If you have been stuck on the same rung of the career ladder for the past few years, you might feel a little trapped in a rut. As you scale the career ladder, opportunities for promotion become more and more scarce. Often, you cannot bide your time waiting for the manager above you to retire, move on or resign. You need to be proactive in your approach to finding a new role that challenges you, sees you with a salary rise and has you taking on more responsibility.
Promotion means reaching further up the management and leadership scale. While you might love your current job, the chances are you can complete the tasks involved with your hands tied behind your back and blindfolded. While an easy working life, you are left unfulfilled and unchallenged.
Being an ambitious individual, you want more from your career. So, it’s time to look for jobs outside your current company. Making this leap away from your comfort zone can be scary, but it can be massively rewarding. Take a look at how you can secure promotion in three simple steps.
Work On Yourself
Before you start putting the feelers out, it’s time to work on your own resume. If you haven’t undertaken any professional development in the past few years, your resume is going to look pretty sparse. To show off you professional credentials, you need to look into the sorts of qualifications and training that your prospective new role requires. Do you need to look into doing an MBA, some postgraduate study or a practical training course. Some of these will be easy to come by, whereas others need more commitment on your part.
Look into course providers and commit to spending some of your evenings studying and upskilling yourself. This will empower you to attend any interview that you secure with a sound knowledge base and skill set. If a job role that you like the look of lists a whole host of training in its essential criteria and you have none of the courses listed under your belt, you need to work on yourself before you can apply.
Applying for roles that you don’t meet the criteria for will only lead to rejection which can then make you deflated and resigned to the fact that you have to stay at your current career level. This needn’t be the case if you put the hard work in now.
Craft Your Applications
Make sure that you don’t scatter gun your approach to jobs. Just because the job title has the word manager in it, doesn’t mean that it’s for you. Look at the person specifications and job profiles for every role that you are considering. If the job appeals, look at the company, its location and the sort of work that it conducts.
A role needs to excite you and leave you feeling enthusiastic. When you are ready to apply, craft a bespoke application to every company you apply to. Address an individual by name and make sure you add a touch of personality to your letter of application. Every employer will use a service like Checkr to run background checks before interview so state that you have a clean criminal record to get a headstart.
Make sure that you describe in detail what you can bring to the company and role, rather than what the company can do for you. They are not there to do you a favor. Explain how you work, the sorts of tasks you have undertaken and the impact that you have had. Have you saved a company money? Have you managed a multi million dollar project? Be specific and enthusiastic in your application.
Smile
When you get invited to interview, be personable. It’s all too easy to let our nerves get the better of us, and we retreat into ourselves. Be open, smile, wear a nice suit, get a haircut and try to relax. Everyone has nerves but channel them in a positive way.
Enjoy meeting a new person, having a chat about your career and getting to know the way a different company works. At the very least, you can develop a new contact and at best, you could find yourself with the promotion that you have craved for so long.
Searching for that next role can be difficult and you will face rejection along the way. Get back up, brush yourself off, and keep going. Follow this guide and you will be able to scale your career ladder.
