Career Destiny In Your Hands: Make sure your manager knows you are doing a good job.

Reading time: 4 mins

Summary

“It’s not enough to do a good job, you have to make sure your manager knows you are doing a good job.” Terry Campbell.?

Destiny in your control Vs Destiny not in your control

• "If a tree falls in a forest and no one is around to hear it, does it make a sound?"

• Jingle: “Don’t be like a silent ninja in the night—make your wins shine bright!”

Recognition (R) = Hard Work (W) × Visibility (V)

• Hard Work (W): The quality and quantity of your efforts.
• Visibility (V): How well you communicate your contributions.
• Comment: If your visibility is zero, even the highest level of hard work (W) might not result in any recognition (R). In other words, without proactive communication, your achievements might well be invisible.

The world doesn’t owe you anything / Best not to be entitled

Approach A puts your destiny in your own hands, while Approach B leaves you hoping for a tree to fall loudly in an empty forest!

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Details

Professional Development Plan AND Professional Self Development Plan

I think the company you are working at should try to help you grow, I think you should also look to grow yourself.?

I think your manager should try to see if you are doing a good job, but also you should try to make sure your manager thinks you are doing a good job. If you are competing against others who are proactively trying to make sure their manager thinks they are doing a good job and you are not doing this, I think over the long run you are going to be at a significant disadvantage.?

I want to be the best employee possible… and for my manager to think I’m the best employee possible. One strategy to be the best employee possible is to be as low maintenance as possible. I don’t want to be a ‘needy entitled pain in the bum’.?

• ‘You’re not noticing that I’m doing a good job’ is not something I think is a good approach to be ‘the best employee possible’.

I sometimes think of two types of opportunity: 1. Opportunity you give to yourself (showing initiative) + 2. Opportunity others provide to you.?

• Yes, hope for opportunities from others, but also try as hard as possible to find opportunity for yourself.?
• The hungriest people do the best over the long term? The most entitled people do the worst over the long term? I think it so.

Having your Manager and your Manager’s knowing you are doing a good job

• Pretty much everyone is going to have a bad manager at some point. Best not to let a poor manager ‘be a dead end’.?
• Do the work to have your manager’s manager also know you are doing a good job.?

Some thoughts on strategies to have your manager know you are doing a good job

First of all I think it’s on direct reports to figure this out… and that they should be consciously doing this. Not on a manager to tell someone how to let them know.?

Weekly / Fortnightly email update for your manager: I think a direct should be doing a weekly or fortnightly ‘push notification’ of what they have been up to.?

• I find this best takes the form of an email (best not in a 1:1, or a slack message, etc).?
• If you are doing this well your manager should really enjoy seeing the email and want to open it. Ideally it takes less than 10 mins to read as well. Frankly the shorter the better.?
• “If I had longer, I would have written a shorter speech.” Churchill.

Monthly / Quarterly email update to your manager's manager.?

Show initiative (give yourself opportunity) on a monthly+ basis: The initiative you give to yourself should be something that is good for the business (vs good for you).?

• Explain to your boss what you are doing as well, don’t go rouge.?
• The best things are selfless and selfish!

Build credibility = 1. You are macro progressing * 2. Explaining as close to reality as possible how you are progressing.?

• Some who isn’t delivering progress to the business or growing themselves in the long run is likely in a bad place.?
• Some who over-represents reality (or never admits some of the things they did went poorly) is not someone you can trust.?
• So often people try to explain why everything is ‘good’. If something goes badly please say so and say what you have learned from it. Best not to try to claim something is not bad.?
• Ideally your ratio of good to bad is higher than 3:1, or you do things well 75%+ of the time.?
• However, presenting that you only do good things is IMO a key way to not have confidence in someone.

If you only take away one thing

• Visibility transforms hard work into tangible career advancement.
• I recommend adopting a proactive communication strategy to your manager and manager’s manager.?