5 Ways to Get Yourself Promoted

I have recently had a couple of conversations with people who have asked me for career advice along the lines of, “What’s your advice for getting promoted?”

This is a question that is on many people’s minds as they progress throughout their career. My response to this question is based on my own career growth, as well as from managing teams at Twitter, Instagram, and GetYourGuide.

I have come up with five key tips for getting promoted in any organization.

In order to get promoted, you need to start earning the trust of your management team and your peers. And in order to earn their trust, you need to deliver results. This means that whatever responsibility you have been given, you need to nail it by producing high-quality results in the eyes of your management.

So this means that you need to clarify the responsibilities and expectations for your performance. Make sure you are completely aligned with what your management perceives as success in your role. Then work hard and work smart to deliver significant results.

What does it mean to work hard and work smart? It means being dedicated and putting in the time (work hard), but it also means prioritizing your time, remaining focused on what’s important, partnering with other people, and leveraging the right tools (work smart).

You will need to be patient and show that you have delivered results consistently before you earn the trust of your management team. And it goes without saying that you should build good relationships with your coworkers in order to build trust.

Don’t waste your energy advocating to get promoted if you haven’t nailed the work you’ve been given in the eyes of management and peers.

Once you have been nailing the work you have been given, it’s time to ask for more. Proactively seek out opportunities to contribute. Most importantly, these new opportunities you take on must be additive to, and cannot come at the cost of, the work you had originally been given. The additional responsibilities are “extra credit” at first, while you continue to deliver against your “day job.”

When your management suggests some additional responsibilities for you, as long as the work is high-impact, put your head down and get it done. Sometimes the work that is highest impact is not the “sexiest” work. Doesn’t matter. In fact, if the work is unsexy, it means that few people may want to do it. Then if you step up and get the high impact but unsexy work done, it makes you even more valuable to management. It also demonstrates that you prioritize the company or team success over your own, an important quality for someone whom management will want to promote.

When I was a McKinsey consultant, one of my mentors offered some advice for how to grow within the organization. He told me, “You have to deliver on your own workstream, and then provide input to the other workstreams on your project. The project leaders will see that you have a broader perspective than the single workstream you have been given. Your teammates will start to look at you as a thought partner and a leader. Then when you get promoted, it becomes obvious to everyone on the team.”

A big part of being a leader is developing a vision. Creating that vision requires you to have broader awareness and a longer term perspective. And to develop that broader awareness and longer term perspective, you have to stick your head up from your own work, look around and look ahead.

What does is mean to look around? It means being aware of how your work fits into your team, what the other people on your team are working on. Proactively identify opportunities or problems that your teammates are facing, and help them as a thought partner. Develop and communicate a perspective on the priorities, direction, and goals of your broader team.

What does it mean to look ahead? It means thinking about where things are going, for your own workstream or (even better) for your broader team. What are the trends that may affect your work? What are the implications of these trends — what opportunities or risks do they create? Develop and communicate a longer-term perspective for your own or your team’s work.

Remember when I said that you can only take on extra responsibility while you continue to nail the original work you’ve been given? Well, how does this scale? How can you continue to take on more and more opportunities, while still delivering on your original responsibilities?

You have to scale yourself. How do you do that? You have to find your successor — the person who will take on your original responsibilities so that you can take on the additional opportunities. When you’re an individual contributor, this may mean advocating to hire additional people on your team and scoping out what the new people would do (your original responsibilities). When you’re a manager, this may mean growing your direct reports so that you can push some of the things you do to them.

It’s a win-win: the people who are taking on your original responsibilities get the new scope, and are probably learning and growing while they do so. And you get to scale yourself so you can take additional opportunities. You also get the opportunity to mentor them (developing your coaching and leadership skills).

Typically an organization will want to promote you once you have demonstrated that you can successfully contribute at the next level. You can only demonstrate that you are contributing at that next level if you have taken on additional scope. And sometimes these opportunities to take on the additional scope will come through a “lucky break” within your organization — someone more senior leaves and they need someone to back fill them, there is a re-org where teams are being combined, or the company leadership decides to spin up a new initiative. You can only be considered for these “lucky break” opportunities if you have found someone else to take on your original responsibilities — your successor. So make yourself redundant if you want to be considered for these growth opportunities.

In order to get promoted quickly, you need to be in a high-growth environment — a company or a division within a company that is rapidly scaling. This intuitively makes sense — but why is this important?

First, because in high-growth environments, there is a lot of white space. You can identify opportunities for the company, and show initiative by tackling them. There is enough work to go around, so taking on these additional opportunities does not encroach on other people’s scope. The pie is growing for everyone, so your “slice” of the pie can grow without really coming at anyone else’s expense. In low-growth or declining companies, there is no white space, and it becomes more of a zero-sum game (your gain is someone else’s loss). So it’s harder to find the opportunities that you can take on in addition to your primarily responsibility.

Second, with a rapidly growing and scaling organization, there will be more “lucky break” opportunities as I discussed in the section above. There will be more organizational changes (which create the need for leaders to step up) or more new initiatives being spun up, which may present opportunities for you to take on more scope if you’re seen as doing a great job and you have a successor. In low-growth or declining companies, you do also see organizational changes, but of the negative kind — downsizing, layoffs etc. You don’t see new initiatives being spun up, you see more existing initiatives being shut down.

Third, it’s easier to find your successor and make yourself redundant in high-growth situations. You’ll see more appetite from management to hire new people (one of which may be your successor). And you will be able to attract more people to your company anyway — people want to join winning, growing companies more than the decliners.

So when you’re considering a new career opportunity and you have multiple options, I would always urge you to go with the option that is growing faster. Go with the rocket ship and you’ll have better chances of getting more responsibility (and then getting promoted).

In this post, I have tried to share some perspective for people earlier in their careers who want to get promoted quickly. My advice can be boiled down to five key tips:

Nail the work you’ve been given. Getting promoted starts first and foremost with nailing the work you have been given. You have to build trust with your management and your co-workers that you are someone who solidly delivers results. So clarify the expectations for your role, and then work hard and work smart to deliver those results.

Ask for more, and seek out the things that have the highest impact for the company. Once you’ve proven you can nail the work you have been given, seek out additional responsibilities. This “extra credit” cannot come at the cost of continuing to perform on your “day job.” You have to continue nailing your original responsibilities and the additional ones. As long as the work is high impact, sign up for it, even if it’s “unsexy.”

Stick your head up, look ahead and look around. To be seen as a leader (and someone who is ready for promotion), you need to develop a vision for your area. The only way you can create that vision is to develop a broader awareness for your area, as well as a long-term perspective. Create the space for yourself to stick your head up, look ahead (for the long-term perspective) and look around (for the broader awareness). Become a thought partner for your teammates and for your manager, so that they start to see you as a trusted advisor and, in the case of your teammates, as a mentor.

Find your successor (make yourself redundant). The only way you can continue to take on more and more responsibilities is to find your own successor. If you can find someone to take on your original responsibilities, it frees you up to take on additional scope. Sometimes the opportunities for additional responsibilities come through a “lucky break” in the organization — if you have your own successor at the moment that a “lucky break” presents itself, you will be more attractive for management to entrust with the opportunity.

Put yourself into high-growth situations. Finally, in addition to all of the things above, put yourself into high-growth situations and companies. In these high-growth environments, there is a lot more white space to take initiative; there will naturally be more “lucky break” opportunities; and it will be easier to attract and find your own successor.

Even with all of the tips above, it’s important to remember that promotions will require patience and luck. Don’t sweat it if you get passed over for a promotion this time around; keep playing the long game, do great work and build great relationships, and the promotions and recognition will come over time.

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