How to get ahead in your career

Since now is the time for performance assessment preparation, I like to share my thoughts.? People often ask me how do I get ahead on my career.?To succeed, my simple advice has always been - you must learn to identify your weaknesses, uncover your blind spots, and strengthen your skills.

Six simple rules to follow to succeed in the workplace:

• First, understand what you’re evaluated on.
• Second, get feedback, especially on areas that you're not aware of. Your blind spots. Your “unknown.”
• Third, give yourself a grade for each skill you need to do your job well, and focus your time and energy on the areas where you can most improve.
• Fourth, increase your visibility with senior leaders so that your work can get noticed.
• Fifth, become the expert in your department on an emerging issue that’s important to the company.
• Finally, find a good mentor who can help you along the way.

Sorry to say this but there's no shortcuts. But with perseverance, you develop that skills, experience, and relationships you'll need to thrive in your workplace.?

In recent years, I am seeing a trend. Employees change jobs frequently that some companies don't see a value in investing in their employees. That's a sharp contrast from when I worked for Kaiser Permanente for 13 years, where "personal development" was treated as a major initiative everyone must complete.? Unfortunately, most companies are unknowingly leaving employees with skill gaps. This leads to career derailment and reduction of organizational effectiveness. I also have heard from people that my manager does not have time to focus on me. In fact, research found that when managers are rated of their skills, "developing others" have been their weakness.?

Ideally, companies should do more to increase career growth - encourage immediate feedback, develop clear success criteria, deliver development feedback with clarity, and provide leaders to make "individual development plan" (IDP) their priority. The big challenge is on you. You must learn to identify your weaknesses, uncover what you are not aware of (blind spots), and strengthen your skills.

Understand what you're evaluated on. Ask yourself. What does success look like in your position? What are your job goals and success metrics? Write it down and identify these with your manager. Communicate what you understand the goals are and key success criteria to be. Get an agreement, and engage in an ongoing dialogue during your 1 on 1 to stay on the right track.

Solve your own blind spots. Top performers are always learning and adjusting - routinely getting feedback from their managers, peers and stakeholders.?There's winning, and there's learning. If your manager does not provide feedback, don't wait! Start the conversation yourself. After a presentation or a deployment, discuss what went well. Ask advice on where you can improve.?

In the world of AI, there are two agent’s state - the known and unknown.? In the known environment - actions are known to you, the agent. You know what the expected results are from your actions.? While the unknown, you have to learn how it works in order to perform an action. Normally, after you learn how to resolve the unknown - it then moves to the known state. Like your blind spot. You may not know how to deal with it immediately, but once you figure it out, it’s no longer unexpected.?Remember Groundhog Day?

Grade yourself. Capture the feedback, and keep track of your areas for improvement. List your top 5-10 skills or competencies you need to develop in your position (don’t think about the higher level position.) Rate yourself and even get feedback from your co-worker. For example, if you're a developer, you might give yourself an A in coding & delivery, a B+ in communication, and a C in presentation. Guess which area you should be focusing closely.

Increase your visibility with Senior Leaders. It may not be possible to get notice through your direct work. Try doing some volunteer work, or going to company events. This is an easy but often overlooked way to rub elbows with senior leaders who will see you in action and take notice of your contributions. Another technique I have used is to prepare a presentation of your delivery / implementation with Senior Leaders in mind as your audience, and move it up the food-chain so your accomplishment gets noticed. I have used this technique a lot in KP, and I know senior leaders are more aware of my team's' accomplishment.

Become the expert in an area of increasing importance to the company. Your department may be grappling with challenges from new technology like IOT, AI, ChatGPT or cloud-based computing. Become the subject matter expert in your department on emerging issues. Conduct Research, Proof of Technology, document about the topic and volunteer to be the go-to person to discuss this within. Developing expertise in the area of growing importance can lead to opportunities and your visibility.?

Seek good mentoring and counsel. The perspective of a senior leader is invaluable. Don't just approach the person with "Will you be my mentor?" Meet in an informal way like meeting in the lunch room or take a quick break together. Meet the person in a company sponsored event like golf outing is another way of getting facetime.? Know the person's bio before meeting and be prepared to ask questions and their areas of expertise. If things go well, you'll hear "Let me know, I can help you." Extend the conversation by an email by entering a Subject "Areas that I would like to get your input".? In time, the mentor relationship grows.

Strong functional skills take time to develop. Being competent often consist of deep functional knowledge in 5 key areas of your position and a good working know how of another 5. You have to be willing to take on challenges, or multiple assignments. This takes time. Your skillset is ultimately your career investment, so take time to develop your functional skills.?

Jumping from job to job too quickly?won’t allow you to develop the functional expertise you need to advance in your career. With time and patience, and by taking the initiative, you’re likely to thrive in your career.