4 (Four) Principles of Career Distinction

I would like to talk about the four principles of career distinction. When we are researching our book we wanted to see what are the things that make some people exceptional in the workplace. There is a lot of people who doing great things but the small percentage of people- they are just absolutely exceptional. What is it that they have in common and we determine that there are four things they have in common that helped them to be so exceptional.

01. Stand out. Stand for something

One of the things we learned is, people who are wildly successful are willing to stick their neck out little bit. They are willing to stand for something knowing that not everybody is going to agree with them. And that is a great key in branding. Sometimes we repel as many people as we attract. If you are willing to take a stand, if u convicted, if u have thought a leadership position that’s really important to your brand. You want to able to stand out, so that people recognize you and understand what is that you stand for.

02. Be your own boss

Hit back 20-30 years ago, when you worked for a company, you pretty much there for life. They would manage a career for you. Sounds he didn’t make too many ways, you leave who you were at the door, you go in, you conform, that’s what they want to form you. They would manage your career move you around, take a review, you retire with pension at the end of thirty years.
That’s not the way of the world anymore. And it certainly not the way of the work world.
Today you need to be your own boss. That means managing your own career. So you have to think about what are you want to go next? I have a career a discussion with you and what are the things that have to accomplish this year that will help me get to the next step in my career. These are the things that are going to make you successful you cannot wait for somebody else to manage your career, you can’t look to HR, you can’t look to manager, you need to take these upon yourself and proactively manage your career.

03. Forget the ladder

We all know the ladder metaphor, climbing the rungs of the ladder and when we are seeking the next rung- all we things is about our career. We update our resume, we start reaching out to professional networking contacts and so forth. Everything’s focused on getting to that wrong.
And what happened when we get to the wrong? We forget all about managing our career which very binary. When I am managing a career anymore we have reached that wrong. So we get caught up in voice mails, emails and meeting and so forth and we don’t think about our careers again until it’s time to reach the next rung.
That doesn’t work in the new world of work either. What you want to do is manage your career every single day with everything you do. You want to ask yourself what I am doing today that going to advance me to where I want to go. So instead of the ladder you need to think about your career as a ramp. That ramp means it with every step you take your advancing toward your goals. So you have to ask yourself, how is this meeting today is going to help me to advance my career, how is this phone call is going to advance my career, how is everything on my to-do list today going to help me take the next step by adding value in demonstrating that value in everything I am doing today.

04. Build your brand

We have seen the people, who are wildly successful, have integrated branding strategies into everything they do. Every day they are asking themselves is it helping to add value to my brand or is it distracting from my brand? And they make decisions based on those things are going to help them increase their visibility with their target audience demonstrate what makes an exceptional and so forth. So you want to be thinking about everything you do is helping me or is it distracting from brand value and make sure you are putting your mark on everything you do-every agenda you write, every meeting you attend, every phone call you have. When you do this branding becomes a natural part of how you manage your career or how you add value to your employer and those around you.

Special Thanks to William Arruda | Personal Branding Guru