Performance Visibility – The Key Factor In Job Promotions

Earning promotion at job is the most cherished desire for any employee as it allows him/her to assume more important roles, develop new competencies, earn higher salary for family, enjoy a better living, gain social recognition and get a heightened sense of accomplishment.??

If you are good at your job, display commitment, continuously strive to develop your competencies, go the extra mile, maintain good relationships at work and have high value system, you can distinguish yourself as a strong candidate for promotion. However, while these are perquisites, promotion at work will always remain a chimera if your competencies, conduct, and contributions are not ‘visible’ in the ecosystem. Truth lies in the fact that world won’t know you exist in the race unless you put yourself out there and once you are there, you automatically get connected to opportunities which you wouldn’t have otherwise. Promotions become easier if the authority to promote is more aware of who you are and what you have been doing.

Some of the true ‘Hard Working’ professionals may discard this thought and refer ‘being visible’ as ‘playing politics’ for getting instant success. Being political is one of the most common characteristics of human beings and there is nothing wrong with imbibing it in our thoughts and actions while at work. Sacred books, too, explain how at times playing ‘fair’ politics becomes the need of the hour to survive zombie apocalypse situations. It’s ok to use this tool to light the room of your career growth with the only condition your intentions are positive and not meant for getting growth at the cost of depriving someone else of the same.??

Target group also matters in your journey of soaring visibility. You need to be clearly aware of the people?who matter the most to you – the key stakeholders, decision makers and key influencers in governance of the appraisal process and ascertain that the story of your hard work and achievements gets transmitted to the ear canals of this group members. This may seem unconscionable but is definitely not off beam if you aspire to have desired fast track growth within the system. Any good work usually becomes visible to all whether you work for its visibility or not. The point here is that visibility to the target group is one of the essentials for success and you should ensure that the same is not missed out.

Also, taking credit occupies a significant place increasing the element of visibility. No doubt, our work speaks for itself, but in the real world, it matters who gets the credit. Many a time it's seen that putting you at the back seat, some other person takes credit of the hard work done by you. Obviously, there could be nothing more infuriating than that. Here, the need is to act faster and smarter enough to ascertain that doors of ‘credit’ are not open to the rest before you enter the same. The intent should not be to stop the path of others, but realise where you lacked and focus on working vigorously to overcome the same.

In continuance to the above, if you are too generous in giving credit of the hard work done by you to others, you are creating prickles on your own success path. Being generous to others is a good thing, but we are living in a toughly competitive professional world. Here for getting real success, at times, we need to be different and adopt needed fair means required to taste the triumph. Hence, don’t be too generous in passing credit to others for all the good work you yourself did. Some may opine that ‘what you accomplish’ always outweighs ‘what credit you get’. Hence, whether you give credit to self or others may not make much difference. But it is also the fact that if you don’t safeguard your own ‘credit bank’ before giving credit to others, your own growth within the system will always be a mirage.?

Further, the type of work you chose to do also impacts your visibility. What you apparently do is your defined KRAs and for survival, you have to achieve the same. However, concomitantly you must also sign-up projects above and beyond your defined area of work. Don’t wait for your manager to assign these projects to you. Remain hungry and curious to discover such opportunities by keeping your ears and eyes open. Once you envision such prospects, be proactive to clutch the same before anybody else comes in front. Exhibit adroitness in steering the opportunity to meet desired objectives. This will surely lay down the red carpet for your visibility.?

Moreover, the way you participate and present yourself in meetings is vital for your visibility. Meetings are part and parcel of every organization. Also, they are a means of creating your impression in the system. Silent participants are less likely to get deserving credit of work as much as they should get as their capacities at work are often downplayed. Hence, you should master the art of actively participating in meetings and ensuring that your voice is heard, appreciated and accepted by the majority. Do proper homework and make sure that you are copiously prepared for logical and beneficial contributions during the discussion. This is vital for your visibility.?

To sum up, you need to do more than stretched hours to make it to the next level. It can only be achieved by meeting perquisites mentioned above and accompanying the same with the element of 'visibility'. But mere visibility without the matching performance can also be counter-productive. The fuel of your good hard work and accomplishments must always be accompanied with the engine oil of ‘visibility’ – the more visibility, the more acceleration in career progression within the system.