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The starting point of
self-promotion is to set a goal and make a plan to become one of the very
best people in your field. The better you get and the more respected you
become, the more you will have in common with other people who also are
farther along on the road of life. You must ask for advice and follow it.
You must make every effort to overcome the obstacles within yourself that
might be holding you back. You must develop the essential skills that you
need to join the top 20 percent in your field.
The wonderful thing about this aspect of self-promotion is that it is
totally under your control. It depends on no one else. It is an ongoing
journey. As Denis Waitley says, “It is continually viewing yourself as a
‘do it to yourself’ project.”
Meanwhile, there are a variety of things that you can do to promote
yourself by getting to know more and more of the most important people in
your community and your industry. This is the second aspect of
self-promotion. As you are getting better at what you do, you deliberately
and systematically make efforts to meet more people who you can help and
who can help you.
People in any field eventually take on the attitudes and behaviors of the
other people in that field. Your peer group has a powerful effect on the
person you are today and on the person you will become tomorrow. The
friends you socialize with after work and on the weekends have an enormous
impact on everything you do and accomplish. Every major turning point in
your life will coincide with the development of a new group of friends and
associates. I have seen many occasions where an average salesperson joined
a company that was full of top salespeople; within three months, he or she
also was a top salesperson in the industry. The very change of reference
groups often leads to a complete change of aspirations, goals, work
routines, and levels of achievement.
Many people’s lives are, unfortunately, a series of random or haphazard
events, like bumper cars at a carnival. They take whatever job is offered
to them. They have lunch with whoever is available, and they socialize with
whoever they run into, whoever happens to be going out the door at the same
time. Their human relationships are largely unplanned and uncoordinated.
Their lives seem to go back and forth, and they make very little progress.
Successful people, on the other hand, are very deliberate about their choice
of friends, associates and colleagues. Successful people make a plan for
their lives, and then they look around them to see which people fit into
their plans for where they are going in the years ahead. Successful people
are very specific about what they need to do and who they need to know if
they want to get ahead rapidly.
Baron Rothschild, one of the world’s wealthiest men in his time, wrote in
his rules for success, “Make no useless acquaintances.” To some people,
this seems a little undemocratic. Aren’t you just supposed to like and hang
around with anybody who happens to be there, regardless of personality or
direction? Not if you want your life to take a specific, upward path.
In one study, it was found that the top 20 percent of high achievers
strongly identified with other high achievers, even before they had had a
chance to accomplish very much in life. Their role models were men and
women at the top of their organizations. The high achievers did not
identify with the average people around them. Their sights were set much
higher. And in almost no time at all, they were up among the top 20
percent, exactly as they had planned it.
There are a variety of things that you can do to promote yourself to the
front of the line, to the head of the pack. You can bring yourself to the
attention of people who can help you quite rapidly, simply by engaging in
the same behaviors that others have used over the years to rise rapidly in
competitive careers.
Start with your work. As I said earlier, you must be very good at what you
do and continually get better if you want to get ahead in your company.
Sometimes, people are convinced that they can play politics to get ahead.
However, it has been shown again and again that politics and gamesmanship
will get a person only so far before he is found out. Peter Drucker, the
management consultant, says, “Only the truly competent person can rise
above politics.” Politics in organizations has to do with gaining control
of people and resources. If you are one of the most valuable people in your
organization, you will not have to engage in very much politicking because
you will be one of the precious resources that others will be eager to
court and influence. You can rise above petty politicking simply by getting
better and better at what you do. When you reach the point where you are
making an invaluable contribution, everyone else, including your boss, will
come to you. Being good at what you do is the key to gaining the respect
and esteem of people around you.
Now, let’s say you are in an organization that has quite a few people who
are good at what they do. How can you stand out from the crowd? In a study
of 104 senior executives, the vast majority said that the key to rapid
promotion in their organizations was twofold. First, they said, an
individual had to have the ability to set clear priorities, to focus on
what was valuable and relevant rather than waste time on what was small and
insignificant. Second, they said, the employee had to have a “sense of
urgency,” a desire and a drive to get the job done fast.
In short, your developing a reputation for speed and dependability, for
doing the right things and doing them right, and quickly, is the most
important reputation you can develop with your boss. It’s invaluable to
getting ahead rapidly.
I recommend that you make a list of everything that you feel you have been
hired to accomplish. Take the list to your boss and ask your boss to
organize the list in order of priority. What does your boss consider to be
the most important thing you do? What does she consider to be the second
most important thing?
Discuss the list with your boss so that you and your boss are perfectly
clear about exactly why you are on the payroll. Then, concentrate on doing
an excellent job at the things that are most important to him or her. I
have discussed this with thousands of managers, all over the country, they
all say that there is nothing that pleases them more than to have an
employee who is working hard on something that the managers consider to be
of top priority. Continually ask your boss if there is anything that he
does on a regular basis that you can take off his shoulders. Every boss has
tasks that he or she dislikes. If you can take one or more of these tasks
away, and learn how to do it yourself, you will be promoting yourself in
one of the most professional ways possible.
Self-promotion also means looking for every opportunity to help your boss
and coworkers to look good at their jobs. Concentrate on cooperation rather
than competition. If you help others get ahead, it will come back to you
exponentially. And the more you help others, the more they will help you in
return.
According to the Law of Sowing and Reaping, the more you give of yourself,
without expectation of return, the more will come back to you from the most
unexpected sources. Successful people in every organization are always
looking for ways to help, always looking for ways to put in more than they
take out. As my father once said, “It’s amazing how much you can get done
when no one cares who gets the credit.”
In self-promotion, you never need to worry about who will get the credit.
The more credit you give away, the more will come back to you. The more you
help others, the more they will want to help you. The more you put in to
help your boss look good and stay on top of his or her work, the more your
boss will want to open doors of opportunity that enable you to get ahead.
Herodotus, the Greek historian, wrote, “All of life is action and passion,
and not to be involved in the actions and passions of your time is to risk
having not really lived at all.”
Your job is to engage in deliberate self-promotion by becoming very good at
what you do, by becoming indispensable to your boss and your company, and
by becoming better and better known to the important people in your field.
The rewards that will come back to you eventually will be much greater than
the efforts that you have put in. And there is no limit to what you can put
in.
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