Promote Yourself (18 page)

 

Six Rules of Self-Promotion

 

1. Make yourself worthy of being talked about.
If you've got a strong personal brand, you're an expert in something and do top quality work, you get along with others, and you're a team player, people will naturally talk about you and what you've done.

 

2. Be well known for one specific thing.
Again, this goes back to hard skills. When you're the one your coworkers can't do without when they need something done, you'll have more evangelists than you can count.

 

3. Take responsibility.
Even if you're a top performer, you can't always count on other people to sing your praises. Vanessa Schneider, a young PR Manager at Eventbrite, put it quite nicely. “Be your own publicist,” she told me. “That doesn't mean be a braggart or a jerk. But it does mean make sure that when you've had a big win, you invite others to share in your excitement. Of course, the way to do that is by getting them excited about the results, not about adding new points to your personal scorecard.”

 

4. Find ways to expand your role.
When you take on new responsibilities you're going to get noticed. And if you handle those responsibilities well, you'll get noticed even more. In an ideal world, you're giving people a live demonstration of how your talents and skills can benefit them and the company instead of having to tell them. But be prepared to tell them anyway—you can't just count on people seeing what you want them to see.

 

5. Make others look good—especially your manager.
If you talk up others, they'll usually look for ways to do the same for you. When you help your manager succeed, that manager will put you on more projects, and that will increase your visibility. When that manager gets promoted and starts staffing their new team, they'll naturally want people who've proven themselves to be loyal and whom they can count on to continue to make them look good. So as they move up through the corporate ranks—whether with the current employer or a new one—they'll promote you right along with them. I've seen it happen over and over again.

 

6. Get some evangelists.
What others say about you is more impactful than what you say about yourself. In the workplace, an endorsement from your supervisor or a high-profile coworker is so much more powerful than you saying the same thing.

 

Self-Promotion in Action: How to Craft Your Own Image at Work

In addition to my six rules, there are a number of other steps you can take to make yourself better known at work, keep your self-promotion effective, and prevent you from slipping into obnoxiousness.

Whenever you have the chance, seize the opportunity to show that you're excited about the work you're doing and the progress you're making on your latest project. Of course, you're only going to do this if it fits into the conversation. If you're in a meeting and everyone is talking about supply chain issues in China, don't bring up the fact that you got your latest sales project in under budget. Best case, you'll look awkward. Worst case, you'll look stupid. But if the project does come up, by all means, talk about it—but try to keep the focus off you. Enthusiastically telling people about a successful project you've been working on allows you to quietly self-promote
and
to bask in some of the glory earned by the project.

Be sure to take credit for what you do, but give plenty of credit to others who are doing great things. If you're presenting with three other people, make sure everyone has his or her name on the presentation and has a chance to share in the success—even if you're the leader. Acknowledging others' contributions in this way makes you look good without you having to say a word. It also makes others want to celebrate
you
when you have success. “You won't have to bring attention to yourself because others will do it for you,” says Dean Lawyer, a B2B Director at T-Mobile. “Find out how your work can assist others in accomplishing their goals and make sure you are making a positive impact on others through your work.” However, Dean warns: “Do not let others falsely take credit for your accomplishments.”

Take every opportunity to become more visible. You can do that by signing up for classes, attending functions, and taking on additional responsibility. The more your name gets out there, the more it gets recognized. “I increase my visibility in my organization through excelling in my normal workload and getting my name associated with any extracurricular activities,” Jeffrey Strassman, a young Audit Manager at Grant Thornton, a major accounting firm, told me. “In my office I'm a leader on the training committee, I am the ‘champion' on certain office initiatives, I get involved in our sponsored social organizations, and so on.” And as long as you're making yourself more visible, don't forget about meetings. Speak up. If you don't, you'll never get noticed.

And if you're not walking around getting to know your colleagues, team members, and folks from other departments, you're missing a great opportunity to let people know what you're doing, and to build relationships with potential supporters who can help you move your career forward. The more you have a chance to get to know people in person (and to have them get to know you), the better the chances that you'll impress them and that they'll promote you. If you're a remote worker and face-to-face meetings aren't possible, send regular e-mails with updates. You need to stay top of mind and continually remind people that you're out there and doing great work.

Before you open your mouth to say anything that might remotely be considered self-promoting, you need to know who's listening. Some people will love hearing about your accomplishments (assuming you do it subtly). But others may see your successes as a threat to their job or security. You'll want to tailor your message to avoid stepping on others' toes. It's especially true when it comes to your boss. Pay close attention to how they handle themselves, get feedback, run meetings, and talk about their own accomplishments. That should give you a hint as to how you should promote yourself to them.

It's also very important that you have an accurate view of how valuable you are in a workplace. That's sometimes hard to do. One way to assess this is by keeping track of the number of people who ask you for help or favors. If the number is pretty small, you either need to do a better job letting people know what you're capable of, or you need to acquire some hard and/or soft skills that your workplace demands.

Performance reviews are the perfect time to do a little self-promotion—after all, you're there to talk about you. But stay focused on the external. If you're being considered for a promotion, the people who are making the decision want to know what you've accomplished, challenges you've overcome, how well you work with your teammates, and how you're adding value to the company.

Finally, come up with a good elevator pitch. This is for the hypothetical scenario where you're unexpectedly sharing an express elevator with your boss and you only have between the lobby and the thirty-second floor to impress them. What one thing will you talk about? Trying to shoehorn a million ideas into a forty-five-second elevator ride will make you seem desperate and pompous. Keep it concise and stay focused on how you can help the company.

 

When Someone Takes Credit for Your Ideas

Unfortunately, not everyone you work with will have read this book, and they won't know how important it is to give credit where it's due. And believe me, having someone take credit for your ideas or your contributions is not an easy thing to deal with. At the very least, it's going to be frustrating. Then, your frustration will turn to anger. When that happens, you run the risk of doing or saying something you might regret. So what should you do if someone steals your thunder?

Step number one is to set up a meeting and talk to the thief privately. Mention that you were disappointed that you didn't get a shout-out and ask what his or her intention was. Your goal here is to get them to voluntarily correct their mistake and tell everyone who needs to know what your role was. Don't come out swinging or making accusations. It's possible that leaving you out was just an oversight. In that case, they'll probably be contrite and apologetic and will do whatever they have to do to put things right.

But what if the person who stole your idea brushes you off and refuses to correct the error? In this case, you'll set up a meeting with your manager. And without coming across as hostile, angry, or vindictive, lay out the facts. “I know my name didn't come up in the meeting, but I want to let you know that I was also on the team that did XYZ and I think I made a significant contribution to the project, and I just want to make sure that you were aware of that.” The most important thing is to not come across as a whiner or complainer—even if you're right. Let your boss know that you're happy with the way the project turned out, that you enjoyed working on it, and that you look forward to working on more projects.

 

Striking a Balance: The Right Way to Answer, “What Do You Do?”

In the U.S., when you're introduced to someone, it's common that the first topic of discussion starts with a simple question: What do you do? (This is something that's actually peculiar to the U.S. In many other countries asking that question is considered rude.) Answering that question gives you a great opportunity for self-promotion. If you don't give enough information in response to that question, the other person may think you're not very interesting and won't be interested in continuing the conversation either. Too much and you'll be noticed, but people will think you're arrogant and obnoxious. So you need to find a level of self-promotion that's just right.

This is a lesson I learned the hard way. Everyone I know knows that I'm a big self-promoter. Once I was out with some buddies at a bar and caught the eye of an attractive female bartender. After bringing our drinks she asked me what I do. I launched into a long recitation of all the things I've accomplished professionally. When I was done she looked at me and said, “That was really unattractive.”

That, ladies and gentlemen, is a great example of self-promotion run amuck. What I should have done—and what I recommend that you do whenever someone asks you what you do—is given a few highlights and then turned the spotlight on the person who asked the question.

Of course, in the workplace, things are a little different. To start with, people generally aren't going to ask that question—they'll assume that since you work at the same company you're doing something productive. But they will ask you what you've achieved. To answer that question properly, you'll need to adopt what I call the “proper self-promotion mind-set,” which means continually reminding yourself of three things:

a. I'm in a team and I'm a team player.

b. My work is important and benefits the company.

c. My work isn't about me, it's about others.

If you maintain this mind-set, it's unlikely that you'll ever come across as bragging or a jerk. Imagine that you and your team absolutely nailed a presentation to a big client. But your boss wasn't there to see it. When he gets back from vacation or wherever, he's going to want to know how things went (of course he'll already know because the client called to tell him). Your conversation with your boss might go something like this:

“Hey Mike, too bad you couldn't have been there—what a meeting! Bill did a great job of laying out the facts, Muriel's PowerPoint kept them on the edge of their seats, Randy wowed 'em with a demo of the new product, and I answered their questions and wrapped everything up. They're coming in Tuesday to sign the contract!”

 

The Dangers of Excessive Self-Promotion

Taking self-promotion too far can produce some pretty negative side effects. At the very least, you run the risk of isolating yourself or alienating others from you. If people don't want to work with you, you'll be hurting your team, the projects you're working on, and the company as a whole. And your boss might think that you're running around taking credit for other people's accomplishments. If any of that happens, you could end up doing irreparable damage to your career. You'll have a tough time moving up. What management looks for when deciding whom to promote is someone who has presence in the workplace, someone others look up to and admire.

As you move up the food chain, you'll eventually have to manage others. And to do that effectively, it has to be less about you and more about the people you supervise who do things on your behalf.

 

The Tongue-in-Cheek “How-to-Tell-If-I'm-an-Obnoxious-Self-Promoter” Quiz

Read the following True or False statements:

  1. I use the word “I” in conversations more than any other word or letter.

  2. Instead of asking what others do, I immediately launch into what
I
do.

  3. I frequently talk about myself in the third person.

  4. I publish on Facebook or Tweet about useless things more than five times a day while at work.

  5. When I talk I make sure my voice is louder than anyone else's in the room.

  6. If I accomplish something at work I make sure all my coworkers and their mothers know about it.

  7. When I do self-assessments, I never criticize anything I've done or not done.

  8. I “borrow” creative ideas from coworkers and take credit for them.

  9. When I take on a team leadership position, it's to build myself up, not to benefit the team.

10. I'm too busy playing Angry Birds on my iPhone to pay attention to what anyone else might be saying.

11. I namedrop constantly and talk about people I've never actually met as if they were my best buds.