Overlooked for Senior Level Promotions? Here's How to Take Control of Your Career Growth? - Part 1

This is in continuation of my previous blog on why do some professionals get overlooked for strategic positions?

If you are in this position, you need to take inventory of the below highlighted by Julian Sloan, in her book, 'Learning to think strategically'

• What I must know?

• What I know?

• What I don't know?

• What I think I know?

• What somebody else knows?

• What keeps changing?

  
  

This will give you a good assessment of skill, perception and communication gaps.

Once you are aware of the gaps, we can adopt a three pronged strategy to bridge deficits in:

1. Capability

2. Character

3. Perception

I will be exploring how to address the "Capability" gap in this blog that will help you take control of your career growth.

There are 4 differentiating competencies in being considered for senior strategic roles. These when absent or not being 'at the right level' will impede or shrink your chances of getting such roles:

1. Strategic Thinking

2. Cognitive Agility

3. Risk Taking

4. Pause on demand.

Let us explore each of the above in some more detail.

Strategic Thinking

In a nutshell, strategic thinking involves three 'verbs' that need demonstration to create future outcomes for your role. They are

-->Envision - Imagining what could be

-->Create - Defining what could be

-->Synthesise - Connect & Make it whole for context.

These three will help you create and rehearse new patterns of thinking rather than going with the road more travelled.

If you are stuck in the "how", 100% of the time, you definitely need to pay attention here.

You can read more in my blogs here.

If you need more help, do join me for the Strategic Thinking Program starting in October 2024. You can request for more details here.

Cognitive Agility

Cognitive agility is the ability to switch contexts with the least loss of attention.

It also includes the ability to zoom-out and zoom-in to situation.

To demonstrate it, you should display the ability to work with details while aligned to work with the big picture. You should be able to switch between contexts with least downtime in terms of attention.

Risk Taking

Often considered the pre-requisite to strategic thinking, the ability to take risks, accepting potential failure and having resilience to bounce back are one of the must-haves for a strategic leader.

While one can say its part of "character" of the leader (which is how I had perceived years ago), I believe that it can be a core capability that requires much of your head to support the heart.

Pause on demand

Love the above from Julian Sloan's book on strategic thinking. The ability to "Pause" at the right juncture, to identify one's preference for certain patterns of thinking and asking "What else?" is one of the critical success factors for strategic roles.

This is called "Shattering the frame" by Julian and what can be a better word?

For eg, you have been asked to bring AI into the programs you run. The default pattern is to find "how", because the boss asked? What if you have to think about "What is to be solved with AI?" "Why AI? Why not XI?".

That's shattering the frame.

Reach out to me if you need to have an intelligent conversation around the above.

If you need individual coaching, book my free 1:1 demo session here.

If you need Master Classes & Group Coaching on Strategic Thinking, you can ask for additional details here.

#coaching #leadershipcoaching #strategicthinking #bridgethegap