The top 3 common Career Killer Mistakes

There are 3 common career-killing mistakes that most young professionals make at work, which have been quietly but surely delaying their career growth and job promotion.

This ultimately means, they take longer than they have to to get each promotion, and every year of not being promoted could mean losing thousands of dollars for even an entry-level young professional.

So let's go through these 3 common mistakes below and see if any of them sounds familiar to you.

Mistake 1: Not tracking your work performance

Symptom:

• In the past year, you have missed several job or project deadlines.

Many young professionals consider the annual performance goal & KPI setting and performance review as nothing more than some HR-given activities, and they only pay attention to these when they receive email reminders from HR about these activities - in the early of the year, mid-year, and year-end.

It's hard to know how well you are performing in your job if you don't track it against the pre-agreed KPI targets and results.

When we don't track our work performance, it's very likely that we end up always rushing to get our job done at the last minute, with stress and long hours of working past office hours.

The problem is that, when you miss a job or project deadline, your failure to fulfill your job expectations & performance targets doesn't end with the year, but compounds up to scar your performance record throughout your career life in that particular company.

Mistake 2: Not being okay with your boss

Symptoms:

• You have an unresolved conflict with your boss.

• You think your boss doesn't like you and is not happy with most of the things you do or say.

I remember how dreadful my working days were when I was not okay with my boss.

You see, in my most recent career risk assessment, "Bad relationship with the boss" still rated HIGH in jeopardizing job performance.

What that means is, if you do not nurture a peaceful, supportive, and synergized working relationship with your boss, you most probably are not yet performing at your best potential at work.

The good news is, you can achieve so much more this year by just strengthening your rapport with your boss. So what can a strong rapport with your boss do for you?

• Can it make your boss give you fewer irrelevant side projects? Yes!

• Can it make your boss pay more attention to your contributions? Yes!

• Can it make your boss treat you more respectfully? Yes!

• Can it make your boss be more supportive of your career growth? Yes!

If you do nothing about your current relationship with your boss now, then all these will probably just remain as dreams for at least another year.

So don't delay any longer. You don't have to struggle like this at work for even another week. Don't lose your most valuable career sponsor.

Mistake 3: Not driving your capability development

Symptoms:

• You don't know the gap in your capability and technical skills.

• You wait for your boss to offer you when there is a job promotion opportunity.

Whenever I met young professionals who told me that they haven't been promoted from the same job grade for longer than 3 years, I would ask them why not.

Almost all of them would give me answers like, "I don't know, my boss hasn't mentioned it."

Because your boss is probably working hard on getting their own salary raise, too!

No one would care as much about your job promotion or salary raise as you do, so why expect anyone else to want to fight for your career growth when you yourself are not driving it?

Most people will just be waiting for their boss or HR to hand them a job promotion offer or career growth opportunity. Be more proactive and self-driven from now on, and you will stand out from among them.

Nothing excites and inspires a coach more than a self-driven coachee.

Have you made any of these top 3 common Career Killer Mistakes yourself?

If yes, then you'll really appreciate the next part where I will outline the 7 key Promotion Levers, with real-life examples so that you can visualize how to apply them in your situation and accelerate your career growth and job promotion.

This part is available in the complete Advanced Promo Checklist that is accessible to all Niecristal members. Log In to read or Sign Up to access the full content along with other member-exclusive resources.