What to do once you’ve found your Dream Job (the 3 step plan)

Start creating your power map by drawing a chart of the people who matter the most to your career — for instance, your new boss. Next, draw circles emanating out from her.

Who influences her? Who does she listen to? Maybe it’s her assistant or the CFO or the head of her professional association. Here’s an example of what one looks like:

Next, rank your relationship with each of these influencers. Who do you have a positive relationship with (they know you and like you)? How about neutral (they don’t know you) or negative connections? You can mark these with a + (positive), – (negative), or ~ (neutral).

For Chris, the big problem was that only a few people knew and liked him (a positive ranking), and the vast majority didn’t know him at all (a neutral ranking). That weak overall score wasn’t going to win him a promotion.

Once you’ve established where you stand, start tracking your progress.

Turn negative relationships to neutral. If you have a beef with someone your “target” is close to, that could create problems for you. That person may always be a roadblock.

Take action to win them over. If it’s appropriate, reach out to them. Apologize for any previous misunderstandings, or at least express your desire for a fresh start. If there hasn’t been a specific incident, you can simply try to be nicer. Making an effort to smile and ask them about their day can go a long way toward dissipating past hostility.

You’ll also want to turn neutral relationships to positive. Think of ways you can get to know these folks better. Maybe it’s inviting them out to lunch or coffee, or making a point to sit next to them at meetings. You could volunteer for a project they’re involved with, or ask them more questions about their lives to find common ground.

Finally, it’s important to continue to nurture positive connections. Take stock of what you’re doing and how you built the relationship in the first place. Keep doing more of whatever that is. Maybe it’s playing on the basketball team with them.

Maybe you help with tech tips when they need it, or always offer to stay late if they need an extra pair of hands on a project. Whatever’s working, keep it up.

Look at the sample Power Map. It shows you have:

a neutral relationship with your new boss Ming and her best friend Rajiv
a positive relationship with Steve from the professional association and Natalie the CFO
a negative relationship with Tracy, her assistant

The goal with all Power Maps is to try to “level up” your relationships. You want everyone surrounding the person you’re hoping to influence either neutral or favorable toward you.

That creates a powerful echo chamber effect. Your target starts to hear your name regularly, from lots of different people, who are saying nice things. It shows that you have something unique to offer. They’ll see that you’re more valuable than they realized. That’s when the right opportunities start to come your way.

In Chris’s case, it took concerted focus, but he built the connections he needed and eventually won the promotion.

Mục Lục

More tips on becoming indispensable at your job

The following advice comes from an interview we did with Pamela Slim, author of Escape from Cubicle Nation and Body of Work. Use these tips in conjunction with the tips above from Dorie Clark to become truly indispensable at work.

Learn to take feedback

Pamela’s first piece of advice to becoming invaluable at your job is to accept and consider the feedback you receive from supervisors or peers.

She admitted that receiving feedback was a massive learning curve for her that’s taken a long time—she used to hate it. Pamela was in the field of training and development where everything she did always had an evaluation attached to it. And, within her personality of being kind of a perfectionist, she would get all 5 out of 5 for 40 people.

But, two people would give her 3 out of 5 stars, and she would feel crushed and devastated.

You have to realize that many people who give you feedback simply want you to be better because they care about you. In fact, I’d be skeptical of someone who doesn’t give you feedback because that might mean that they don’t take your work seriously enough. So it’s crucial to learn how to take feedback.

However, it’s equally as important to sort through people who are being vindictive—people who like to make people squirm—versus people who actually see the potential and who you are and are willing to give you tough feedback.

Let’s put a real-world example on asking and receiving feedback.

Pamela called Ramit in November of 2011 and said, “Ramit, I want to have a call with you. I want specific feedback on these areas of my business.”

She detailed out the exact parts of her business that she wanted feedback on. So, Ramit reviewed her business and gave her some feedback. Ultimately, he told Pamela that her prices were too low.

She was way too valuable for what she was charging and it was negatively affecting her brand. Do you know how Pamela took the feedback?

She embraced the feedback because she trusted Ramit, and that’s why she asked specifically for his help. Learn from Pamela’s example of trusting the person to give you honest, usable feedback. Then, internalize what they’re telling you so you can make adjustments and perform better next time.

Learn to Value Yourself

Let’s now talk about undervaluing ourselves. Creative people tend to undervalue their work, chronically.

We asked Pamela if she could share any personal insights or insights she’d gotten from coaching people.

When Pamela was making a career transition earlier in her twenties, when she was working for companies, she remembered a piece of advice that she got from somebody that helped her to think differently about undervaluing herself. Pamela was interviewing at different places, and a woman asked Pamela, “What salary are you asking for?”

Pamela said, “Well, I probably need something like $50,000. That’s probably pretty good.”

The woman told Pamela, “When it comes to compensation, especially if you’re a female, you must charge what the market will bear, especially in relation to your male peers.” And then, if you find yourself unable to figure out what to do with the extra money—you can give it away.

Wow… Pamela’s story hit home because we’re taught that a big salary must equal that you’re a more important or valuable person. In truth, it’s not about that.

Learn how to negotiate your salary here

Valuing yourself in your job can take a lot of forms:

Not being afraid to voice your opinion during meetings
Following your gut instinct on the direction of your projects
Asking questions
Taking the initiative to learn new things that interest you or further your skillset
Respecting and valuing to other people’s work and input
Ask for what you truly deserve (whether that be more compensation, more benefits, better resources, etc.)

How to take action after you found your Dream Job

Finding your Dream Job is an amazing first step. But it’s only the first step. If you want to thrive at it, you need to stand out. That starts with:

Becoming a local expert – a big fish in a small pond – in a subject area of your choice
Connecting others across your organization
Creating a power map to track your relationships with the people who matter most
Learning to take feedback
Learning to value yourself

It does not matter if you are an employee or an entrepreneur. Standing out is no longer optional. The good news is that taking even the smallest action puts you miles ahead of the competition.

What’s one thing you’re going to do to make sure others recognize your true talents? Teach a mindfulness class, like Chade-Meng Tan? Invite a new colleague to lunch each week? Start asking your boss’s assistant about her life once in a while?