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 in my professional career; it's in my nature a human being because 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 second 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
Time management - I'll keep this short in the interest of time management. Get good at it however you can. use lists, focus-time, diaries and calendars, a personal assistant (I have had many and they work well if one knows how to run them properly.) Wasting time is never going to help progress a career, it will do the opposite.
Negotiation skills - I've spoken about this before but it's so important I'm mentioning it again. Most people are terrible at negotiation because they don't listen attentively, fail to understand others or core issues, are scattered in their thoughts, distracted, don't seek mutual benefit, are egotistical and prideful and other such things. Brainstorming is something I like to do, finding loads of bad ideas that won't work is a great segway to a few good ones that might. Exploring options, discussing them in an environment where everyone has a voice and addressing the needs of all parties is a great place to start. If you are not good at negotiation and want to accelerate your career then get good at it.
Self-awareness and reflection - To this day, I reflect on my performance, what I say, how meetings have been, how I negotiated, how my body language presented, my level of preparation, the wins and losses and so on. It helps to identify areas of improvement, things I do well to build on and things I need to improve. It's about being honest, looking as objectively as possible and having the bravery to accept the faults and failures, to actively seek change and to continually improve. Not doing this is professional suicide.
Decisiveness - Indecision is the enemy of a person seeking to progress in their career and especially so if one is a leader of others. On the battlefield it's better for a leader to make bad decisions (as often happens) than none at all - one has the chance of success and one is a certain failure. It's important to know when and how to consider the risks, how to mitigate them, recover from or reverse them and the benefits as well. Understanding how and where to pivot and being versatile and flexible enough to do so is also advisable as is the point above self-awareness and reflection because after decisions are made and results ensue (good or bad) one needs to understand the why and how of it to better make decisions next time. Making no decisions is in fact a decision to fail whereas a bad decision can usually be recovered from, or learned from. So get decisive.
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
I made a career advancement move at the middle of last year by joining my current company - a significant improvement from my previous job role. Fast forward a year and a half and it feels like a mistake.
It has robbed me of my time and creativity, two things I value.
Am not saying it hasn't had its perks, just that one needs to always think critically about the price of career advancement before proceeding and if it is worth paying
Those two things...both vital to a healthy and meaningful life, I get that you feel like you've made a mistake considering the feeling of the loss of time and creativity.
Many people think climbing the ladder is exactly what they want but a lot of the time their perception of what's up there is skewed because they're not up there. Command (military), management and leadership are lonely places and not just about more pay...the price one pays out is often not commensurate to the additional pay that comes in as you say.
Time management, I always use it, more outside work really, in work i simply have a deadline and I respect it, but doesn't take a big time management, also because if I finish early I don't even get a pat on my shoulder and if I finish late a bit it's not even noticed...
Decision i think it's matter of which work you do, if you are a cop or a soldier or a surgeon that's super important, on my place if I choose for myself I get blamed because I should have asked if that was the best choice lol
Reflection, that I do outside work like after a weekend to think about how it was, if there was something to improve etc, when I punch the timecard at work, I just cut off and don't even want to think about it one more minute
Decisiveness is a very important skill and not everyone will gain the knock of it, especially when decisions need to be made under duress; I'm fortunate to be one who has been able to do it and it's worked well.
It seems you've got a reasonable process and if it works then keep doing it and build upon that foundation.
During my career, I have attended several time management and negotiation skills trainings, in addition to stress management training, which is closely related to time management.
I heard interesting suggestions on negotiation skills, but it didn't improve me further (I have an innate talent for negotiation 🙂).
As for time management, that's where I learned the techniques you mention here and they helped me in moments when I was overloaded with work, where I allocated the time I had available according to the priorities of the tasks.
I remember a video the coach played for us once, a jar with tennis balls, ping pong balls, marbles, sand and finally beer. Excellently explained, for someone who has doubts, what are the priorities in life.
You also mentioned decisiveness. For a leader, this is a very important quality, because if someone does not have the courage to cut something, he is not a leader, he is someone who is not ready to accept responsibility, and someone who is a professional must have responsibility for the work he is doing. Even if he learned something from the mistake that will occur due to a wrong decision.
There's nothing to add to your comment, all good thoughts and statements and I agree. Thanks for taking the time.
Thank you for sharing these helpful tips.
For someone who is at the beginning of his career, if he reads them, they can be very useful.
I've been around for 156 years so have learned a thing or two and am happy to share some.
Time management was never my forte. I simply worked until the job was done perfectly. My negotiation skills, however, were second to none.
In legal services, success depended on convincing reluctant civil servants to fetch heavy, dust-covered tomes from the archives. That required diplomacy of the highest order, a little bribery, generous flattery, and, most importantly, remembering every birthday and enquiring after each of their family members by name. It was almost an art form.
This is quite interesting. Would you say the skills you had and used were innate or did you develop them over time?
Becca 🌷
I was an earnest child who took everything to heart and was always miserable. Over time I learned it was far easier to roll with the punches, and became the well-adjusted, blissful specimen you see before you today.
Bribery huh? Cheesecake works on me, scones with jam and cream too...I'd go get dusty tomes for either.
Also, what you describe is certainly an art form. Its interesting that people look at others performing their job and think how easy it is, but what looks easy for one isn't always easy for all.
Lists have been an absolute savior for me to be sure. Usually I can manage things pretty well, but occasionally I get a bit overwhelmed and throwing it all down into a list allows me to tackle it. Indecision on the other hand is something I still struggle with. I have to make pretty big decisions that impact the whole organization and occasionally I spend way too much time second guessing myself.
It makes sense to use lists rather than commit everything to memory which can become overloaded causing things to be missed and that equates to suboptimal performance.
For sure! Google Keep has been a life saver for me.
In terms of time and for greater efficiency, I have been applying the technique of taking short 5-minute breaks, and it has worked very well for me. I have improved in that regard.
On many occasions, I have felt indecisive when faced with two possibilities or paths to follow, weighing up which is the best or most appropriate. I eventually make a decision, but sometimes it takes me a while to decide. I need to be quicker.
Indecisiveness is very unproductive; it might be prudent to work around some techniques to improve your decision making skills.
Exactly, it doesn't always happen to me, only in extreme cases, but that's when I have to resolve things more quickly.
That’s a powerful reflection. I really like how you emphasize honesty and courage in self-assessment—it takes real maturity to confront one’s own flaws and use them as fuel for growth. And you’re absolutely right about decisiveness; hesitation often does more harm than a wrong decision, especially in leadership. Taking action and learning from the outcome is far better than being stuck in uncertainty.
Thanks, you've paraphrased sussinctly.
Uhhhggg.!!!
That photo always makes me hungry.
I am drinking a grape 🍇 juice and fasting. This sucks!!
I am a glutton for punishment. Gonna try to truck a few more years. Decisions... Decisions...
