Get good at something, really good. Like – totally own it.
There’s a way to not only make you more effective in your day to day, but also dramatically increase your value to your current or future employers. It’s a concerted effort to make yourself as much of an expert as you can in a certain area.
The ones that I’ve seen most often:
-At my previous companies – there’s been folks that were so knowledgeable and adept with our ATS that they became indispensable resources. This got to the point where their book of business was particularly improved, but also everyone in the company lined up at their desk with “hey, how do we do this thing again???” They were of course gracious enough to help and everybody wins.
-In the digital marketing world – there’s a ton of tools. Marketo, Eloqua, Hubspot, Salesforce, yadda yadda. Many of them do the same thing but look different. Sometimes you need to learn a whole bunch of them too. I’ve seen a lot of people become true SMEs in several of them that were later chosen to help implement and integrate new tech/systems later on. It’s definitely a way for promotions, advancement, and movement upwards.
-Process improvers – doesn’t need to be an actual thing. In my latest role, we’d set up a Process Improvement Tracker. A few individuals are guiding the group to literally “write down the stuff that makes us slower” and they’re honing the ideas to get those roadblocks out of the way. And – they’ll be remembered for the efforts and called upon next time that job needs to be done.
Doesn’t really matter what it is. Pick something. Own it.