There you are staring at your computer screen. It’s one hour before the deadline to apply for your dream job and you’re facing that dreaded question on the job application. “What is your greatest accomplishment?” Argh! You turn to your resume to cut-paste the answer to that all-important question, but you realize in scanning the document that you don’t have an easy-to-grab paragraph.
OR
You’re having lunch with a mentor two levels above your boss and you tell her that you are considering applying for an opening in a new department. She offers to put in a good word for you and asks you which accomplishment in your current job is most relevant. Argh! You scramble your brain cells trying to think of something fast and end up drawing a blank.
Don’t you wish you had an easy-to-reference list of previous accomplishments to choose from?
Why Do They Always Ask for Your Greatest Accomplishment?
It can be annoying to get this question while positioning yourself for success, because accomplishments can be hard to think up and present. Why do they always ask you for them? In short, recruiters and hiring managers get a lot of resumes they have to scan. They tend to first review them for who meets the essential job requirements, and then they try to find information that will help them rank and prioritize who looks best. These people in the “cream of the crop” pile get the first invitation to interview. Know what tends to pop a resume out of the pile and into the “cream of the crop” list? Yep. Relevant accomplishments. Interviewers will always ask about your accomplishments to weed you out quickly if your experience is not relevant.
Stating your accomplishments is a word-efficient way to tell others a lot about what you have done and can do in the future. <==Click to Tweet
There are many reasons accomplishments catch their eye, however one of the most basic factors is simply that stating an accomplishment is a very word-efficient and intuitive way for them to envision your competencies. For example, when you state this accomplishment: “established cross-functional team approach to product testing prior to release, reducing reported errors in commercial production by 25%”, this is what recruiters and hiring managers immediately know about you:
you “get” how important reducing errors is to company and customer success
you’ve lead people in a product group and/or customer service discipline
you are effective working across organizational groups and departments
you can put tracking systems into place and/or use them to measure success
you know the importance of testing prior to commercial release and can probably manage projects
That’s a lot you just told them with very few words. And they probably want to reduce their own errors by 25%, too!
How to Be Ready for the Greatest Accomplishment Question
As the second example above makes clear, whether you’re actively looking for a new job or not, you should always have a list of your greatest accomplishments, and keep updating it over time. This way, you have your list of accomplishments at the ready when:
Applying for jobs
Tailoring a cover letter for a specific job
Updating your resume
Updating your LinkedIn
Job Interviews
Informal networking
Performance reviews
Asking for a raise
Reminding your boss how valuable you are
Reminding yourself how valuable you are
What goes on this list? First of all, realize that this list of greatest accomplishments isn’t something you necessarily publish to anyone. This is your personal resource. A document that sits in your files alongside the last ten versions of your resume. Each job on your resume should have a list of accomplishments, and for each one you need a short description and a longer description. Here are some greatest accomplishment examples:
Greatest Accomplishment Examples
Job: Program Manager at Company X
Short Accomplishment Example: Saved most profitable customer from cancelling multi-million dollar contract by instituting emergency escalation procedures, which became a company best practice.
Best used for:
Resume
LinkedIn
Performance Reviews
Reminders
Long Accomplishment Example: One of our biggest customers had chosen to be a beta account for a large service upgrade program. That service release turned out to be more error-prone than previous releases and the customer experienced several disruptions in their service. They had also appointed a new point of contact who didn’t know us well and who began escalating even the smallest problems to our President (a personal connection of his) and threatening to cancel the contract. While this was only one of four major accounts I was managing, once I realized how important it was to do right by this particular customer, I worked with the head of service delivery to establish an immediate escalation and response process for their complaints. The process worked well, the contract remained safe and the service delivery department requested that we use this same process with all VIP customers in the future.
Best used for:
Cover Letters
Networking
Interviews
By the way, you also have to be ready for them NOT to ask you this question, and yet still find a way to weave your examples into answers to their other questions. Why? Because even if they don’t say the words, “Tell me about your greatest accomplishment,” they still want to know!
How to Prepare Your Greatest Accomplishments List
FIRST: Write them out immediately.
One of the most important things to do is to create these accomplishments immediately after the fact, as soon as you complete them. That’s when the situation is freshest in your mind and you have access to the data you need. You’ll get started by remembering everything you can about previous jobs and writing down your most meaningful accomplishments, but keep this document up to date! Don’t wait until an hour before the deadline to update your resume to try to think it up.
SECOND: Relate your accomplishments to a business driver.
All your greatest accomplishments relate to an outcome that drives the organization forward. A business driver is often a key metric (e.g., quality) but not always (e.g., competitiveness). When you can demonstrate that your work produced results that helped the business serve its customers, manage its finances or achieve its mission, you are showing that you deliver value for your employer. Know what drives the business case for your organization and ensure your results support success. Even if you work for a non-profit, these business drivers matter, since they speak to the health and success of any organization.
THIRD: Practice speaking your accomplishments
We usually think about accomplishments as something you write into your resume or LinkedIn, but they can be even more powerful in person. That’s when you get to give your storytelling (long-form) version. People from a networking event or job interview will walk away with a much greater understanding of how good you are and what you can do when you’ve told them a story or two about some of your results.
Visibility is not vulnerability. It is an important step on the ladder of success to stand out as an individual. <== Click to Tweet
If you find yourself shy about talking up your greatest professional achievement, don’t be. Do it in a way that teaches others the lessons you’ve learned along the way. This way you’re not bragging, your sharing knowledge about what works. And in the process, you’re making yourself look good (because you are!)
Ready to catalog your greatest accomplishments? Create your list now and identify the 2-3 that are highlights to emphasize. But feel free to pull out a small one that is the perfect example to show someone how you can shine.
Women are often caught in the paradox of wanting to “play nice” and the need not to “rock the boat.” It can feel like a no-win scenario but Henna reminds us that the path out of this paradox is authenticity. – InPower Editors
How many times have you stopped to reconsider what you wanted to say because you were concerned about how it would ROCK THE BOAT?
True story. I recently wrote a blog post about embracing my inner “dumb blonde“. The response was overwhelming. I was completely clueless about how many people I would offend in writing this post. People wrote in wanting to be unsubscribed. I felt this sinking feeling of not being “liked” in the pit of my stomach. It didn’t feel good. I wondered if I should have stayed safe and polite. As I reflected on my own discomfort at offending so many people, I realized that as women leaders, many of us walk a fine line between being nice and being powerful. We often hesitate to voice our convictions with confidence. How to walk this line?
Research Supports us “Playing Nice”
There’s plenty of research that supports our vigilance about what we say. Research suggests that women get penalized more if they offend others because the expectation of our gender is to be nice, nurturing and collaborative. Research also shows that women are much more wary of how they are being perceived than men are. We do a whole lot more self-monitoring.
The Downside of “Playing Nice”
The downside of all of this self-monitoring is that we appear hesitant. We don’t express our point of view powerfully, especially if it is different from that of others. Ironically, this (different) point of view is precisely what is needed for diverse teams to make better decisions.
All this self-monitoring can also backfire in terms of our career aspirations. It undermines how others see our presence, our confidence, our strategic thinking, and our ability to contribute. Most importantly, excessively worrying about whether we are being “liked” undermines our ability to be authentic, to have a strong voice – all key drivers of our career success and engagement at work.
Breaking Out of the Paradox
So how do we break out of this paradox? It requires a paradigm shift. We have to find a way to embrace both aspects of ourselves to be fully authentic – our inner “nice girl” and our inner “Iron Lady” – Margaret Thatcher.
That paradigm shift requires choosing what we say based on our values rather than our fears about how we will be viewed. When we speak from our authentic values we can embrace both our inner “nice girl” and our “inner Iron Lady”. When in doubt, here are five questions to ask ourselves:
Is my point of view well founded based on the experience, facts, and information I have?
Is what I am saying true to my values?
Is my intention in the right place (serving the business vs. being hurtful or undermining others?)
Will my point of view enrich the dialogue?
How can I say this so it will be understood and best resonate with the audience?
Let go of the attachment to being right, being popular, or any decision going in our favor.
Try it. Sure, it can be uncomfortable. Sure, your point of view may fall on deaf ears. But it’s precisely in those moments when we speak up that our voice becomes stronger. As our voice becomes stronger we grow our influence. The moments that count are when we choose to speak up with courage and authenticity. The rest is secondary.
A version of this post first appeared on my Forbes.com blog.
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We love it when smart thinkers challenge buzzwords, which is why we love Laurie’s post this week as she endeavors to define Authentic behavior in the workplace and explore the deeper meanings of this important idea. After reading the post, take a moment and think about what is most authentic about you in the office. Can you be more of THAT? – InPower Editors
Be your authentic self. Let your freak flag fly. Remove your masks.
That may be fine for creative entrepreneurs and your crazy cousin Pepper who lives in Vermont, but does it fly in the workplace?
Yes. In fact, authenticity is essential to a high-performing team, growing companies and your own fulfilling, high-energy life.
What Does It Mean To Be Authentic At Work?
I’m not suggesting you wear beads in your hair, your tie-die shirt or a Harley jacket to work. I’m also not suggesting you hug everyone, drop f-bombs or crochet during meetings.
Authentic is defined as “of undisputed origin.” Authenticity therefore is to be of your undisputed origin. That means authenticity isn’t about what you wear or even your “personality.” Authenticity is who you are as a person at your core.
After years of trying to please others, be right, look good, be safe and many other things we work to do to “keep it together” and get ahead, it’s easy to draw a blank when posed with the question “who am I really?” It’s funny that this is such a hard question to answer. But face it we all come into the world in the same way. We are a unique, magical, biological amalgamation of DNA. Yet we strive to be different, special, loved, cherished, honored, and respected. In this effort to be something we are not, we lose touch with our authentic self.
Being authentic isn’t about removing masks. Being authentic is about:
dropping the judgments and triggers (about yourself and other)
ending the tiresome pursuit to please others
accepting there is enough to go around and you don’t have to fight others for limited resources
recognizing you are good enough and you deserve respect (without demanding it)
accepting that you everything you need within you
Being authentic is about being free and open enough to connect with others and to tap into your inner wisdom and energy. – Click To Tweet
Why Authenticity In The Work Place Is A Must
The success of your company, your team and you depends on every employee, including yourself, being authentic.
I know this may sound a little woo-woo, but bear with me.
A workplace is made up of individuals. For that workplace to be successful and achieve the desired results, the individuals must work together and that means they must connect with each other. If you aren’t connecting with your co-workers without too much conflict you aren’t getting things done to your fullest potential. As Helen Keller says, “ Alone we can do so little; together we can do so much.”
In-authenticity, on the other hand, breeds fear, fighting, and fatigue. Some of the price of in-authenticity in the workplace therefore is:
less then maximum revenue growth
unhappy customers and clients
product defects and design flaws
lost opportunities
silos in which employees don’t communicate, collaborate or support each other
employees or teams undermining each other
Companies spend thousands, if not millions of dollars, each year trying to get their employees to work better together and manage change. Yet they don’t address the heart of the matter and that is creating an environment that fosters authenticity. If you want a workplace where people collaborate, are energized, creative and innovative, provide excellent customer services and bring their best, start by being authentic.
How Can You Be Authentic At Work?
If you are not being authentic at work, it’s a scary idea to consider. I can tell you that the first time you are authentic it’s frightening.
The first time I was authentic at work was when I asked our CEO if I could present an analysis to the executive team of how we could create stronger client relations after we had a massive, costly failure. There were many reason I shouldn’t have done the analysis, much less presented it. For one, I wasn’t responsible for client relations. I also wasn’t on the executive committee.
Then there were the internal reasons I shouldn’t have boldly spent late night hours thinking about and creating the presentation. The internal reasons were all the internal conversations I was having:
Surely no one would listen to me. Who was I” to be doing this analysis and presentation, I was just the lawyer and no one listens to lawyers? What if I step on someone’s toes? What if they thought my analysis was stupid or wrong and I got fired?
Here’s the thing about that negative chatter that triggers you. It’s rarely right. None of that awful stuff happened, the presentation was well received and changes were made. A few years later I was even overseeing client relations.
Despite success stories, I find most people are still wary of speaking their mind and being authentic at work. The key to being authentic is quieting the voices in your head and speaking up with your ideas, your thoughts and your creativity. The key is taking a risk that you know better than the gremlin in your head.
Being authentic is no stopping even when you get shot down time and again. As the saying goes, if you don’t succeed, try again. Change your approach. But don’t give up.
How will you be authentic today and move you and your company forward today?
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Sheryl Sandberg contributed many valuable insights to professional women in her book, Lean In. The one that hit me most squarely was her analogy of a career as a jungle gym instead of a ladder. Truer words have never been written, and I think this is a major contribution to the discussion of work-life “balance.”
The current mythology of success defines our career journey as a climb up the ladder. The ladder represents many things – all artifacts of the hierarchically structured industrial age economy (which, by the way, is being radically restructured as I write). The higher we go on the mythical ladder, the more money, influence, power and respect we get. This is why when women (and men!) “opt off” the ladder to pursue a more “balanced” work-life, the mythology defines them as unsuccessful until they acquire those same top-o-the-ladder treats via other means.
But what happens when you take away the ladder analogy and replace it with something resembling a jungle gym? A more integrated, geometric structure that offers progression in many directions, just not all at once?
When the analogy shifts, so do the definitions of success. In a jungle gym analogy, many of the same kinds of success are attainable, but not in any particular order. Our personal journey to find them becomes an individual search for “what’s next” in multiple directions instead of what’s next on a defined path. Our path becomes our own and our definition of success does too.
I noticed this personally when I opted out of the ladder in my 30’s. I had checked the box on many of the “success criteria” the ladder had to offer me. Going higher held less of an interesting challenge to me that branching off into an unknown, where I have in fact grown more as a professional and a person. Here is what I’ve noticed along the way about the realities of climbing the jungle gym (and I believe these also apply to those still on the ladder if they want them to):
Money comes and goes. It’s only the goal or definition of success if you want it to be. How important to you is money (and the things it can buy), really?
There’s nothing more perplexing – or disciplining – than discovering you can have anything you want as soon as you decide and devote tremendous focused energy on acquiring it. If you can have anything, what do you want? How hard is it to admit that there are some things you don’t want enough to do the work to get it?
Sometimes when you branch out in new directions, climbing upside down (or working at home) for example, you use new muscles in new ways – and they get sore until they get used to this new way of being. But then after a while you know how to climb upside down whenever you want to. What new muscles might you decide to use?
Leadership expands. It’s not just about people doing what you need them to do to fulfill your team’s goals, it also becomes doing what you want them to do for any reason whatsoever. What do you want people to do?
It’s easier to track success by looking at how many new skills you master as a person, including those that a company might not value, but that you do. What do you value only because it’s what you value?
You have the option to chart your own path, which can make you look crazy at times (climbing upside down, for example). If you need the approval of others to be happy, this may not work so well for you. What are you willing to look crazy for?
Are you on the ladder or the jungle gym? What’s your experience and where are you going? Please share!
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I won’t pretend that I see every trend or can put my finger on THE solution to how to achieve gender parity in leadership, however, I do notice a few things I believe can help women gain important perspectives. One thing that’s popped up in my practice lately are conversations about a “seat at the table” – What does it really mean? At what point in your career should you sit there? Why is it important? How do you get there? What should you do when you get “a seat at the table”?
Why Do You Want A Seat At The Table?
Let’s start at the beginning. For some women, the answers to the questions above seem obvious. To be a leader, you have to be a player. To be a player, you have to be “in the game” Sitting “at the table” in a meeting – instead of in a chair along the back of the room — is a great analogy for being a player in a business context.
But for many it’s not so obvious why you would want to take the risk of being at the table. For many, they hear voices that try to talk them out of sitting at the table because it makes them uncomfortable. It makes them feel exposed and vulnerable. What if they don’t know the answers to the questions they are asked? What if they don’t feel ready?
Sitting at the head of the table means you had a seat there in first place. – Click To Tweet
Sometimes these voices pipe up with good reasons for turning down these opportunities, and some not-so-good reasons, too. It’s valid to opt out of meetings that are truly a waste of time, but if you’re missing important socializing that leads to trust and camaraderie, maybe a little time wasting is a good investment.
And if you don’t feel you know enough to be at the table? It’s valid to be concerned about your ability to contribute value, but if that worry keeps you from trying to contribute value, you’ll never learn what value you truly have to offer. You probably know more than you think you do. Here’s a way to find out, and learn along the way. Take a seat at the table and challenge yourself to ask really good questions. You’ll soon know more and people will notice that you’re a good thinker and interested in learning. This makes them want to invest more of themselves in helping you.
When Do You Want a Seat at the Table?
Here’s what I’ve noticed more recently as I listen to women talk about their fraught relationship with “the table,” when and why to sit at it. The women who figure out how to get a seat at the table early in their careers are more often at the head of the table later in their careers.
Some of the women I counsel who are farther along in their careers lament over how hard it is for them to get the kind of face time they need to be promoted into, or included at, the leadership level. When we probe more deeply, I find that they have had many opportunities to sit at the table along the way in their careers, but they turned them down. Usually they talk about the kind of discomfort mentioned above in the past tense. They’ve already opted out of sitting at the table so many times, these reasons have become baked into how they lead and collaborate at work, which is to say that their management style is to avoid discomfort and personal risk in the name of efficiency and productivity. But efficacy and productivity aren’t the only leadership traits people look for when it’s time for promotions.
Sitting at the table used to be a man’s game, and many women didn’t know the rules, so they didn’t want to play. These days, while the culture is still largely male, sitting at the table is less about gender and more about culture. Be a part of the leadership culture so they see you deserve to help lead it.
Younger women are struggling with these issues too, but they have yet to “bake in” their personal brand and management style. They are still experimenting and flexing their leadership muscles.
Here’s my advice to every woman, but especially younger women: get comfortable with sitting at the table as early in your career as you can. This increases the odds that you’ll have the choice to sit at the head of the table later in your career.
Sitting at the Table Is a Leadership Skill
Yes, some tables are like a boy’s locker room. Some are a waste of time. Some are competitive gladiator games. Some are sleep-fests. That’s not the point. Meetings, both informal and formal, are where business gets done. They are the backbone of every business culture. To be a player — to have a chance at influencing leaders, evolving your own leadership skills and being seen as someone who can lead – you have to be there. You have to participate. You have to develop your personal style for participating and influencing in those situations.
If you want to lead, you have to learn to do it at those tables.
This may make some readers think, “Well then, leadership is not for me,” and I respect that. But let me frame it to you this way. Leadership is a personal development journey. It’s an ongoing inquiry into who you are at your best and what your special style of making a difference looks like. Leadership is hard. It requires us all to look critically at ourselves and ask “how can I be better?” and “how can I make a difference?” The answers are not the same for all of us.
If you look at the table and think it’s not for you, that’s fair, but my suggestion – especially when you’re early in your career – is to try to learn to be at the table anyway. You may find a table you want to sit at the head of someday, and the sooner you learn how to sit there confidently, productively and comfortably, the more leadership options you’ll have in the future, whether you take them or not.
Have an opportunity to sit at a table? Take it and learn more about yourself when you get there. Don’t have one, but want one? Strategize and plan. Learning how to get a seat at the table is a leadership journey, too.
Executive Coach Dana Theus shares her tried and true strategies to help women excel in higher levels of leadership and achieve their executive potential.
What leadership lessons can we learn from a drag queen? I have been a RuPaul fan for years. It all started after I heard his song, Supermodel. Then I was an admirer of his Viva Glam campaign for MAC cosmetics. I was thankful for RuPaul reminding us to be glamorous during the 90s grunge fashion years (thank GOD that disappeared). These days, I faithfully watch Drag Race every season.
He’s a talented artist – singer, writer, fashion icon, drag star – and successful businessman. He has created an empire.
“Well, drag is really making fun of identity,” said the world’s most famous drag queen. “We are shape-shifters. We’re like, ‘OK, today, I’m this. Now, I’m a cowboy. Now, I’m this.’ That’s what drag is about.”
–“RuPaul Defines ‘Drag’ vs. ‘Transgender'”, The Advocate
5 Leadership Lessons I Learned From RuPaul’s Career
Lesson 1: “If you can’t love yourself, how in the hell are you going to love anybody else!”
RuPaul closes each Drag Race episode with that quote. And it’s true. If you aren’t full of love for yourself, it’s almost impossible to give love to someone else.
How do you start loving yourself? Put yourself first. I started practicing this recently. I think this is a challenge for most people because society teaches us that putting your own needs first is selfish. But if your energy reserves aren’t full and you aren’t feeling complete, how are you going to have anything to share with someone else?
Here’s a video from Oprah that explains this best:
In a recent interview on The View, RuPaul said, “We are God in drag.” All the more reason to put ourselves first. – Click to Tweet
Lesson 2: “We’re all born naked and the rest is drag”
Every day, we go to work and consciously or subconsciously, we are wearing a personality and costume. In some respects, we dress in drag every day. Society dictates that women typically wear dresses and heels, men wear suits and ties. We hear about management traits that are stereotypically masculine or feminine and at times we don’t just accept it, but we embrace it and adopt the behavior in our own lives. I have worked with men who act more traditionally feminine and some who act more traditionally masculine; and vice versa for women. It makes one wonder – are there really any gender specific personality traits? Or do we choose what we each “wear” for our personality?
I think this is why we use the term “dressing up” to go to work.
I do it myself. When I visit clients, I’m wearing loads of jewelry, bright colored clothing, and heels – the taller, the better. And if I’m feeling a little tired, I will turn turn on my work personality with the smiles and charm. After a few minutes, I cheer up and get into character. I think we all do this. No one always starts a day at 100%.
We sometimes need to consciously choose to play a leader to transition into that character and be that person for the day. – Click to Tweet
Lesson 3: It’s fun – and powerful – to be a girl
Drag may be a parody about gender, but at the same time, isn’t it fun to dress up as a woman?
Women have the best props for a costume. The clothes, the shoes, the jewelry, the makeup, the colors, the fabrics. And of course, the purse. I think sometimes women are on a quest to be taken so seriously in the world, that we forget to have fun with being a woman and play dress up.
Often we’ll hear about men wearing fun socks or goofy ties with a serious suit. Many of these men have senior positions and are taken very seriously, but they wear something to remind them that clothing can be fun.
Women who embrace their femininity show others that being a woman is powerful. Women can always wear a fun piece of jewelry, a scarf, or even lingerie to make them feel like the sexy women they are inside.
And when you feel good about yourself you project confidence and power. If you’ve got it, flaunt it. If you don’t got it, flaunt it anyway. People will think you have it. – Click To Tweet
Lesson 4: There is room for all to share success
Drag Race just celebrated 100 drag queens being on the show since episode one. 100 drag queens have now been televised to millions of homes.
The show isn’t just about the competition; it’s about being your best possible self that week. RuPaul coaches every contestant so they can all see what they are capable of, how they can be better drag queens, and even greater than that, how they can all be better people. The judges also challenge contestants to go beyond their comfort zone to create, experiment and grow.
RuPaul doesn’t need to do this. He could be a star on his own, continuing to create new songs and performances. Instead, he has shared his spotlight. He created Drag Race, created world tours for the winners, and made a conference, RuPaul’s DragCon, for drag queens to meet drag stars and learn from them. He constantly makes room for drag queens to be as successful as he is. And by doing this, he is elevating and transforming the drag artform.
Lesson 5: You create your own reality
Underlying all of these lessons is the most important lesson I have from RuPaul’s career: you are responsible for creating your own life.
You can sulk at home and avoid your dreams and passions because you are different. You can take life and the world very seriously and worry about what others think of you.
Or you can love and embrace your fabulous self, enjoy dressing up, and adopt a better personality. You can actively enjoy life. You can share the spotlight and make room for others to join your success. You can embrace being different and spark a revolution – just like RuPaul did.
How you live your life is up to you. You choose to be fabulous – or not. – Click to Tweet
Can I get an Amen!?
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Executive Coach Dana Theus shares her tried and true strategies to help women excel in higher levels of leadership and achieve their executive potential.
Recently, I’ve attended two different events about women in the media. The first was Her Girl Friday‘s “Throw Like a Girl: Pitching the Hell Out of Your Stories.” The other was the New America Foundation‘s panel, “Navigating the Pink Ghetto.” Both looked closely at the gender disparity in the media and how women can get their voices out there.
We all know how to deal with rejection – by rejecting it! Marcia does a fabulous job of helping us understand not only why a “no one likes me” attitude can be part of our problem, and she gives practical advice for how we can stop playing this head game with ourselves! – InPower Editors
When someone tells me, “I don’t care if people like me,” they are showing me the emotional wall they use to block the hurt of rejection.
All of us care if people like us. Humans are social animals. According to the psychologist Abraham Maslow, feeling love, affection and belonging is necessary before we can reach the highest levels of consciousness and wisdom.
We need each other to survive, from infants through schooling and throughout our professional careers. Many studies have shown that social connections help seniors to live longer and happier lives. The greatest form of punishment is isolation.
To think you can realize your potential without the help of others is an illusion. While trying to navigate your work and home life, you need people to talk to, to listen to you, and hopefully, someone who will challenge some of your rambling thoughts. I often need a human mirror to see how much I’ve grown in the past year and to remind me of my strengths. I, like most of you, excel at reminding myself of my weaknesses, so I elevate my self-awareness with the aid of my trusted friends and colleagues.
Based on this need for social connection, your reactions to rejection, negative judgment and stinging sarcastic remarks can range from minor hurt to bouts of depression. The ability to let a show of dislike roll off your back is a learned skill. You have to consciously balance your need to be liked with understanding what is true about the current situation.
1. Catch yourself reacting defensively or shutting down. The first step to handling a negative situation is to recognize your reaction. Instead of stuffing your emotions, you need to stop three or four times a day and ask yourself, “What am I feeling?” Do you feel fear in your chest, betrayal in your heart, anger in your shoulders, gut or head, or humiliation in the pit of your stomach? It takes practice to discern your feelings, but the first step is to identify what emotion has shown up in your body so you can choose what to do next.
2. Ask yourself what is true about the situation. When you sense yourself shutting down or feeling defensive, ask yourself what you believe the person meant to do to you. Did they truly mean to insult you, betray you, disrespect you, or make fun of you? Your brain works very hard to keep you safe, so it will judge a situation as threatening if there is any possibility of social harm. This is not a logical process. When you react to a person’s words, ask yourself, “What was the intent of the comment? Is it true they meant harm? Is it true that others will agree and judge me negatively because of their words?” Would it be possible to ask the person if they meant to insult you or discredit your ideas? Often people do not realize the impact of their words. You will feel better if you discover they meant no personal harm.
3. If you are sure the person meant to be negative, determine if their target was you personally or your ideas. When our brains sense a possible threat, we react as if we were personally attacked, meaning we take things too personally by nature. Take a breath to relieve the stress and ask, “Was the person commenting on my idea or on me as a person?” If you aren’t sure, take another breath and feel it enter your stomach. This will ground you in the present and take you out of your chattering mind. If you can, look the person in their eyes. Then ask yourself the questions in point #2 to determine if the remark was a personal attack that needs to be addressed or just a disagreement you can live with.
4. Finally, if you believe the person doesn’t like you, ask yourself if this matters. Some people will like you. Others will not. Will the person’s judgment of you impact your work or life? If not, what can you do to release your need to be liked or even respected by this person? And, what can you do to stay neutral and not return the dislike? The more you can come to accept others as who they are, to resist fixing them or changing their opinions, and to listen with patience and compassion, the more you can move forward with your goals regardless if someone likes you or not. According to Charlotte Kasl, PhD, author of If the Buddha Dated, when you dismantle your personal censor you can achieve your highest potential. Rise above the discord by mentally forgiving the person for not appreciating what you contribute and forgiving yourself for reacting with fear or anger.
If you are doing the best you can with what you have, worrying if people like you or not is a waste of your most precious resource: your energy.
Take charge of your career development to get the job that supports your work and your life. Check out the tools and resources in the InPower Coaching Career Center.
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In a previous post about job interview tips, I outlined the findings of several research studies about advancing your career – especially for professional women in leadership who want to land a C-suite executive job. The research basically pointed up the following:
If targeting a C-suite job, you won’t get there by doing what got you to where you are now. Specifically you need to gain a strategic perspective, business acumen, a global outlook and maintain high integrity.
Once you’re there, you need to excel at making decisions about the business more than running the business in any functional specialty.
Career coaching: 3 tricks to getting out of the weeds
When you’re targeting the top executive jobs, you need to broaden your perspective, act strategically and think globally before you go for the top spot – to help you get noticed, rock the interview and to help you survive when you’ve got the coveted slot. But this can be tough because it requires refocusing and spending energy in places that don’t always feel like they’re helping you get your current job done. When you’re getting yourself ready to leap from middle management to the executive suite, how do you stop focusing on what you’ve spent your whole career becoming good at?
Here’s some practical coaching advice for how to do this.
#1: Be Good Enough
The first thing to do is to accept that you’re good enough at your functional skill set and start actively expanding your perspective, exposure and knowledge of the interdependencies your function has with other parts of the business. Sometimes we women struggle a lot with this acceptance. We’ve succeeded so far by refining our skills and knowledge of our chosen area of expertise – and we never feel that we’re good enough – so we just work harder. But this approach keeps us in the weeds of our jobs and saps our energy from learning to fly over the treetops to get the broader view an executive needs.
If you want to move on through the glass ceiling and into a C-suite job, you’ve got to get over the “not good enough” thing and stop letting those negative thoughts trigger you into inaction or playing small. As an exec your scope of responsibility will be so broad that you can’t possibly know every detail, and you don’t have to. The data says that at the executive level you’re not getting paid to know every detail. You’re getting paid to have good people working for you (like you, now!), trust them and know when and how to cross-check their work. Before you make the move up, learn how to detach from the details and weeds, accept that you’re good enough at them and start expanding your perspective.
If this feels challenging, it could be because you’ve got to invest in activating more of your own internal power more before you take on the challenge of going after, and managing, more external power.
The secret to getting an executives job: beginner’s mind. – Click To Tweet
#2: Get “Educated”
Start working on problems and opportunities outside your area of expertise. Suck up the insecurity while you work on building your own InPower reserves, and start vying for committees and task forces where you’ll work with colleagues from other parts of the company or industry. Do a stint overseas if you can.
Going back to school is certainly an option, but before you do that ask yourself if you really need more book-learning. If you already have a master’s degree, look even harder and ask others – including HR and your mentors for an opinion on education vs. experience. The way you’ll succeed – especially in the top slots – is by having experience to draw on. Experience helps inform your “gut” so your instincts and intuition become better. That’s hard, if not impossible, to get at school.
You also need to get smart about your industry and “upskill” yourself on a regular basis in order to stay competitive and future-proofed today for the job you’ll have tomorrow.
The point is that you have to expand your understanding of the business. You have to work on strategic projects because strategic thinking is different than being in the weeds, where meticulous research and detail focus score you the points.
#3: Ask Questions!
To become an executive you have to interview like an executive. To interview like an exec you have to be noticed by the execs. To be noticed, you have to think like they do, provide information and statements that answer questions they haven’t even articulated (to you). How do you think like an executive? This is pretty easy.
Ask yourself why they do what they do. If you aren’t 100% sure you know why they do something – or ask for something to be done – then ask them! Asking demonstrates that you want to learn how they think. Most of the time they’ll be glad to tell you. Always, they’ll notice that you asked. Listen to their answers and take it in so that the next time they do something, you have a hypothesis about their reasoning. Tell them your hypothesis and see how close you were. Sometimes you’ll even give them some good ideas (a great way to be noticed!)
Here’s an example. The VP of Sales sends down a request for a new kind of analysis on the numbers. Instead of looking at revenue per sales person, which is in her normal weekly report, she’s asking for number of sales per sales person, in addition. You think she might be planning to give some spiff bonuses to some high performers at the upcoming awards luncheon. When you deliver the report, you ask her why she wanted the additional data. She tells you that the VP of Product Development is considering a new product at a different price point and it would require a higher volume of sales. She wants to give him the names of the sales people who are already selling at a higher rate for an internal focus group on the new product idea. You tell her you’d be interested in sitting in on the focus group to expand your knowledge of product-sales team interaction, and you tell her about the bonus idea. She nods and says she’ll ask about your meeting attendance; she likes your spiff idea too and thanks you. Together you brainstorm a new productivity metric, which combines both the number of sales and revenue per sale to add a new commission bonus level into next year’s sales compensation plan. She tells you she’ll talk to the CFO about it.
You made it! Now what? Multiply your impact and not your stress.
In this example, here’s what that one question did for you:
You learned that Product Development is looking at a new offering.
You learned that one way to choose internal focus groups is based on the specific aspect of sales productivity required.
You share a good idea with the VP.
You create an opportunity to broaden your experience and exposure to the product development group.
You work with the VP to refine the comp plan to incent more sales productivity.
The VP notices you and is likely to mention you to both the VP of Product Development and the CFO.
If she’s not already your mentor or sponsor, this interaction creates the potential for you to ask her to be and increase the chances she’ll say yes.
Of course, not every question is going to be so productive, but you might be surprised how often they are, especially if they help you establish relationships with the executives you have a chance to interact with. See one sitting alone in the cafeteria? Sit down and start a conversation. Ask them about the hardest decisions they’ve made, the best product launch they’ve been through and why, the most surprising board meeting they’ve attended. Just get them talking. They’re people and they like to share their knowledge. They will absolutely notice that you take the time and have the interest. If your questions are good, you’ll be on their radar.
What is your experience with the weeds and how to get out of them? Do you find it challenging to believe you’re good enough? Are you easily intimidated by people with big titles? Do you see other ways you can learn about other parts of the business or industry you’re not taking advantage of? Do you have some broadening experiences you can share with us? When is school education enough? What does “education” in this context mean to you? Talk to your execs and tell us what they say too!
One of the best ways to be invited into the C-suite is to gain an executive sponsor who will promote you behind closed doors.
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Out of the mouths of 7 year olds . . . Who says that leaders have to do it all – perfectly? Too often we talk ourselves out of taking on more responsibility because we don’t want “that” job. Mitch reminds us that we have control of what leadership looks like to us. – InPower Editors
My 7-year-old daughter is one of my BEST teachers. One day last December I was driving her home from school, when out of nowhere she said, “Mom, I want Santa to bring me pixie dust. Not the fake stuff. The kind that ACTUALLY makes you fly.” Luckily, I was focused on the road, so she couldn’t see my expression—equal-parts amused (big smirk) and searching (hmmm, what am I going to say to this?). I said, “Wouldn’t that be cool! I know Santa makes toys, but I’m not sure he can do pixie dust.” To which Adi replied, “Well, Mom, maybe no one’s ever ASKED before.” Touché. She had a point.
Last week, I was reviewing the org chart I’d written up on my whiteboard with my assistant, Darcy. Before me were all of the roles I’d identified to help WiRL scale and reach the maximum amount of women: Marketing, Business Development, Technology, Services, Operations, Contract Management, etc. The box at the top read, “CEO.” I told Darcy, “I may hire a CEO at some point. After all, it’s never been my goal to work 60-70 hours a week and be on call 24/7. That sounds hellish.” Darcy simply said, “Oh, really?” She has this great way of asking me a seemingly innocent question that seeps into my heart and brain over the next several days, and wakes me up at 3am.
So, I got to thinking. I recalled what my daughter said: “Maybe no one’s ever asked before.” Well, maybe no one’s ever defined the role of CEO before, so it’s fit for human habitation—particularly female human habitation. Seriously, do you know a single CEO (male or female) running a large company who feels good about their work/life balance? There’s this old paradigm we’ve bought into (myself included, until now) that the job of CEO requires long, exhausting hours with a stay-at-home partner and/or the help of a team of nannies. Does it have to be this way? No, I don’t believe it does.
I’ve always been a rule-breaker, I don’t fit easily into a box, and my next great mission is to prove it’s possible to be CEO of a successful business while working 30 hours a week, spending awesome quality time with my family, and taking 6 to 9 week’s vacation per year. The question isn’t, “Can it be done?” The question is, “How can it be done?”
Only Change Begets Change
Some of you may be saying, “Well, that’s easy for you to say, you run your own business.” I believe change can originate at ANY level in an organization—not just at the top. That’s why WiRL caters to women at all levels. When you bring your FULL value and gifts to the table, companies will move mountains to keep you. Whether you’re in middle management or you’re just starting out, ask yourself how you can change things from YOUR position. Is there a way to create additional roles, or levels, to ensure all critical functions are covered, including the leadership of these functions—so it doesn’t roll up to one single individual? Is there a way to job-share more roles, including that of CEO? Seriously.
Make it Appealing & Sustainable
We’re never going to achieve leadership parity if we continue to operate under the old, all-consuming, I-have-no-life-except-my-job, I-have-a-stay-at-home-partner-or-I-could-never-do-this, I-have-to-be-a-superhero paradigm. Frankly, I don’t know many women who would sign up for that. So, rather than asking, “How do we ‘get’ more women into leadership positions?” we should start asking, “How can we redefine the job of leader so it’s an appealing and sustainable existence?”
Here’s my definition of an appealing and sustainable existence:
I love what I do, but I don’t feel chained to it
I often make time for yoga or a walk before or during my workday
I eat breakfast and dinner with my family
I make guilt-free time for friends
I trust others to make critical decisions
I rarely utilize heroics in my leadership style
My business grows only at a pace that’s healthy for our employees; nobody’s being constantly asked to do more, with less.
I model the way: We offer positions that are both full- and flexi-time (for real!)
I help get my kids ready for school at least a couple days a week, and I get to pick them up and hang out at least a couple days a week
I sometimes choose to work longer hours because I’m driven by passion and dedication, yet this is the exception rather than the norm
The amount of overwhelm I feel is rare and low, rather than frequent and high
I would generally describe myself as confident, happy, healthy and fit
I’m having an epic life—on my terms!
You Can Have it All
If we, as a society, keep emphatically stating the impossibility of “having it all,” then this will continue to be our reality. Take Hillary Clinton, or at least the media portrayal of Hillary Clinton. The fact that it’s considered inconceivable to be both a leader and a grandmother is telling about the culture of leadership we’ve established. Political affiliations aside, imagine if instead of asking, “Should I be president or focus on being a grandmother?” Hillary Clinton was to instead consider, “How can I lead this country while being an exceptional grandmother?” Is not the true test of leadership doing what’s never been done before?
When people ask how I “do it all,” I tell them I do the things only I’m uniquely qualified to do—and get help with the rest. I consider myself uniquely qualified to be the main visionary behind WiRL, wife to my husband, mom to my kids, and exerciser of my body. Everything else is partially if not fully achievable by another person.
Believe it & You Will Achieve it
I’m currently in Luxembourg to spearhead a leadership offsite for a global tech company. Last night, during dinner with a colleague, I got on my soapbox about my vision of redefining what it means to be a leader. I told her about my fear of sharing it: that people might say, “OK, miss la-la land, how about you step into reality!” Her response was brilliant. She said, “Those with ears will hear you.” If you have ears for this topic, then take it upon yourself NOW to help me prove leadership CAN be done differently. Until we can believe it and conceive it, we cannot achieve it. You don’t have to know HOW; you just have to know it’s your heart’s TRUE desire (not to mention a sure-fire way to make our companies more successful). If you believe it’s possible, then it’s possible to make it happen.
If Hillary Clinton reads this post—and I hope she does!—she herself may scoff, “Oh, sweetheart, you just don’t get it.” And she’d be right. My single biggest asset is that I DON’T GET IT. I have the audacity to think differently. I’ve often heard leaders who’ve taken on a role in a new company say, “I just don’t get why they do it this way. There must be a reason, so I’ll wait until I understand before opening my mouth and risk being seen as ‘not getting it.’” I tell them, “Be careful. The next thing you know you’ll be inducted into their way of thinking!” There’s a fine line between being seen as crazy-town and holding up a mirror to ludicrous practices that have become ingrained and unquestioned. If you want to be a leader, you have to question everything—especially anything labeled “simply the way we do it.”
I’m dying to hear your thoughts! Please share your comments and opinions—and any examples you’ve seen of people (women or men) successfully modeling leadership in ways you believe are fit for human habitation!
Executive Coach Dana Theus shares her tried and true strategies to help women excel in higher levels of leadership and achieve their executive potential.
