Growing in your Career: Tips from Questrade's Chief People Officer

My name is Emma Horgan, and I am the Chief People Officer at Questrade, a position I have had the privilege of holding for just over five years. Supporting people with their personal and professional growth and development is a passion of mine.??

Career growth is often top of mind for many professionals, and for a good reason. It has many benefits, such as growing our skill set, experiences, capabilities, and momentum in our career journey. I am not just talking about the benefits of fancier titles and higher salaries, although they can be motivating factors. I am talking about the equally, if not more important intrinsic benefits. Building our knowledge, skill, and capabilities and taking on new challenges all helps build our confidence and self-esteem. This, plus the sense of accomplishment, is a good feeling that feeds our sense of well-being. Furthermore, focusing on learning and growing to maximize our professional performance can help us feel more secure in our careers and open more doors to continue the cycle.

If you asked a cross-section of senior executives or other people you consider to have career success, I deeply believe you will find two common themes in their answers about their career journeys. Firstly, they will very likely speak of having had at least one or two great coaches and mentors that helped inspire, enlighten and support them along the way. These might be leaders they reported to, mentors assigned to them through organization programs, or other people from their network.? People who in some way had a profound impact on their career and professional learning and development path. Secondly, you will likely find that they were intentional and took ownership of their own career journey.? What I doubt very much is that any of them would say they simply told their manager one day that they wanted to understand their career path and left it with them to figure out on their behalf and come back to them with all the answers and then clicked their fingers and made it all happen.

I have been navigating my own career journey now for over 25 years (with the help of great leaders and mentors along the way!) By virtue of my career as a Human Resources professional and leader, I have witnessed many career growth successes. It also means I have witnessed some that have not gone so well. I have put together some insights I have learned from my own experiences and those of others. In the hope, they may be helpful to those starting off their careers or struggling to chart and navigate their path. Because when it comes down to it, while we may be blessed to have people to help us along the way, no one other than ourselves can or will actually manage our careers for us.

1. Choose the organizations you opt to work at carefully. If you are in a fortunate position to be able to pick from a number of options.? Be sure to understand an organization's purpose, culture, and values and consider how well you feel you may thrive there.? Organizations can have very different cultures, and it's less about whether they are “good or bad” (although I would certainly suggest avoiding any that appear to have toxic cultures) and more about a level of connection you think you would have.? I have been fortunate to have experienced “good culture fit” at the organizations I have worked at but know many people where that has not been the case; that can be a miserable experience.? As well, it is good to assess an organization’s commitment to growth and development.? What type of learning and growth programs do they have? What are their philosophies on coaching and mentoring??
2. Focus on experience acquisition, particularly early in your career. Ensure you have a good foundation of experience to build on. If you progress too quickly without a solid foundation, it can catch up with you later.? Think of the pinnacle of a career as being at the top of the pyramid, not at the top of a ladder - being at the top of a ladder without a supporting base is a precarious place to be, and I have certainly witnessed several metaphorical falls. So make sure you build a solid foundation. Lateral moves and new projects that contribute to your future career goals are still career “progression.”? While they may not come with an immediate title-level change, you are learning and taking on new challenges. They help “progress” you to your next career stage. They are helping you get to that next step where the title will come.?
3. Excel in your current role. A key enabler to your next step, whether it is a lateral or an upward one, is excelling, or at the very least having solid performance,? where you are. I remember very, very early in my career when I was working at a local newspaper in Sales Support, one of the lead Salespeople was very ambitious.? He worked very hard to pave his way to a promotion, so hard in fact he started to neglect the core elements of his job. Eventually, he realized and shared the insight with me that focusing so much of his effort and energy on his next job caused performance issues in his current role and actually held him back. Doing ‘extracurricular' things and going above and beyond can help progress careers, as discussed later, but must be kept in balance.?
4. Avoid procrastination. If you are in your early career and you don’t know where you want to go, my advice is to not wait too long before picking at least a general direction. It will help you focus your experience acquisition and skill development.? My constant reminder is this quote by Lewis Carrol - "If you don't know where you're going, any road will get you there."? It can be challenging if you spend a lot of time down multiple paths only to realize later the one you wished you were on!
5. Map out your destination and consider your journey. Articulate where you want to go and assess the experiences needed to get there. While I was a Human Resources Manager in the UK at a small bagel manufacturing company, a mentor, a VP of HR from the parent company, came for a visit.? During the visit, he asked me questions about my career plans and intentions.? Because I had already thought about it, I was able to be very precise in my answers, particularly about the type of experiences I felt I needed to still acquire to progress further as an HR professional that was not available in the role at that time.? About a year later, I got a call from him out of the blue, telling me about an opportunity at another company's division in Toronto- that it would provide many of the experiences I had articulated to him that I wanted to get, should I be interested (which I was!).? The move into that particular role was pivotal to how the rest of my career, and life for that matter, substantially unfolded.???
6. But stay open to detours. When opportunity knocks, don’t be afraid to answer! Notwithstanding what I said prior, avoid being so rigid you miss seizing great opportunities if / when they present themselves. One of my colleagues shared his story from when one of his previous leaders/mentors suggested a particular path for him that he had not previously considered. After some consideration, he decided it could be an opportunity for him;?he pursued that path, and it ended up being extremely positive and instrumental to his career.
7. Become a life-long learner. Continue to find ways to ensure you are stretching and learning new things in your work. These should not be just academic or training courses; although they certainly have their place, it's also important to keep abreast of advances and trends in your proven profession through research learning. Most of all, though, in my opinion, is the importance of “on-the-job learning” that comes with new challenges and stretch assignments.?For me, these have always had a way more significant impact on my professional growth and development than any training course I have been on. Discomfort and feeling slightly out of your depth can be your friend, so seek out new challenges within your roles!?Do not let fear hold you back; help it fuel you to excellence.
8. Be self-aware and develop self-mastery. You need to leverage your strengths and develop the gaps to build your career, to be able to do that starts with knowing what they are!?In leadership, to lead others, you must first lead yourself. Know your strengths and weaknesses.?Self-mastery is about managing them to a great outcome and avoiding them from becoming career derailers. A little caution, though, do not overthink your shortcomings or you may end up second-guessing yourself all the time and that is not helpful for forward momentum.?Also, pay attention to not just your strength and development areas, but also what you do and don’t enjoy most. ? What type of work are you doing when you feel most fulfilled or energized??Is it numbers and analytics? Is it presenting in front of or engaging with a group of people? Is it being creative??Is it organizing and coordinating projects??Is it the variety that encapsulates multiple aspects that is important to you??When we are doing things we enjoy and are energized by our motivation and therefore often our performance is enhanced, and life is simply more enjoyable when earning a living doing things we like to do.?These sorts of insights can also help in choosing a career path (back to #4).?
9. Develop and protect your personal brand. What are you known for? You need to take ownership of determining, developing, and protecting your brand; decide what you stand for and be consistent in showcasing it.? What are some of the words you would want managers and colleagues to use if asked to describe you and what you contribute? Do your actions, attitudes and behaviors align with those words, and if not what do you need to adjust? This is where the importance of self-awareness and self-mastery from number 8 comes in.?Another key part of this and related to self-awareness again is ensuring your starting point is realistic. Our personal brands should be both authentic and aspirational, something that stretches us to work towards, but not such a departure from our true selves that we would need a complete DNA re-write or personality bypass for it to be true because that is doomed to fail. It is not about being “a different self”, it is about being your “own authentic best self”.
10. Stand out from the crowd (in a good way). Some ways to do this include volunteering for initiatives around your organization, networking, and adding your voice to the conversation. Be an active participant in your community. Once you know what you stand for, it is easy to find activities that align with your values and plan. Leading doesn't start when you reach a specific position. John Quincy Adams, the? 6th President of the United States, said, “If your actions inspire others to dream more, learn more, do more, and become more, you are a leader.” That is true for any role or title. There is leadership in every position — bloom where you are planted (while heeding my words of caution from #3).
11. Find great leaders and mentors. Coming full circle back to one of my opening comments, many people a way into their career will likely speak of having had at least one or two great coaches and mentors that helped inspire, enlighten and support them along the way.? In some cases, it might have been direct managers, 2-up leaders, formally assigned mentors, organically developed, etc. In # 1 I spoke of being selective about the organizations you chose to work for if you can apply the same principle to the managers you would work for too.? If you are interviewing with different organizations, pay particular attention to the hiring manager.? Do they seem invested in developing their people, what is their leadership style, and is that going to be a good fit for you?? With that said, we don’t always get to choose our managers and don’t have control over when a great one may get swapped out for a not-so-great one for various reasons.? I have been fortunate to have worked for some great leaders, and some not so great, but there is something to be learned from each experience, and why identifying additional coaches and mentors for your network can be helpful.
12. When you get an opportunity to be coached or mentored, make the most of it. In reality, we strike up an easier connection with some people than others, and if you are assigned a coach or mentor, it may not feel completely natural straight away compared to one that develops more organically, and that is ok. Regardless, I can assure you, you will get way more out of it if you invest the time and effort than if you don’t. I have mentored people outside my department and more junior team members inside and without a doubt the ones that put the most effort in got the most out of it (as is true for most things in life in fact!) Not due to anything intentional on my part - it's not like I decide if someone is not putting effort into the relationship that I try and withhold anything. It is simply that the more curious and engaged mentees do a better job of extracting knowledge, insights, and value. I remember mentoring one individual some years back, and it was just awkward. They rarely came with any questions or topics to discuss, and I found myself at the moment trying to find things to fill the time with that I couldn’t really tell if they had any interest in, and it was a real energy drain. Conversely, a very high-potential individual on my team I have been mentoring for a couple of years always comes to our meetings with situations he wants advice on as well as interesting thought-provoking questions that really caused me to reflect. We have some very interesting discussions and I always feel energized afterward.? He sent me an email recently listing out “all the things he had learned from me so far this year”, but in reality that is only happening through our sessions because he shows up, without fail, prepared, curious and engaged. So if you are fortunate to have a formal or informal coach or mentor, I highly recommend you show up, prepared, curious, and engaged, each and every time. If you don’t think you can or don’t want to, then better to not waste someone's likely very limited time.
13. Look after yourself. The concept that the healthier we are and the more healthy practices we have, the better we will perform does not only apply to athletes, it applies to everyone. Nurture your mind, body, and soul to ensure you perform at your peak. Eat healthily, get sleep and exercise. Invest in healthy relationships and pursue spiritual endeavors, whatever that means to you. Your well-being affects your actions, capabilities, and emotions.?
14. Last but not least - believe in yourself. We all have the potential to be great leaders, whether we be people, an expert, or both. All it takes is planning, intention, and discipline. Wilma Rudolph says, "The potential for greatness lives within each of us." As you plan your future, believe in yourself and have fun along the way. Enjoy your journey!

Emma is a progressive, strategic and global HR Executive with over twenty years of experience spanning the full range of HR disciplines. Throughout her career, she has also been the HR lead of multiple organizational transformation efforts, including M&A activity, restructuring, and expansion.

Emma joined Questrade as Chief People Officer in February 2017, and since then, she and her team have helped fuel, support, and adapt to the organization's tremendous growth. During her time at Questrade, the organization has had the privilege of being named one of Canada’s Most Admired Corporate Cultures twice and recognized for three consecutive years as one of the GTA’s Top Employers.

Prior to Questrade, Emma enjoyed a long career at Maple Leaf Foods Inc., progressing through several HR leadership roles, the last of which was Vice President HR & Leadership.