Feranmi has consistently met and exceeded her KPI at work and even though it felt good to outperform, she was unhappy because, for three years, she’s yet to get noticed for promotion.
She reached out to a career coach to find out what she could be doing wrong. He told her that she had spent years building her skills but not building relationships.
Here are the tips he gave to help her strengthen her relationships throughout her career and get on the path to promotion and continued success.
1. Share your gifts with others
To be considered for promotion, senior management needs to see that you’re able to work well with others since companies succeed through collective leadership. What’s that special thing about you or the way you go about your work? Share with your teammates to help them become better. Seeing you demonstrating this capability now makes it easier for management to think of you in a role with additional responsibility.
2. Shift your perspective from “me” to “we”
How do your team-mates or people you often collaborate with see you? Do you like to tackle tasks alone and take the glory? That is not a team spirit. Start involving your team in strategy planning, listen more, talk less, and focus on leveraging the skills of your team to achieve goals collectively. In short, become a team player.
3. Mentor others to develop your leadership skills
Even if you’re not managing a team yet, find opportunities to lead or teach others – it could be through volunteering. We learn best when we are teaching others.
4. Collaborate better with clashing personalities
Identify the specific personality characteristics that are challenging for you and develop strategies for working effectively with them. When you find ways to get along with coworkers of all types, you eliminate friction, become more productive, and make it easier for management to promote you.
5. Set healthy boundaries in your work relationships
To advance and take on more responsibility, you should learn how and what to say “No” to. Some tasks may not add value to you, your team, or organization or could be a complete waste of your valuable time. Be judicious and diplomatic and learn to delegate where necessary.
