25. Have you mastered your current job?

Aug 10, 2021

 

I’m raising this topic because I often hear from people who are wanting to move forward into a new role but are still yet to master their current role. In these situations, it’s difficult to promote people or move them into other roles when they’re not giving 100% of their effort to their current roles.

So, if you’re not being promoted, or if you’re being overlooked, then I’d encourage you to have a hard conversation with yourself and consider if you’ve mastered your current job to the best of your ability.

How do you know if you've mastered your current role? 

Start with the basics
Dust off the job description of your current role and go over it thoroughly.
If you don’t have a job description, I’d recommend writing yourself one.

Rate yourself against the key performance metrics
Rate yourself on a scale of 1-5: with 1 being the things you know you aren’t doing, and 5 being the things you know you’re acing.

Look for gaps
Then, sit down and look at your ratings and identify where the gaps are. Anything that’s rated between 1 and 3 needs your focus.

Ask for feedback
How can you improve these areas? Take your job description to your boss and ask for their feedback on your performance, and for any advice they might have for your improvement. You might also find value in chatting to someone else that you trust, whether it’s a colleague, friend, or maybe even someone in a different role. Seek as much external feedback as you can.

Do your skills need an upgrade?
You might even find that you need to do a bit of self-learning, so have a chat with your HR department to see if your business offers any courses for skill development.

 
So, the key steps to mastering your current role are:

  • reviewing your job description,
  • rating yourself,
  • looking at what needs improvement and then
  • planning how you will develop those skills.

 

Make sure you commit to this process – it’s not enough to identify your weak areas and not put in the work to improve.

Once you’ve done these steps, give yourself a couple of months to work on your improvement, and then review again.

When you reach the point where you feel confident that you’ve truly mastered your current position, then you can start considering the next step for your career!

If you need a bit of help with this process or you're considering career coaching, don't hesitate to reach out. You can find all my coaching information, here.

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