Those of you who make it to the end of my often very long newsletters may have noticed that I recently started an “Ask the Coach” section where I invite subscribers and followers on social media to submit their professional dilemmas to get coaching advice from yours truly.
You see, it wasn’t that long ago when I could have used some professional advice to help me navigate the challenges in my corporate life. Most companies teach you how to get your job done, but few coach you on the best ways to partner with colleagues while you do it. I could have really used a coach early in my leadership career to help me deal with office drama. But in most companies, coaching services are reserved for the big dogs. I was years away from being one of those and having access to support from a coach like me.
Ask the Coach is my way of railing against the trend in corporate culture that reserves coaching for the successful to become more successful, and creating access to the coaching advice professionals need to succeed without having to beg Carol in HR.
As it turns out, there’s no shortage of professional advice seekers out there who could use a coach! Last week, I came across a question so good that I decided to dedicate the entire newsletter to my response. I hope you get as much out of reading it as I did from writing it.
Q: What Advice Would You Give Your 24-Year-Old Self? I need some career advice. I am an anxious 24-year-old beginning their career and worried that I don’t have what it takes to be successful in corporate. What advice would you give to those just starting out? |
A: You know, I wish I had the wherewithal at 24 to ask advice from those who learned to survive in the corporate world. Perhaps I could have saved myself a lot of stress and anxiety…I might have even figured out how to escape earning the nickname Napoleon from my colleagues…but I digress.
Your wise question prompted so many thoughts that I had to pull my car over at one point and send myself a very long email to capture all the ideas swirling in my head. After some careful consideration of everything I’ve learned and a lot of editing, I finally settled on the top 5 things I wish I knew when I was starting my career. Here's my advice to Gen Z.
Learn how to give it, and how to take it.
I can’t tell you how many seasoned professionals struggle with giving difficult feedback. They wait for issues to become critical before they speak up, waste time sugarcoating bad news, or avoid giving it entirely. They don’t challenge themselves to learn to deliver uncomfortable feedback while keeping their relationships intact and miss golden opportunities to coach their colleagues to develop their careers.
Just as many professionals can’t receive negative feedback to save their lives, they get defensive, waste time trying to litigate the past, and miss the chance to capitalize on any wisdom in feedback to improve their performance. I was primary offender numero uno when it came to dismissing and invalidating feedback meant to help me succeed. It was a mistake.
I wish someone told me that delivering honest feedback in a sensitive way is an essential skill to master as an aspiring professional. I also wished someone had taped my big mouth shut when receiving difficult feedback so I could absorb what my colleagues were trying to tell me. Don’t make the same mistakes I did. Learn to deliver sensitive feedback and mine for any wisdom in feedback designed to help you succeed (even if you don’t agree with all of it).
Know your number-one currency
When you are first starting out, the way you contribute value to your organization is not coming up with ideas no one at the company has thought of, nor is it reminding the boss how things can be done more efficiently with a new app. Your number one currency when you’re young is your reliability. Do what you say you’re going to do, show up on time, and earn a reputation for getting s*it done. When you do, you’re building a professional brand based on trust that you can leverage when you have bigger fish to fry with your company. Keep your head down, become known for delivering, and watch as your value in your organization expands beyond reliability to include so much more.
Build your squad
Corporate life isn’t for the weak, and you’ll need sounding boards, both within and outside your organization, to look to when you need advice. You need to assemble a professional team of supporters who know how to be honest with you when it’s time to pull yourself together, supportive when you need reminders to believe in yourself, and resourceful when you need ideas about how to handle tough situations. You should never be anxious alone and have a team of peeps you can reliably call upon for advice.
Allow me a few extra pieces of advice on this one?
Friends and family are great when you need to vent and complain, but not the best additions to your professional squad. They are hopefully biased to believe the sun shines out of your you-know-what, and may have trouble offering objective advice. Stick to professionals who are more experienced and capable of effectively mentoring you to succeed.
Also, when members of your squad are in your organization, they are not your outlet for venting. Complaining to colleagues can quickly work against you. Find a squad members outside your team and above you on the corporate ladder, and think of advice and solutions…advice and solutions…when leveraging their wisdom and expertise.
Have a good relationship with failure
Too many kids enter the workforce having zero experience with failure. They may struggle and overcome adversity, but parents and teachers work pretty hard to make sure most students succeed. Outright falling flat on your face isn’t an experience most of us have starting our professional lives, and we start to panic when we realize life is not a series of compounding successes. Most of us will fail at something we care about, more than once, but only some of us will allow the experience to destroy our confidence. Failure is one of our most valuable teachers. In fact, most professionals will tell you they’ve learned infinitely more through a few significant failures than all the successes they’ve achieved combined. Learn to appreciate failure as the wonderful knock upside the head we need to get back on track and don’t let it shake your confidence. Use it as fuel to get even better at what matters most to your development.
Think about your brand
Your jobs are not jobs. They are opportunities to build your professional brand. The Gen X-ers on your team may refer to it as your “reputation,” but these days, it’s so much more than that. From the minute you take your first job, you are building a brand that you will carry with you throughout your career. Building a strong brand requires results, development, and relationships to become one that’s sought after in any industry you choose. Think about increasing the value you bring to your team and organization by evolving your strengths, pay attention to building strong partnerships everywhere you go (without burning bridges), and take every bit of advice, training, and investment in your career as opportunities to build a professional brand you’re proud of. Building a strong brand means naming your ticket later in your career, but it starts with your very first job. I wish someone had told me I was damaging my professional brand when I was ordering everyone around all the time. It would have forced me to consider the long-term consequences of my decisions and empowered me to think more strategically about how I was creating value in my organization.
My anxious friend, I know how it feels to have little support and wonder if you’re getting things right in a new job. Most professionals are running a million miles an hour, and don’t have the time to make you feel more secure in the job you have. But the fact that you’re thinking about the long term and leveraging resources by sending such an important question is a sign that you’ve got your head in the right place. Keep asking questions, develop some confidence that you can do hard things, and know that your desire to succeed means you’re likely to find a way to do just that (even if you survive a few bumps along the way). I’m honored to be a small part of your developing squad, here to remind you, you’ve got this.
Danielle Terranova is the voice behind Leadership Lessons with Danielle.
She has been an executive coach since 2015 and owner of Terranova Consulting, LLC since 2019.