Most of us would like to think of ourselves as able to do more. To have a job with more responsibilities. To make more money. To be able to be more of service in the community. In short, to grow…to get ahead in life and in career.
However, in my experience most people are not going to realize any of those things, They haven’t done a very good job in positioning themselves to take advantage of the opportunities that they say they want.
You might be saying, “Wait a minute that doesn’t apply to me. I work my fingers to the bone every day. I’m the one that’s first in the door every morning. I’m the one that’s last to leave it every night. I’m the person is willing to do whatever it takes to get the job done.”
And yet, many like to wear this kind of “hard work” as a badge of honor. Maybe that applies to you.
There is a conflict in this belief.
Think about a hay barn.
How do we determine if the barn has room for more hay? Pretty simple. You walk into the barn and look at the loft. If it is not full, there is room for more hay.
But, of course, a person is not a barn so how do we determine if there is “more room”? Stated another way, how do we determine if a person has the capacity to take on more? More responsibility? More challenging jobs? More difficult tasks? A promotion?
It is pretty hard to do if your organization has a culture that focuses on having people being busy all the time.
It is pretty hard if individuals believe that being busy is the behavior we need to get recognition.
On the other hand, if we have a results-based culture and our individuals, including ourselves, focus on getting things done it is easy.
Let’s say you are the head of a department or the whole company and you have a new opening for a senior manager. Who are you going to consider for the promotion?
- Someone who is always busy, but a workaholic that seems over their head and does not get the results, or
- Someone who always hits the assigned targets and is constantly asking for more?
Easy isn’t it?
The way to put yourself in a position to get ahead is to get everything done with time to spare. In that way, you will have time (capacity) for more.
Others will see that and will come to you with bigger and bigger challenges on a constant basis.