Talent development is an essential element of human resources strategy. It helps to engage and retain employees as well as enhance skills required for organizational long-term success and achievement of its strategic goals. While organizations have a lot of talent development programs and initiatives, they always emphasize that employees are the ones who are responsible to drive their professional and career development. First, they need to define a development need (what skills they want to develop), then create an opportunity to develop them (for example, leading or participating in a new project), and finally, make it visible for the organization.
Based on my experience as an HR business partner, visibility is the area that many employees underrate often. It may be uncomfortable for some people to actively promote themselves in the team. Many employees believe that hard work will be noticed itself and rewarded. Unfortunately, it is not always the case, or it may take longer than they initially think.
Harvey Coleman’s PIE theory of career progress says that performance, image, and exposure are three critical elements of professional advancement. It is interesting that performance accounts only for 10% of your professional advancement while 30% comes from image (perception) and 60% – from exposure (showcasing your abilities). (Coleman, 2010)
While it may be unusual to consider yourself as a “product” that needs promotion, the good news is that organizations have a lot of tools and avenues that you can leverage to showcase your abilities and create your internal image in the way you want to be seen by your colleagues.
Here are several strategies how to maximize the results of your development efforts:
- Create a list of your career stakeholders and think about ways to be visible by them (team / department meetings, cross functional projects, mentorship programs, touch base meetings, volunteer initiatives, townhalls etc).
- Share results of your projects and your accomplishments. Think broader than your team only. What cross functional groups may be interested to know? Reach out to functional leaders and offer to share on their staff meetings or via email. Also, do not forget about internal communication channels like newsletters, Teams, and intranet.
- Speaking of communication channels, it may be a good idea to find out who is responsible for communications and connect with these people. It may be extremely helpful to know about communication and social networks policy, all corporate communication tools and channels, their target audience, and the process and deadlines for submitting materials.
- Share your learnings and insights with colleagues. If you completed a training, offer to share your takeaways with your team and manager. If you are passionate about a certain topic, update your colleagues about recent trends or best practices, it will make you seen as a subject matter expert in that area.
- Be active and speak up on meetings. Ask questions, share your thoughts, or provide feedback. If you are an introvert and it is not very natural for you, try to set up personal target to say something on each meeting you attend.
- Turn on camera on your virtual meetings. It is easy to start multitasking if you are not on camera and not be fully present in the conversation. Also, visual presence will help you to build better connection with those who are on the call.
- Schedule a networking lunch once a quarter with a colleague from a different team.
- Join 5 mins before the beginning of virtual meetings to be able to chat with colleagues who joined early.
- If you travel for business (training, project meeting), plan to spend 1-2 extra days in that location to connect with colleagues and attend other meetings.
- Use professional networks (LinkedIn for example) to share your achievements, interests, and news.
- Prioritize attending corporate events in person instead of joining virtual when possible. Spend extra time to connect with other participants.
- Leverage Employee Resource Groups (ERG) or corporate community initiatives. They have leadership opportunities that have high visibility and can provide access to the group that are not in your usual professional circle.
In the conclusion, I would like to remind that you and only you are “the captain of our own ship.” (Sonnenberg). As visibility stands for 60% of your professional advancement’s success, you cannot rely on chance or other people to promote yourself. Ask yourself how intentional you are about your internal brand building and how much time you invested in it this year. Build your own strategy how highlight your abilities in your organization and make it as a part of your development plan.
