Why You Are Stalled, Part I

The new year has arrived and we are all back to work. I hope your holiday break was enjoyable. Mine was. I always take time during the holidays to reflect on the year. Did I meet my goals? What worked well? How can I improve?

If I answer these questions honestly, I can be sure to improve in the upcoming year. I’ve done this throughout my career. It’s worked, and I believe it could work for you. So I’ve written a three-part series to help those who feel they have stalled in their career and want to jump start it in 2015.

Here’s Part I.

You may wonder why you are not advancing in your career as you hoped. While there may be many outside factors that are limiting your growth, don’t let that keep you from looking within.

In my experience, many talented individuals hold themselves back by failing to address their own weaknesses. They see all the outside hurdles to success but they overlook the opportunities to move ahead through self-improvement.

So, why are you stalled? Perhaps you are not constantly improving.

The concept of constant improvement is one that is prevalent in the business world. We look for it all the time in our products and processes. In manufacturing, many around the world use the Japanese term made famous by Toyota Motor Company – kaizen. Constant improvement.

To break free from your career stall, consider: are you constantly improving?

• Are you efficient? See if you can improve your efficiency – do some part of your job faster – even by a small margin.
• Are you skilled? What skills can you add to your repertoire? Can you learn a new technology? A new language?
• Are you creative? Can you push past expected innovation processes and come up with something truly original? Can you draw inspiration from unexpected places?

Kaizen is critical in today’s companies. It is no less critical in today’s employees. If you are stalled, perhaps kaizen is your answer.

Next week I will write Part II, which will address bringing passion into the workplace.