In the course of our coaching- & consulting- practice we often work with startups & fast-growing organizations who frequently hire younger individuals. For some of these young new-hires it’s their first “real job” or the first time they’ve actually thought about the prospects of a professional career.

A few days ago I actually had an early morning coffee-chat with one of these bright, young people who sought me out for counsel. He had a great attitude, was eager to work, but also had some concerns & great questions: “…how do I increase my value and grow?…how do I gain experience & responsibility?…how long should I expect to be in this role before being promoted?…”  

Here are some principles I shared to encourage, challenge, and guide him in his thinking and next steps:

Patience, Endurance & Performance – your job is a marathon, not a dash (often unlike an academic environment they might be used to). Settle into a sustainable pace of being an excellent performer where you’re planted. Nothing replaces the consistency of being the best at what you’re responsible for. Let your work speak for itself.

Grow Horizontally – increase your span of experience by looking for areas adjacent to your core role (above) where you can add value. Look for “train-wrecks” to fix. Volunteer to take on responsibility. This broadens your base of value and marketability. Keep in mind that you’ll have to “do more” before you’ll be “given more” (…pay-raise, titles, promotion, etc.).

Learn How to Grow Others – this is a real sign of maturity, and often counter-intuitive to an ambitious starter who tends to want to focus on ways to differentiate themselves. While it’s fundamental to be excellent at your job (back to #1), having the ability to work with others and make them excellent (…dare I say, better than yourself) is a sign of an emerging leader with real potential.

Stay Positive & Constructive – many young people enter the job with high expectations & rose-colored glasses, but are often disappointed by the daily grind, interpersonal issues, or job-related challenges. Rather than resent constraints, change your mindset and embrace them. See problems as “fun to fix.” It’s the bread and butter of what real leaders do (shocking to many) and a unique opportunity to add value.

While I’ve found these principles useful in counseling the “next generation,” I’ve also found them valuable & timeless reminders for myself. So, what about you?…can you think of someone you could encourage with these points?…or maybe one of them particularly resonates in your situation?

Picture: www.pexels.com

Happy New Year! (I think it’s still appropriate to say that until end of January…)

The fresh start of a year is typically a time of reflection and goal-setting. While it’s critically important to set objectives and have a plan, we’ve found there’s a factor even more powerful in predicting whether you succeed or fail. It’s your attitude and mindset.

Just think of a sports team that sets goals for winning, hires coaches, lays out a practice schedule, etc…but then only sometimes shows up for practice, doesn’t listen to the coach, makes poor grades in school, etc…You get the point!

In our experience working with dozens of organizations, leaders & teams, we firmly believe that mindset & attitude is the ultimate gamechanger that determines winning…or failing.

Taking it a step further, our experience tells us there are specific key attributes that characterize a “growing mindset.” We call them the “5H’s”…or the “5 Attributes of Growing People.”

Here they are in order of priority…including “what they sound like” (so you can see them more clearly in yourself and others):

As you review the list, note that there are personality types that gravitate toward certain combinations of these attributes. For example “Hungry & Hardy” are close cousins that you’ll often find in certain types of people, while “Humble, Hearing & Heading” might be a more common combination found in others. The point is that some of these will come more naturally to your personality, while others will take a lot more work.

So how do you make this actionable? Assuming you want to change & grow (an important prerequisite), here’s a simple way to assess yourself: 1) read each attribute slowly, 2) for each one divide 100 points across “when it’s there” vs “when it’s lacking” depending on where you feel you’re more heavily weighted (ex Humble: 25 “when it’s there” vs 75 “when it’s missing”…which would mean I’m more on the “lacking” side of humility) , 3) look for attributes where you have the least points on “When it’s there” and think of specific actions to take.

To make it even more valuable, also ask someone else to assess you. It takes courage…you may find a discrepancy (your view vs their view), but it’s an incredible gift to get this kind of external perspective.

So what’s stopping you? Remember, growing people are “hungry” and therefore not afraid of gaps. In fact, they see them as opportunities. So jump in, evaluate yourself and accelerate your growth into overdrive!

If you’ve been following my blog for a while, you may have realized an underlying theme of “doing to learn” and “learning to do.” It’s about trying new behaviors, succeeding or failing, learning and trying again. The pivotal part of this whole process is the “learning part” i.e. improving each time you try based on new experiences & insights.

From this perspective, it’s less important if you succeed or fail, as long as you learn from it. Taking it a step further, it’s proven that we actually learn more from our failures than successes. This is an especially important lens to adopt as you scan your experience for significant learnings.

So let’s put this to work…now. What better time to reflect on lessons-learned than the end/start of the year? Grab a pen & paper…here are some practical pointers to get you going:

• Think of key events that occurred in 2018 and list them quickly on a piece of paper (scan your calendar if you need it as a reminder)
• Highlight events that evoke more intense memories & emotion (successes or failures…it doesn’t matter)
• For those highlighted, take a moment to write a key learning next to each (don’t overthink it, do it quickly)
• Based on this short-list of learnings, look for a common theme. There may not be one (so don’t force it), but with a bit of reflection & reframing you will typically find a “red thread” that ties them together (this is where the magic happens!).
• Then ask yourself – “so what?” What can I do differently in 2019 to build on this learning and move forward.
• Finally, share it! Tell someone what you learned. It’s a great way to put it in words and have someone hold you accountable.

 …to follow-up on the previous point, I’d LOVE for you to share one of your “2018 lessons” in the comments below. No need to share personal details…just the key learning that is most valuable to you. Depending on the response, I’d like to feature some of these on this blog in the coming year.

Thanks so much for your faithful readership! I wish you a blessed Christmas & Happy New Year. May you continue on the journey of “doing to learn” and “learning to do.”

Picture: www.adweek.com