Career Skills

by Karen Adamedes

There are a number of disappointments in business that you may need to deal with, and one common one is receiving negative or unexpected feedback about your performance.

Ideally you won’t receive any nasty surprises because you continually monitor and evaluate your performance, are aware of your strengths and weaknesses and able to take remedial action.

However, there are all sorts of circumstances that can lead to negative feedback at work – circumstances out of your control; a new manager who doesn’t understand the context of what you have achieved or you just don’t (for some bizarre reason) perform to your usual standard.

If you do receive negative feedback:

• acknowledge what has been said
• thank the person for their comments
• ask for time – if you need it to think about what they said
• ask questions and clarify your understanding
• go into solution mode and take action – this could be anything from resolving an issue to enrolling in a course to develop your skills
• evaluate what you have learnt
• mentally file away the experience, and
• move on!

When you get negative feedback others will watch to see how you react. No tears. Don’t be emotional, and find ways to give yourself some space.

If you are in a meeting with a number of people you may be able to excuse yourself or take the issue off the table and ask for it to be discussed later, in private. For instance, saying, “Can we discuss this in detail after the meeting?” buys you time to think through your reaction to a situation.

Whatever you do, don’t get into a debate about your performance in public.

If you receive critical feedback in a one-on-one meeting with your manager, you don’t need to react or resolve the situation there and then. If you need time, say you want to think about what has been said and make an appointment for further discussion. Be calm, logical and self-confident, whether you feel that way or not.

How you handle negative situations is often an important influence on how others see you and how ’emotionally intelligent’ you are considered to be.

Career Tip To Go:

[Tweet “If you receive negative feedback, be calm, action-oriented & solution-focused.”]

Receiving feedback, whether positive or negative, is a good opportunity to learn. You’ll know how to go about things next time, and what you could do more or less of. Then again, you may realize that you are working for someone who has no idea about how to help you develop, or that the environment is not right for you. Whether feedback is positive or negative there is always something you can learn.

Whatever the feedback, don’t beat yourself up for not being or not being seen to be perfect. Don’t replay and relive the situation.

Accept it is has happened, learn what you can and move on.

Career Tip To Go:[Tweet “Learn from feedback.”]

 

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by Alice Young

During economic down-turns and hard times lots of companies put the brakes on the Learning and Development department and before you know it, that Project Management course that your boss told you was essential for you to be considered for that next level role is no more than a pipe dream.

So in these constantly changing times how can you take ownership of your own personal development whilst at work?

1) Formal courses

Of course the stereotypical way that we think of “developing” ourselves is by attending a course.  And as long as these are the “right” courses, and delivered in a way that plays to your personal “learning style” (we’re all different on this – some like lectures, others prefer a team focused approach, others learn visually, others through activity based learning), then this will be a productive use of your time, and you might even get a professional accreditation from it that you can add to your resume.

But do your homework before you sign up.  Ask the course organizer why this course is being run (i.e. how and why this course was selected), how they’d describe the facilitator style, what are the intended learning outcomes, how many other people are on the course, and of those, how many are from your company.  Then make a call as to whether you feel this is the right course for you, and if not, research one that you feel is more appropriate and ask your manager if you can attend that instead.

2) Stretch or inter-department projects

A lot of people view projects as “additional” work.  I view them a) as great learning opportunities, b) as great networking opportunities, and c) as an opportunity to raise your profile in the business, particularly if you’re on a cross-cutting or inter-departmental project.  In order to formally gain the most from the experience (and make sure you’re not just doing extra work), make sure the project and it’s outcomes are entered into your performance appraisal, with success measures and learning outcomes (if your organization has a performance appraisal process).

Worried about signing up for a stretch project?  Don’t be.  Just agree with the project “owner” at the outset that whilst you bring a,b and c to the table, ultimately this is a developmental experience for you (and way cheaper than going on a course).  Then breathe.  And enjoy.  You know what they say – you learn more from your mistakes, and sometimes not having all the answers is good for you, even if it feels uncomfortable.

3) Innovate and problem solve

You know that issue that everyone works around? (eg the HR database doesn’t talk to the Finance database and 7 people spend 2 days at month-end inputting and verifying data in order to get staff paid).  Well instead of working around it, work it out!

This is a key example of 2, except that the organization might not be acknowledging that it’s an issue (because to do that means that resources should be allocated into resolving the problem).  So don’t just complain about it, put together a business case to resolve it, gain buy-in from your manager and key stakeholders and go for it.  Never managed a project team before?  Well now is the time to learn 🙂  And anything’s got to be better than 7 people spending 2 days verifying data – yawn.  Your team and those around you will love you once it’s all resolved.

4) Find a mentor

Does your company have a formal mentoring program?  If not, that’s ok, you can still find a mentor yourself, internally, or externally.  Have a think about what you feel you would gain from a mentoring relationship and what sort of mentor would suit you, and set some goals accordingly.  Then speak with your manager and your HR team about whether they can help source a mentor for you.  If not, look through LinkedIn at your own connections, and the connections of your connections.  If approached appropriately, many people are delighted to be mentors.  If you’re not comfortable with this approach you could try one of the many mentoring services that are now in place i.e. Propellher (indeed there’s some good tips on their site about mentoring relationships, how to set goals etc)

5) Shadow someone in a different department

A great way to get to know your organization in a deeper way is to shadow someone who does a completely different job from you.  You can have been working at a company for years and still get a new perspective on the organization, what it does and how, by spending a few days walking in another team member’s shoes.  Make sure you share your experience by talking about what you’ve learnt at a team meeting afterwards.

6) Sign up for a volunteering opportunity

Does your organization have a community or Corporate Social Responsibility  program?  Have you ever signed up on it?  If not – you should!  A recent study by the UK based HR body, the Chartered Institute of Personnel Development has found that volunteering programs deliver many benefits for participants, not least: enhancing professional knowledge, workload management, internal networking, community understanding, team work, creativity, self awareness, personal confidence, communication, coaching and mentoring.  That’s a lot of courses you’d have to attend to gain all those skills, and they’re all rolled into one experience!

So quite simply the message is, if you want to be at the forefront of your career, you need to keep learning, no matter how much of a technical expert you are.  And the best way to do this?  Don’t sit back and wait for permission to attend a course.  Instead, [Tweet “Create your own learning plan based on what you want to be doing in your career”] in 5 or 10 year’s time and strategically start placing the building blocks of increasing your skill-set so that you can get there.  Of course, you still have to perform in your day job, but if you’re prepared to go the extra mile you’ll find that constantly learning will leapfrog you ahead of the crowd over your next few career moves.

[Tweet “Career Tip to Go: Keep Learning!”]

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by Karen Adamedes

Career Skills are the abilities you have to that enable you to do your job and to manage your career. These are over and above the skills and technical knowledge you need to perform the tasks that are part of your job.

There are numerous reasons why career skills are important – from the expected arrival of robots and other technologies that will change jobs to the reality that being good at what you do is just not enough to ensure that your work is valued and to allow you to keep moving forward in your career.

The question is – What are the skills that are required to be effective in your job and manage you career?

And the supplementary question – Are these different skills?

Taking the second question first…no these are not different skills. The skills required to be effective in your job and manage you career are the same. Bonus! Which means that you can be developing the skills you need for your career and get even better at the job you are doing (which is only going to help your career anyway!). Double Bonus! And if you need to, you can justify the time and effort you invest in developing your skills as they are helping you in your current job. Bonus! Bonus! Bonus!

They are the sum of your knowledge, skills and experience.

They will determine your success in decision making, influencing others and getting the job done (well).

They will ensure that you are able to get the job you want, negotiate your salary and are prepared for your future. The one that you want. (Not one that is dictated for you by others).

So the crucial question, what exactly are career skills?

They fall into 3 main categories:

• the skills that you have to communicate with others
• the skills that form your operating style – how you work (whether anyone is watching or not)
• Career development skills

Let’s have a quick look at each of these:

Communication

Communication is the currency of work.

It’s the mechanism of how work is done in organizations. Your interactions with others is how you build your reputation and relationships – and get stuff done. It’s how you ask for what you need and let people know what you’ve done.

Understanding and adapting your communication to the accepted style of business can have a substantial impact on your career potential, how much you enjoy your work and whether your contributions are recognized.

These skills enable you  to be able to say what you mean and have what you mean understood.

Operating Style

Your Operating Style is how you work and importantly how you are seen to work.

It is the expertise that underlies how you work and interact with others. It’s how you naturally work when you don’t think about how you are working!

Developing these skills, such as how you work in teams, behave in meetings, negotiate and resolve conflict will enable you to work efficiently and productively, allowing you to think about what you are doing not how you are doing it.

How do others think about your capability? Your competence? Do they see you as someone who is able to get things done? Effective? Efficient? A good thinker? A strong leader?

How others view us determines credibility and professional reputation.

The skills that determine and influence your Operating Style are not often talked about but they can be learnt.

They are not techniques to trick others into thinking that you are good at your job if you are not. Rather they are specific and tangible tactics to optimize your time, your energy and your potential for career success.

Your Operating Style is the expertise that underlies how you behave and interact. It is fundamental to success in a business career.

Career Development

Developing your career requires the skills to plan, negotiate, build networks, learn from your experiences and understand who you are.

It’s also essential to develop the ability to recognize opportunities and threats (and be ready to act on them).

The skills you develop and the support you put in place to manage your career for the long term will also help you today. It’s human nature to evolve, transform and develop. Working towards the future you want will not only put you in the best position to get what you want, it will give you confidence about what you are doing today and the choices you are making. And theses skills also help you improve your performance in your current job. It’s a win-win!

The world of work is full of subtleties and nuances, competing priorities, too much work and too tight deadlines.

The more skills you have, the better equipped you are to be effective and positively impact your destiny and manage the complexity of how work works. Knowledge, skills and experience are the keys to career success. Focusing on the areas that are most important and have the biggest impact is vital.

The Career Tip To Go: Take the time and effort to develop how you do what you do.

Next week: How communication skills help and what they are.

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