progress. It's never just been about promotion and more income, it's always started with the need to continually improve and my desire to chase excellence rather than perfection.
Career acceleration
Active listening - This is something so many people do not do well mainly due to inattentiveness, thinking about their response prior to hearing what's being said, ego and hubris and many other reasons. Active listening involves eye contact, body-language and verbal cues all of which show the speaker they are being listened to and heard. Reflecting back to the speaker and clarifying any points is next and then paraphrasing what they said generally to demonstrate they've been understood is a solid way to find better results.
Find and nurture resilience - Things won't always go your way, challenges are part of life and business and understanding this, accepting it, will help a person on their path to excellence. It goes hand-in-glove with confidence (not arrogance) in one's abilities and if the right coping mechanisms are found and used it can help a person move along their career journey towards greater results, progression and even promotion.
Resolving conflicts - This is always going to raise its head, conflicts in the workplace. Getting good at conflict resolution is a big leap forward for anyone looking to accelerate their career. Understanding the reason or cause for the conflict, acknowledging and validating other people's emotions and allowing everyone to be heard and actively listening are three of the steps that move conflicts to satisfactory resolution; finally is managing the outcomes, collaborating with all stake-holders to find beneficial resolutions. Staying calm along the way and keeping discussions focused on the problem not the person/people helps grease the cogs of conflict resolution and those that are good at it typically rise to the surface within organisations.
Body language skills - It might sound easy but it's not. Learning to read other's and control our own body language is a critical element to excelling in one's career. It's how we stand, shake hands, where we sit, where our eyes look, how we mirror and match others in certain situations, our gestures and even down to the micro-expressions our faces make without us even knowing. Study it and get good at it and people will open up more, feel more comfortable and connected and for the individual it brings confidence, likeability and other such things. Body language forms the greater part of communication and is often much more important than the words.
What do you reckon? If you want to comment below then go ahead, I'm interested in your thoughts and experiences.
Design and create your ideal life, tomorrow isn't promised - galenkp
[Original and AI free]
Image(s) in this post are my own
No 5: Workplace Politics - You have to know how to play office politics quite well if you want to rise. I've seen it in the two major organizations I've worked for. Those of us who stay 'neutral' will sometimes be overlooked for choice opportunities even when doing other things right. Sad but true
I agree with that, there's a lot of machinations, plotting, sometimes backstabbing and intentional misdirection; typical human behaviour. Greedy and egotistical. It's for these reasons many of the wrong people are promoted or favoured.
Today, in the time of rapid technological progress, the wisdom "One learns while living" is the most accurate since the beginning of civilization.
I thought, when I was young, that until some years of my life I would build a career and improve myself, but now I understand, I will improve myself while I live, in order to stay afloat in the turbulent sea of technological progress.
You have to swim constantly, because when you stop, it's hard to stay on the surface and you sink to the bottom of that sea...
That's a good way to look at it indeed.
I'm actually at the point where my career is decelerating, but I am starting to get prepared for the next phase of my life which might contain a new mini-career. Oddly enough, all of your tips still hold just as true!
Me too...and my next career is doing whatever the fuck I want and getting paid from my investments - my meeting with my financial planner went really well last night so I'm pretty enthusiastic right now.
Anyway, I'm somewhat intrigued about the mini-career...something in I presume. Are you becoming an AI? 🥴
That is awesome. My investments aren't quite to that place yet, so I am going to have to figure something out. Plus, my wife still has several years left before she can retire, so sitting around probably wouldn't go over too well with her. I talk about it and I am curious about it, but I'm still really not a fan of AI. It is the big bubble right now though, so I thought about digging into it because there could be a decade or so where an "AI expert" could be desirable to some companies. Given my technology background, there are a lot of paths I could take. I'm actually heading to a trade show next week and I am hoping to make some contacts there with ed-tech companies to maybe find some position with one of them.
There's opportunities out there for sure, for those of us with the right skills. I do some consulting now based around some of the things I've done in the past and I could probably do more if that after I finish work, more for something to do and to help others than for having any real need to do it financially. We'll see.
I will travel a lot when I cease working, overseas and domestically and fill in some gaps that exist with where I've not travelled before. The States is on the list, North America generally.
North America is a pretty awesome place :) I do some side work right now with my main job, but it would never be enough to supplement my pension if I were to retire. I'm also not sure I would want to keep doing that sort of work. I'm kind of open to a change if I start over again.
Change is often exactly what a person needs.
I always look ways to improve, not for the work itself because they will never give more money or a better level just more responsibility with same payment, but to be more valuable in the future if I want to change work...
I'm a good listener, yet usually I don't have to listen because others come ask me for opinions or tips most of the times but I gotta say I get listened often... As a dev things NEVER go my way, it's like a daily challenge
I would also add, stay out of work politics and don't take sides, listen but no public opinions, be very careful with what words you use when boss is around, stay also out of normal politics (left, right etc)
Having an improvement ethos in life can be a very rewarding thing, it gives focus and reward.
Listening, being good at it, is a skill many do not have...my brain works at a million miles and hour and I have trouble with slow thinkers but I've learned to deal with that and it's paid dividends. I'm also very structured and disciplined so listening to someone (perhaps talking about irrelevant things) whilst there's other things to do drives me fucken nuts...but part of listening is patience.
Well said on the work politics thing...I can't recall, but I think I refer to that in part two.
Oh yes, slow thinkers annoy me too, expecially when you even reach the conclusion earlier than them... Also too much verbose people, that use 100 words to say what can be said in 10
Indeed, verbosity...not good.
I made this comment short in case you thought I was being needlessly verbose. Lol.
Hahaha but you don't take 100 words to say a thing of 10... I got people telling me all the game of the goose to tell a simple thing, like something happened at supermarket and they gotta tell me everything before, during the trip and detail in the supermarket, super silly
I have a look I give people that sort of says, "give me the short version," and when they don't pick up on it I usually just say it. Give me the short version.
I make the punch gesture and say "squeeze, just the juice of the topic"
One of the things I have found most difficult to master is remaining calm enough to resolve conflicts. It is very easy for me when the conflict involves others, but when it involves me, I find it more difficult. I am working on it.
I have always found body language very interesting: paying attention, keeping quiet and listening, and above all observing the other person, who says more with their body than with their words, not only in the workplace but in everything. Body language does not lie, but words can. I had a teacher who taught me some of this, such as when a person crosses their arms, it is a block and distance they put between themselves and others, or facial gestures that indicate to me that they are making up what they are saying.
Body language is very important, but has to be interpreted correctly. Sometimes people cross their arms when they're cold and it has nothing to do with blocking or creating distanc; just one example.
If it's true, what about in a job interview? It could be a negative thing.
Definitely negative in an interview.
My point was, that to simply read the body language without taking other factors into consideration could lead one to "read" the wrong thing.
Perfect!
Active listening was something I didn’t do during my early days at work. I was so hubris-ridden that I hardly listened to my subordinates, let alone my fellow employees. So I missed out on good learning experiences. Eventually, I became stagnant. Then an officer from the head office told me that I should get to know the workers well. Since I couldn’t do anything without approaching them, I became friendly with them and listened to them. My subordinates shared their problems and offered solutions to some organizational problems. After some time, they realized that I was their best listener. After that, I studied the work of even the lowest employee. Only then was I able to assign work to them.
Well done for making a fairly big change in your own attitude and behaviours, that's not an easy thing to do generally. I'm glad you got a good result from putting in the effort.
Active listening and resilience really do make a huge difference in personal and professional growth.
Are you speaking from experience? It's something that many people take a long time to learn but once learned it pays dividends.
Absolutely!
Conflict resolution jumped out at me from the screen. Conflicts have destroyed a lot of good relationships. Everyone should learn that.
Of course, when talking to people, we should not focus on how and what we are going to reply. We should listen solely to understand what the speaker is saying, our response will come naturally on its own. This helps conversations flow more naturally and smoothly.
I often tell myself, when debating with friends: "I'm listening to learn something new, not to come out on top in the debate." That helps a lot. I remember one debate I had with two friends at the end of which both thanked me immensely for enlightening them.
Have you ever been a bad listener and if so what made you want to learn how to communicate better?
Yes, I have been. But I improved my listening skills by telling myself that the speaker may in the course of speaking, say something, a piece of knowledge or information that can change my life, or help me solve a problem, or help me know them better. So I listen with that in mind. That helps me listen with intent.
I never realized how much things like body language and active listening can actually change how people see you.
I know, incredible right?