Stepping Stones

One of the acting contributors to my program describes time management as the ability to balance performance tasks with maintenance tasks. Maintenance tasks are those things you have to get done every day or every week, which leave you in the same place once they are completed. A performance task is one that moves you forward toward a goal. We all have maintenace tasks to manage, but the difference between being a great employee and being a promotable employee is how well you manage to complete those maintenance tasks, while still accomplishing others that move you ahead.

I have taken his philosophy and used it to help me set goals. It may sound silly, but for most of my life, I thought it was enough just to be a stellar employee. I really believed that I would get ahead just by being the very best at my job. That's what people had taught me anyway. If I was the best at what I did, then I would be rewarded for that. Maybe our ideas of rewards were different? I want to move up and ahead, not just be told, "Wow, you're fast!"

A few years ago, I started setting goals in my career. A few times a year, I would sit down and look at what I had done in the last months. I would determine where I wanted to be in the next year, then write down the steps it would take to get me there. Did I need budget money? Where would that come from? What kind of human resources would I need? What kind of time would it require? Once I had everything hashed out, I would go to my boss and present my plans. More often than not, my boss would ix-nay the ans-play before I was even finished pitching the idea, but now and then he would give me a green flag and let me run.

Now I am trying to set goals for a new position. Dawn has some a great goal-setting guide here. I don't really know enough about the job to make solid, full-blown plans, but I can pitch some stones out ahead of me and do my best to run toward them. The first stone I've pitched is management. I want to be promoted into a management position. Working backward from that point, I determine what my next steps should be and I work toward that. My outline would look something like this:

Main Goal: Management Position 1. Find out what my company requires for the position of manager. (Must have a minimum of 3 direct reports. Must manage diverse areas of need. Must contribute to the bottom line.)

2. Learn every detail about current position. (This will allow me to find areas that need fine tuning, and designate areas of growth potential. Only when I know all there is to know about my current job, will I be able to expand it.) 2a. Ask questions of people who have been through program 2b. Make time to interview contributors for ideas 2c. Ugh--read all the old materials. All of it.

3. Double program size. 3a. Find ways to fine tune program details to allow for more participants 3b. Make management aware that the program is doubling, thus will require more staff to help run it

4. Learn my boss' job. 4a. Offer to help with special projects 4b. Ask to be involved in meetings that might or might not touch my program 4c. Listen closely to boss' description of workload, then take tasks that will make her job lighter. When she is freed up of busy work, she can be creative and find bigger roles for me. The more I take on, the more obvious it will be that I am willing to work hard, and that I need a staff to help me.

5. Spend time brainstorming and offering up new ideas (I don't mean offer up any old idea I have, but I should be spending time every week really thinking about my program and my department and brainstorming ways to improve and build, while streamlining processes. I should present fully formed plans.) 5a. Present one new idea for implementation every quarter.

Of course the first order of business is to figure out what I am doing right now, but soon I'll be on my way. Check out more career planning information on Dawn's site. She can show you step-by-step how to build your goals.

~Elese Morris