Smart Skills: Building Career Success

Anthony Jacks

• Publisher: Legend Business
• Year: 2018
• ISBN:
  9781787198173
• Topic: Personal Development
• Subtopic: Careers

Book 5 of the Smart Skills series: practical guides to mastering vital business skills and techniques. Using proven strategies from business experts, these essential smart skills can empower anyone with the tools to get ahead.

The only book you need to succeed in the world of business

In today's working environment, building your career success can seem like a minefield, thanks to increasing levels of competition, accountability, limited potential for advancement, and a lack of opportunities available. The only way to stay on top of the game is to build up your 'soft skills' and accumulate useful experience that makes you stand out from the crowd.

This concise and simple Smart Skills guide will show how and where to focus your energies when you want to become a more successful professional:

• Developing your skills and competencies
• Capitalising on your resources, strengths and weaknesses
• Building strong work relationships
• Increasing your visibility in and out of the workplace
• Making best use of your business knowledge

With these easy steps, professionals at any grade can achieve peak performance and start climbing that ladder to career success.

CHAPTER 1

FIRST PRINCIPLES

ADOPT THE RIGHT OVERALL APPROACH

In the introduction, the point was made that there is no magic formula which can guarantee that you enjoy a successful career. Here we discuss what may seem a general point, yet it is probably as close to such a magic formula as exists. Career development is an active process. You have to work at it. That is not to say that you have to do nothing else. In fact much of what needs to be done is an integral part of the work you will be doing, only needing a “career development” focus on it as well as whatever other role it has in your business life, to be useful.

Any career is influenced by a thousand and one different factors. The organisation you work for, the people you work with and for, and the differing circumstances of each, all affect how you will progress. You cannot possibly predict everything that will occur along the way. What you can do is have a clear idea of the things that will help you as time goes by, so that you can keep a hand on the tiller. Being prepared to work at it is the first step (you see the need or you would probably not have purchased this book), but you cannot do so in a vacuum. Some analysis of you, your situation and prospects is helpful. Also useful, if not essential, is a plan; something that can be drawn from the analysis. Both are investigated in a moment. So, the starting point is an appreciation of the necessity for career development, a resolve to work at it systematically that becomes a habit, and then an ongoing study of how you can make a difference and the application of any individual methods that you judge suit your circumstances.

Most often, the people you hope to emulate have not reached their positions by good fortune. Of course, good luck may have had something to do with it, but it is not something you should rely upon – just sitting back and hoping for a lucky break is not career planning – and, if and when it does arrive, it needs to be taken advantage of, developed and made permanent. The only element you can guarantee will always be there to assist you, is you. So think of yourself as an active careerist and go on from there.

DECIDE WHAT QUALIFICATIONS YOU NEED

It is said that you cannot have too many qualifications. To an extent this is true, though there are those who become perpetual students and never seem in danger of escaping into the real world at all. Here I want to say something about getting the balance right. First, let us put on one side those qualifications which are mandatory for particular fields of activity; for example if you wish to be an accountant, you have to pass the necessary exams. There is no decision to make here. If you want to get into a particular field, you must do the exam.

On the other hand, many qualifications are much less specific. How do you know, in advance, what an MBA will do for you, for instance? Such qualifications can be useful. They are not however, from an employer’s point of view, any guarantee of competence (in my own field of marketing, there are certainly people with paper qualifications in the subject who have no marketing flair at all). Qualifications do of course, give some signs, namely they:

• Impart a great deal of knowledge

• Improve thinking (developing approaches to, say, problem solving)

• Develop skills, though usually much less than gathering knowledge (certain courses blend different elements very well, as with many programmes nowadays that combine a management degree with language study)

• Give you a “label”.

It is this last point that needs some thought. Different qualifications are seen in a different light. This applies to both the qualification and to the institution from which it comes. There is a compromise to be made here for those at the stage of seeking qualifications – where will you be accepted? Where geographically do you want to be? How long is the course? What are the financial considerations? And so on. This kind of consideration is even more difficult if you are contemplating a post-graduate qualification, perhaps one that needs a break from work or private funding. When employers talk about what they want from their employees, they tend to link closely together “qualifications and experience” – this is what goes on a C.V. also – and they do go together, in other words whilst you are studying you do not get any work experience and vice versa. Part time courses exist to mix the two factors, but you may find the perception of them is also different from full time equivalents. So another balance that must be struck is between what advantages you will gain from, say a year working, and the same year spent on something more academic.

One more point: there is also a fashion element in how some of these things are regarded, with one institution seeming to be in favour at one moment, then another. All in all, you need to think long and hard about what will suit you best. What will give you the greatest career advantage in terms of both what you will learn and how the qualification will be seen? Then make a decision remembering both the saying that “you cannot have too many qualifications” and the various practicalities.

Note: not least here there are financial decisions to be made; gaining qualifications can be expensive and leave you in considerable debt, something that may inevitably affect you decisions as you seek employment.

INSIST ON A JOB DESCRIPTION

This is obvious and important; and curiously I regularly come across people and organisations where the whole area of job definition (and appraisal, which is touched on later) is ill-defined or non-existent. First, it is important from the point of view of any organisation. If managers are to manage, and manage effectively, then the organisation structure and who does what must be thought through, agreed and documented; and the whole process must link with the corporate objectives centrally and at the level of individual divisions or departments. What is more, whatever the formal benefits of a system of job definition, evaluation and appraisal (and they are undoubtedly a vital tool for personnel and other considerations) are – or should be – working documents, which act as a guide to individual managers and staff in day-to-day operational terms. You will gather that I am in favour of job descriptions.

But consider it too from the individual’s point of view. Surely everybody wants to know whether they are doing a good job or not – a sense of achievement is after all, a basic human motivation coming from any work. How can you possibly gauge if you are being successful if the job in question is ill-defined? It is not possible and thus leaves a sense of dissatisfaction. More important still from the point of view of career development, progress in a career is perhaps, more than any other single factor, dependent on performance, and other people need a clear view of what this is in your case. As the old maxim has it, “you must never confuse activity with achievement”, progress is so often dependent on evidence of achievement and that in turn is dependent on knowing what is expected of you and comparing how things go with this. A job description should not be restrictive, indeed it should be dynamic and if it needs changing and updating regularly so be it. It is after all, a working document.

So, in any job you do, make sure you have a clear, written, job description. I would go further: you should have one, everyone who reports to you should have one and whoever you report to should have one. In fact, the whole process works best if your staff see yours, and everyone else’s, and you see the job description for your boss. That way everyone knows not only what everyone else is doing, but how the various responsibilities interrelate.

OBTAIN THE RIGHT REWARDS

Job satisfaction is desirable, important and makes the inevitably less attractive parts of any job worthwhile; but it will not pay the rent. Whatever you do, you no doubt expect a fair reward for it. Fair in this context, normally means a comparison with your peers in the same organisation and with those in comparable organisations such as your direct competitors in the commercial world.

A moment’s thought shows that money is important in a number of different ways. It is a means of purchasing basic needs (and less basic needs too for that matter!). It is a symbol of the worth the organisation places on someone, it is a means of comparison, as stated above, and a reward in itself. But it is not the only reward. Most executive jobs involve increasingly complicated remuneration “packages” where in addition to the salary you may receive:

• A company car

• Incentive or bonus payments

• Share options

• Special terms loans

• Expenses (that do more than cover the costs incurred in conducting business on behalf of your employer)

• Discounts on company products or services (which will be more valuable in, say, an airline than in a firm manufacturing sewage treatment equipment or some such)

• Health and other insurance

• Group incentives (e.g. attending an overseas conference)

Some of these may well be linked to performance, and there may be more which you can think of that are favoured in your work field. Fashions vary with regard to such benefits and current practice tends to vary in different countries and change over time (as with company cars, much favoured in UK but nowadays being made much less valuable because of the way they are treated for tax).

Two further points need to be made here. First, do consider other rewards which should perhaps be weighed in the balance. For example, one job may pay less in the short term and yet offer unique training advantages that make it the best choice for the short term.

Secondly, do not be afraid to negotiate these kinds of benefit. Certainly once you reach a certain level, most organisations expect the package to have some element of tailoring. If you do not raise certain issues they may not get an airing at all. Similarly you may want to expand the agenda and include things the company have never even thought about previously. One example of this: an acquaintance of mine seconded to Singapore from London was offered but felt no need for a car in such a small place, but to keep himself mobile he negotiated a company motorbike! The difference in cost he took as money which suited him well and demonstrates useful flexibility. A final, warning point: negotiation is fine but you may come to a point where it is better and more valuable to your future career not to push further but maintain good relations with those with whom you are negotiating. Principles do not pay the rent, and in some economies it is a real risk to push things so far that your job becomes in doubt.

Note: it may be going beyond my brief, but the question of professional advice is worth a word. First, there could be occasions when you might sensibly check the terms of a contract with a professional. Secondly, whatever financial rewards you obtain, you may need advice about tax and savings and investments during your career.

TAKE A CHANCE

Here, I am not advocating an approach that throws caution to the wind, and you must consider your temperament and approach to risk, but chances do sometimes have to be taken. There is an old saying that says: “Don’t be afraid to go out on a limb if that is where the fruit is.” Trees are high and climbing may be dangerous, but it makes a fair point. You need to consider this in several ways:

• Perception: How do you want to be seen within your organisation? At one end of the scale, there is out and out recklessness which may be linked in the mind with such characteristics as being unthinking or taking ill-considered action. Such an image may be wrong for you. So too may be that of a staid, predictable and perhaps, as a result, less innovative person. You must consider where on the scale you should be, and even so can make the occasional exception.

• Job skills: The degree of taking a chance is something that you have to think about in terms of your job and the action and decisions it demands you take. Some decisions are a risk, and not everything goes right for companies and the people who work in them. Research, consideration and careful decision-making must usually precede any significant action but there is still a place for a chance to be taken. A reputation for a reliable business instinct is good for anyone’s image, but when this is there it is usually balanced by sound homework.

• Career decision: I know of people who have taken awful career decisions and gone through a bad patch as a result, and a few who have become stuck in something which they dislike or at least to which they are indifferent. Equally you may be put off a course of action because of the risk, or what you see as a step into unknown territory, and the fear of that clouds the argument in favour. In my own case, setting up my own business was the best thing I ever did in my career (my mistake, before anyone thinks I am claiming perfection, was not doing it earlier) - but it was also certainly...

Table of contents

• Cover
• Title
• Copyright
• Contents
• Foreword
• Introduction
• Chapter 1: First Principles
• Chapter 2: Self-Analysis
• Chapter 3: People Power
• Chapter 4: The Power of Communication
• Chapter 5: Career Skills
• Chapter 6: Training and Development
• Chapter 7: Being Effective
• Chapter 8: Your Personal Profile
• Chapter 9: Moving On
• Afterword
• About the Author