Are You a Wall or a Bridge Builder?

Humans can be quite territorial and naturally react with some covert or overt hostilities when their personal boundaries are threatened or crossed whether wittingly or unwittingly. Because those boundaries are invisible, they get threatened or crossed all the time. Some people are more tolerant than others or better at communicating their boundaries. Those who are intolerant or poor at communicating tend to polarize people into those who are "with me" and those who are "against me."

Very few people succeed by building walls around them. The real key is building bridges with people or in simpler terms, relationship building.

As a professional interested in career success, it is important that you recognize the importance of building relationship with your boss, your peers, your subordinate and your customers. It also helps to build a strong and growing network of friends outside of your organization because your social network can open the gates to bigger and better opportunities. By offering to help instead of waiting for one and getting disappointed, you invest in strengthening relationships with others.

Competence + Commitment

A lot of people put their best foot forward trying to land a job. After getting that much coveted job, they lie low and lose a great opportunity to achieve career success. The reason, getting the job means being assured of the salary. And if you don't mess up or  mess things up too much you get to keep getting that salary. If you stay long enough, you might get more due to seniority.

Career success does not end in landing the job, neither does it start there. If you are still studying or just fresh out of college, this is the perfect time to read this article. If you've been in the corporate world a long time and not making any progress, this may be the best time to reflect and move onward to success.

Competence + Commitment are two important elements of career success. 

Kaya Ko Yan!

Your career success or any other endeavor for that matter depends on how often you say "kaya ko yan" (I can do this). Nope, that's not all you need, you silly, but it starts there. CAN or on the other hand CAN'T are pretty powerful words. "Can" sets you on your way, "can't" stops you dead on your tracks.

I've been working for the last 20 years. I got to where I am now because of the number of times I said "kaya ko yan." On the other hand, I got this far also because of the number of times I said "di ko yan kaya" (I can't). I can just imagine how much farther I could have gone had I said kaya ko yan more often than I did and at times when it most mattered.

We all have that "UNKNOWN" window pane in our JOHARI window and the way to shrink it is by challenging our selves, taking some risks or sticking our neck out so to speak. You really can never tell what you can't do if you haven't tried at least once.

I wrote this because I see a lot of people who can't muster enough courage to say kaya ko yan when faced with an opportunity or a challenge. The low self expectation cause a lot of us to believe we are incapable of excellence that's why we settle for mediocre. Just imagine the possibilities if we all believe we can do better. It would mean better products, better customer experience, better quality of life.

Go get that job and then succeed in it. kaya mo yan!

Who Do You Work For?

The logical answer of course is your employer. To say otherwise is to invite criticism that are you are being a smart aleck.

Changing the way you look at this whole idea of working for another may change your attitude about how you deal with work.

Think of it this way, you are running your own business, you are therefore working for yourself and you are your own product or service. What do your employers represent then, you may ask. They are your customers and in order for your business to flourish, you have to make them happy.  Their happiness improves the market value of your product. Your ability to do more than expected makes your product attractive both to them and other potential customers. The more attractive you are, the more people will be interested to retain your services, hence the better job pricing offers.

Are You Putting Your Strengths to Good Use?

In a book written by Marcus Buckingham entitled "Now Discover Your Strengths", he mentioned a research that showed only 20 out of 100 people work in jobs that fully utilize their strengths. If the same is true in the Philippines, it means that 80% of our workforce is not achieving their full potentials. One of those millions of people could be you or me! How do we make sure that we are on the better end of the statistics or better yet, how do we add up to the statistics of people who are doing work that fully utilize their strengths so there can be more than 20%?


Buckingham said that there are three major ingredients to one's strengths. The first one is talent. The test, strengths finder identified 36 types of talents.  They are: Achiever, Activator, Adaptability, Analytical, Arranger, Belief, Command, Communication, Competition, Connectedness, Consistency, Context, Deliberative, Developer,  Discipline, Fairness  / Empathy, Focus, Futuristic, Harmony, Ideation, Inclusiveness / Includer, Individualization, Input, Intellection, Learner, Maximizer, Positivity, Relator, Responsibility, Restorative, Self-Assurance, Significance, Strategic, Woo.  Go to this website to find out more about what they mean. http://strengthstest.com/theme_summary.php. You could demonstrate a variable number and combinations of any of those talents. You may also want to check out Richard Step's free version of strengths finder test here.

Of Love and Work

One of the works we do as recruiters is to separate the grains from the chaffs, the men from the boys, the ladies from the girls the haves and the have-nots, the diamonds from the coals. In the years that I've been involved in this work I have observed some patterns that separate great candidates from the mediocre ones. Is it their pleasing personality, their ability to articulate, their dilligence or is it their high IQ? I say not. This is of course not to say that these qualities do not come in handy. They do, but they are not the differentiator. You can have all these but if you don't love what you are doing your success becomes limited.

To say that you love your job  is much more than paying lip service to it. A spouse for example believes it when he/she is being loved not because of what is heard but because of what is seen and experienced.

You can tell if a person loves his work because s/he invests in getting better at it.  I'm not talking about just pursuing continuous education here. I've seen too many people who completed advanced education but have nothing to show for it in terms of quality of work. People who choose to do the things they love put every bit of what they learn to action. Well, maybe not every bit but I'm sure you know what I mean.

These people are updated, up-to-date and continually updating themselves to improve their craft. They take interest in how to do things better and search for a way to do them. If they can't find, they invent, they create.

You know you love your job when you take pride in it.  This reminds me of the "bug exterminator" character in that movie Ant Bully.  That guy demonstrated an almost obsessive take on his job. Something that is not strange for somebody who really have the love and the passion for what he is doing.  I think the best indicator of love for one's work is when one misses it in the same way tha person misses another important person.  In short, people who curse Mondays because it means returning to work are people who most likely hate their job.

Every employer wants to hire people who love their job, because these people are great at what they do and are continually getting better. According to Gallup Poll in the US, only about 20% of the working population love their job, the others either like,  indifferent or hate their work. Which side of statistic are you in? Again, it's easy to say you love your work, but the important question is how do you show it?

Who is Responsible for your Professional Growth?

Taking full ownership of your career development is the proactive answer to the subject matter. I'd bet that most readers would have the same answer. It's ironic, considering that the great multitude don't seem to behave in that proactive manner. It is ironic too that many of us dream of career success and yet we wait for breaks and depend on others who have more power to prepare us and then offer us the opportunity. It is of no wonder why we are often frustrated, disappointed, feeling used,  bitter and victimized by our own victim mentality.

What Values Do You Bring to Work?

Finding a job is easy. Succeeding in it is the real challenge.  In the last few days I met people who have all the right opportunities to make it big but failed to do so on the account of their failure to capitalize both on the opportunity and their abilities.

This happens when we fail to acknowledge the importance of what we do and why we do it. The "why" part of the last sentence gives us a sense of purpose, a motivation to give it our best, without which all we'll see is the amount of time we spend at work and the financial entitlement for those spent hours.  We fail to account for our contribution. In fact we might not even want to talk about results, just hours spent or a semblance of effort. The "whys" represent or manifest our values.

Cast A Wider Net

If you want to catch more fish, you should go where they are and then cast a wider net. If you can't do both, you'll be in for a lot of frustration.

If you want to catch the big opportunities that come your way, you should prepare for it by increasing the size of your net so to speak. Widen your net by broadening your knowledge, improving your skills, maintaining a positive attitude and removing obstacles that stand between you and your dreams.

How much of these have you done? How far are you willing to go?

Sometimes, it's not the lack of opportunity that causes us to fail, it's our unreadiness to take them on when they come along.

10 Skills You Need to Succeed in Your Career

Here are some of the skills that I believe everyone who is serious about moving up in their career needs in order to succeed.

• Customer Care - No matter if you are in the front lines or not, you have customers. They are either inside or outside the organization. Your success depends on your ability to serve them well and build a strong relationship with them. Reading up on customer service concepts and practices, attending seminars and possessing a customer-focused attitude should help you acquire this very important skill.
• Problem Solving and Decision making - Being able to identify problems and being able to recommend or initiate the application of solutions is a valuable skill that bosses are sure to appreciate. The higher you go up in the organization, the more you'll need this skill.  Read up on topics like continuous improvement, Kaizen, Business Process Improvement or Re-engineering or Six Sigma. 

Of Love and Work

One of the works we do as recruiters is to separate the grains from the chaffs, the men from the boys, the ladies from the girls the haves and the have-nots, the diamonds from the coals. In the years that I've been involved in this work I have observed some patterns that separate great candidates from the mediocre ones. Is it their pleasing personality, their ability to articulate, their dilligence or is it their high IQ? I say not. This is of course not to say that these qualities do not come in handy. They do, but they are not the differentiator. You can have all these but if you don't love what you are doing your success becomes limited.

To say that you love your job  is much more than paying lip service to it. A spouse for example believes it when he/she is being loved not because of what is heard but because of what is seen and experienced.

You can tell if a person loves his work because s/he invests in getting better at it.  I'm not talking about just pursuing continuous education here. I've seen too many people who completed advanced education but have nothing to show for it in terms of quality of work. People who choose to do the things they love put every bit of what they learn to action. Well, maybe not every bit but I'm sure you know what I mean.

Brand You

Your name is a brand name.  It represents the kind of experience you offer. Whether you intend to or not, you have a brand. In the same way that the products and services you avail of have brands, so do you. Some brands are more well known than others. Some are preferred more than others because they are known for delivering on their promise.

When you avail of products or services you consider value for money depending on your need. Do you want high quality, low price,  prestige, overall experience? You look at product/service reputation to guide you in choosing.  When you experience a product or service, you form an opinion on whether or not it is worth your time and money. In this day and age of easy access to massive communication media, you can shout out to the world about your experience with a certain brand. Others pick up the information and use it as reference for making their own choices.

Now, think about potential employers or clients. They have the same privilage of choice as you have.  Now that information is so easy to access, they have the best opportunity of knowing about your brand more than people have in the past. They can check out available information  about you on the web or talk to people you know with or without you knowing. And in the principle of "better to err on the side being too careful", their decision to avail of your product or service will be affected by what other people say about their own experience with your brand. The phrase "your reputation precedes you" has never been more true than now. It is for this reason that you need to take care of your own brand.

On Stepping Up

Who will tell you that you are ready to take your career to the next level? It won't be your boss, your peer, your customers or anyone else except you. If they say it and you agree, they would just be stating the obvious. If they say you can do better or more and you disagree, they are wrong  only for as long as you say they are.

I remember when I was just at the beginning of my career. I was a training assistant then at 7-Eleven here in the Philippines. I used to conduct company orientation and new employee training. I also assisted Training consultants who facilitate the more interesting training. After I assisted our consultant who conducted our basic supervisory course, I went to my manager and said, I can run that workshop better because I know the business better. I remember my boss' hesitation. I said to her that I will design the program and the slides and I will show her that I can run that workshop. I never looked back since then.

If you look beyond my bragging, you will realize that what I did was not unique at all. Everything that you did in advancing your career came with a personal decision to step up no matter whether you did it on your own or if you acted on the encouragement of others. The more important element of stepping up is the decision you make.

I met a lot of people who  invest in a lot of training and schooling and still end up not doing what they dream of doing because they feel they are not yet ready. On the other hand some people just say, yes I can do it and then go ahead and do it. They make mistakes but they never let mistakes stop them from what they really want to do, they learn and then they try again.

If you are waiting for the time when you are absolutely ready to move up, that time may never come because we can never be completely ready. Sometimes we just need to take a leap of faith and accept the risk that go with it.