Every month on our site, Jo Miller, CEO of Women’s Leadership Coaching Inc., will answer your career and leadership questions. Please send your question to advice@anitaborg.org and it may be answered in an upcoming column.
What’s wrong with working hard?
Question: Why is it that the people who work hardest are not the ones who get recognized or promoted?
Answer:
As chief financial officer for Morgan Stanley, Ruth Porat is the firm’s most senior-ranked female executive, and one of a small handful of women currently serving in C-level positions on Wall Street.
It is a tough job with tremendous responsibility, and you could be forgiven for assuming Porat is a proponent of working hard. In fact, she is quite the opposite.
Quoted recently in the New York Times, Porat remarked “One of the biggest problems women have is they work really hard and put their heads down and assume hard work gets noticed”.
The workforce is full of smart, talented, hard-working women who sit at their desk delivering outstanding results to the benefit their company. The problem is, they are relying on the assumption that someone from management will eventually stop by and recognize their hard work.
If your plan to get a promotion or a raise only involves work harder, you should plan on waiting a long time, because hard work alone does not guarantee reward and recognition. You need to take additional steps that make your accomplishments visible.
Take five minutes today to step away from your desk and your work. Go interact with a leader who has the power to advance your career. Ask them how they are doing, and when they return the question, tell them you are doing great, and briefly mention a recent accomplishment, e.g.: “I’m doing great. I just got nominated for an innovation award”.
That’s how hard work gets noticed.
Jo Miller is CEO of Women’s Leadership Coaching Inc. which offers women’s leadership seminars, webinars and coaching programs. To read more of her career advice, visit the Ask Jo archives. Copyright 2010, Women’s Leadership Coaching Inc.