Five ways to find informal career opportunities
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Being able to be a social animal can be a helpful part of building a successful career. Don’t get me wrong, you need substance, but if people don’t know what you’ve delivered then you’re sunk. People won’t automatically find out about your good work and successes. You need to find ways to drip feed information though to them, finding informal opportunities to make people aware of what you’re working on and what you’ve achieved.
Here are some of the best informal opportunities to advance your career:
TAKE AWAY
Even if you’re not a “people person” and this doesn’t come naturally to you, it’s really important to make people aware of what you’re doing. So start small, find something that could work for you – and try that!
Here are some of the best informal opportunities to advance your career:
- Stop by to talk. Instead of constantly emailing, drop by to speak to people or offer to go for a coffee with someone and catch up properly. Instead of sending seven emails on lots of topics, in 10-15 minutes you can build your relationship, talk about what you would have emailed them about, got more commitment, and socialised!
- Sit with different people. Do you find that you’re in a rut? Do you sit in the same place for meetings and go for lunch with the same people? Start mixing it up a little bit and sit by different people. Find people who are sat in the dining hall who you have a loose connection to and sit next to them – even if it’s just five minutes of pleasantries, it means you now have a more firmly established connection.
- Keep in contact with your fringe. People who are at the outer edge of your network are great to connect to as they have the most ties to people you don’t know. This will help you to continue to broaden your network. If it’s been a while since you last checked in with them, make an effort to catch up – it’s easier to tap into a pre-existing relationship that to start a new one from scratch.
- Join mini-socials or organise them. If people are off to the pub, go with them or, if the social calendar is a little empty, can you arrange for a group to go to the theatre, for a meal or on a boat trip? One organisation I know even started a book club at lunch times!
- Share the journey. If you can possibly help it, don’t drive alone. If you’re traveling to another office for a meeting – find out who else needs to go there and share the journey. The time spent in the car together will open more doors than you can imagine!
TAKE AWAY
Even if you’re not a “people person” and this doesn’t come naturally to you, it’s really important to make people aware of what you’re doing. So start small, find something that could work for you – and try that!