JT4 | Show, Don’t Tell

So you’ve been in the same role for years now and it’s getting to be a bore. But your manager doesn’t trust you to do a bigger job and neither are they willing to let you move to something else because now you’re too critical to the team. Yeah I know, it sucks. Who wants to be doing the same thing forever? Should you fight for a promotion? But what if that makes you look bad? Or you should prepare for a job interview and leave this organization? But you have friends here. Isn’t there another way?

Discussion Topics: Show, Don’t Tell

• The time-tested way – get some training.
• Interview internally, but is it really encouraged?
• A third, maybe better, way to show what you can do.
• Make it work the right way, without burning bridges.

Transcript: Show, Don’t Tell

So you’ve been in the same role for years now and it’s getting to be a bore. But your manager doesn’t trust you to do a bigger job and neither are they willing to let you move to something else because now you’re too critical to the team. Yeah I know, it sucks. Who wants to be doing the same thing forever? Should you fight for a promotion? But what if that makes you look bad? Or should you just find another job and leave? But you have friends here. Isn’t there another way?

It’s the eternal dilemma. Companies want you to prove you can do bigger things before they let you take on additional responsibilities at work with expanded scope and definitely before they promote you. But how do you prove that you can take on more responsibility in the workplace with no extended scope of opportunity?

Get Some Training

Well, first of all, there’s the time-tested way of doing this, something your HR or manager will probably tell you to do. Which is to take some training or do an online course. Most companies have access to pretty decent training programs and you could definitely use them. Or perhaps they might be willing to pay for you to do a course online. Or if you’re desperate errr motivated enough you might just pay for it yourself! This is actually not a bad idea in concept. Training after all does help you learn new things in a structured manner, potentially avoiding mistakes you might make learning on the job.

The key issue though is that most corporate training focuses on soft skills like communication or people management, whereas your issue is likely to be unfamiliarity with hard skills like sales or project management that may be necessary for you to take on the wider scope. And external training to get good at things like this last months, not the 2 days you are likely to be able to take off to learn something new. Worst of all, even if you did manage to take some training in your spare time and come back to your manager with a shiny new certification, they still might not trust you to do the job over someone with proven experience! In other words, you could get a cert but no certainty!

Interview Internally

The other way to expand your horizons without quitting your company is to interview internally with other teams. This gives you the opportunity to do something truly new and leave your old job behind, which is a fantastic way to build skills and work on expanding your resume. If this kind of move is encouraged at your workplace, then I would wholeheartedly recommend it as the best option for career growth.

Unfortunately, a few things usually come into play. In many places, internal movements require the explicit consent of the releasing manager. And which manager wants to release their backbone employee – the one who’s been around for years and can do the job in their sleep? And even in those places where there is no such need, the hiring manager will at least want to check in to get some informal feedback and that’s when your manager could still try to block or delay the move.

Last, and possibly most problematic, for the same reasons that your manager is not giving you a wider role, the hiring manager might also prefer to bring in someone with proven expertise from outside rather than giving you a chance. Which defeats the whole purpose of even trying to make such a move. This last issue is one of the main reasons why internal mobility programs often don’t work well, but that’s a subject of another episode

There is another way

Luckily there is a third way – and I think it should work quite well for almost everyone. But if I share that secret with you right away then this podcast will end up being really short. And what’s the point of that? My sponsors want ROI or at least I think they would if I had any sponsors. And you’re probably listening at 1.5 speed anyway so I’m sure you won’t mind this little anecdote to illustrate.

This was back in 2003-ish when I was a project manager with an Indian software services company. Part of my job was to help our sales teams respond to RFPs or Requests for Proposal where large enterprises would issue massive telephone directory sized documents with all their requirements from a piece of software and then we had to reply to their requirements with what our software could do, a proposed price, timeline for implementation etc. OK I just realised that hardly anybody listening to this knows what a telephone directory is. Anyway it was just a massive document the size of whatever is the thickest paperback book you’ve seen.

So we’d respond to those things and over time I got pretty good at writing the responses in a manner that was factually correct but also salesy enough to get clients interested. So our sales teams started involving me more in those responses till we reached a point where I would write quite a lot of the response, with them focusing on the commercials. And then they started having me participate in calls and meetings to strategise our responses and eventually even to directly join meetings with the client because it was just so much easier to close deals by bringing in a more technically-oriented team member than just by themselves. Which was great for them since they closed more deals and made mode commission, and it was great for me as I was learning a whole new thing in a relatively safe environment.

And as time went on, I took on more of that kind of work and expanded my scope beyond project management to pre-sales, which eventually led to a full-time sales role. But lucky for those of you still listening on 1x speed, that’s a story for another day.

So did you get what I’m trying to say? The secret to getting more scope is just to take it. Why ask for permission when there’s tons of work and not enough people to do it all? Look around for an interesting looking job that needs doing, or where the person in charge is struggling to get it all done. And then offer to help out, so you can create a win-win for your colleague and for yourself. 1.

But of course you can’t just roam around picking up bits of work here and there. So how do you do it? Here are some ground rules you could follow

How to expand your scope the right way

Make your motivations clear to your colleague so they don’t think you’re just barging into their world. You’re there to learn and expand your capabilities by helping them with their excess work.

Work with her to carve out a piece of work that you can own semi-independently. It of course can’t be their core job because then what would they do? It should be something secondary or lower priority but on the other hand it can’t just be some mishmash of tasks or grunt work that they don’t want to do. It needs to be an independent piece that’s well-defined with clear expectations and outcomes.

Plan it so your main work does not suffer. You’re the one trying to take this stretch assignment so it’s on you to make sure both your work as well as this new project get done properly. Put in extra time if needed.

Once you have a plan and understanding between you and your colleague, make sure your manager and your colleague’s manager both know this is happening and what they should expect. In particular, your colleague’s manager should be clear about whom to hold accountable for this work

Once you’re in you’re in. Treat the work like it’s your own and make sure you put in your best effort. Your colleague is trusting you to deliver. So even if it feels like too much at any point you’ve got to keep going. Otherwise you not only let your colleague down you also show yourself in poor light and reinforce the impression that you can’t be trusted to do anything more than your day job.

Summary: Show, Don’t Tell

So that’s it in a nutshell. If you want to take on a broader scope, you can go with the tried and tested options.

• Take some training or get a certification.
• Or try to move to another role within your company.
• Or, if our little JobTok has you all fired up, look around for a job that needs doing and fill it. The secret to getting more scope is just to take it.

All right folks. Thank you for listening today. May I please request you to subscribe and share today’s JobTok with other colleagues who might be feeling a little stuck in their jobs?

As a reminder, show notes are linked in the episode description in case you need a little reminder of the key points later.

See you later. Sampai jumpa lagi. This was Amit with JobTok.