CONGRATULATIONS. You have got the promotion – more money, sexy job title, good prospects. Yet what do you need to do to ensure you get noticed, to start the long and difficult climb up the greasy pole? What should you do in the first 100 days or the first year? Here are the seven steps to the stars.

Know the corporate culture. This is about understanding and following the unwritten rules and etiquette of the workplace. It’s best to start with someone telling you the history of the organisation. Equally important is hearing the stories, sagas and myths about past and present managers.

The culture dictates everything: timekeeping, dress sense, politically correct terminology, and who holds the power. Watch and copy; act fascinated about what is going on; hover around the coffee machine; accept invitations for a drink after work. Remember you are an anthropologist with a lost tribe.

Explore expectations. Observe and listen to understand what is said about the vision and values. Be very receptive when given feedback of any sort. Find out what they expect of you or your role that was not said at the interview or in the advertisement.

Listen carefully when the brand is discussed and any future strategy is mentioned. Don’t be afraid to make the odd point; it shows you are listening and have your own mind. But be upbeat and positive – show you are committed.

Do serious networking. You need a map of who’s who; who holds power and influence; and who will be most useful to you. Job titles are poor indicators. Start mapping your environment; it is called social network analysis but all you need is a good eye and ear.

Use those “elevator” and “water-cooler” moments to introduce yourself. Build relationships by finding out what you have in common with people and how you might be able to help them. Accept all social invitations.

Start an early strategic plan. Think carefully about what you can offer. Get below the surface in terms of how the organisation runs – what is really important and what is not.

Note the people who might aid or block your promotion. Find out how long it usually takes to move up and what sort of things help that process. Think about where you best fit in. And beware a hostile element; you may not be uniformly welcomed and you may be subject to jealousy and resentment if your predecessor was much loved or your colleagues were passed over for your job. Be alert to those who try to bend your ear to their backstabbing or request your support for their pet projects. Their intentions may be sincere, but the consequences for you could be damaging.

Make priorities and stick to them. Be sure you understand what really is important and what is not. All the old maxims are true – “Don’t sweat the small stuff”, “Beware the tyranny of the urgent”. Understand the core of your job and the important current projects. You want early wins and publicity for them. You need visibility and to be regarded as someone who brings value to the organisation. You want to be seen as a good selection decision – a person with focus and ability.

Work on your team. Get to know your workers as individuals, but also manage team morale and spirit. Listen to them and tell them your story. In the early days, be very available. Recognise their expertise and what they like about the organisation.

Don’t be frightened of conflict, and start having short meetings with a clear agenda. Don’t rely too much on past experience or stories. Try to get the “tough but fair” reputation rather than just warm and supportive. Find out who is most influential and who you can trust the most.

Be upbeat, energetic and positive it all times. This can be quite tough as all that new learning is exhausting. You will need to protect yourself with some private time, so that you can appear calm under stress.

So what do the “grown-ups” want from you? They want three things. First, they are looking for a good communicator. Can you be assertive without being ‘rude or arrogant? Can you persuade people with clear arguments? Are you sociable and able to form and maintain healthy relationships? Can you manage up, down and out?

Second, do you have energy and drive? This means getting things done, being proactive, being determined to improve performance. It means being fit, positive and up for anything. It means the “can do” attitude – the real desire to improve things, and the competitiveness to be successful.

Third, they want a strategic thinker. Do you understand the business? Have you “mastered the brief’? Are you “on side” and someone who can, in due course, sit at the “top table”?

Reproduced with permission: Adrian Furnham, Professor of Psychology, University College London

It’s 2025. Do you still need a resumé? The surprising answer is “yes,” even for CEOs and board members. While digital bios are great, they do not take the place of a document that clearly communicates your career accomplishments and potential. Rarely do people put detailed metrics into their online profiles, and the medium still matters for controlling how your information is absorbed and emphasized. As an executive recruiter and leadership adviser, I have seen my fair share of resumés. The best ones are not laundry lists of completed tasks, but ones that tell the story about who you are as a leader. Here are some tips to help ensure yours fully reflects your personal brand:

1. Don’t just refresh. When updating their resumés, most people just dust off the last one they have (whether it was written two years ago or 20) and add whatever they have done since the document was last saved. Have you ever seen a house that has a lot of additions and nothing quite feels right? That’s what happens when approaching your resumé this way.

Instead, start at the beginning and write down everything you can think of. This “kitchen sink” document should include anything that was hard to do, had an impact or defines you as a leader. This isn’t your new resumé — it’s a starting point.

2. Aim for the Goldilocks balance. It can be a challenge to strike the “just right” balance of too few (e.g., deleting whole decades) and too many details, especially for highly accomplished executives. The goal is to convey not only your expertise, but indicate your potential to succeed in the next role.

I often read resumés where someone will write “CEO/GM/President” as their aspiration in the summary and then include bullets like “managed facilities procurement for five sites” in their experience. That might have been the most fulfilling aspect of the job and been an enormous area of accomplishment, but it is unlikely to be relevant for a CEO role. Therefore, I always suggest people do the following:

Take your “kitchen sink” document of raw material and sort it into the following 2×2:

Highlight the most relevant and impactful items first, and then add in other accomplishments. Remember that as an executive recruiter, I am trying to establish first whether you can do a specific job, and then I am trying to figure out if you are an amazing person/leader. You might have won an Olympic medal, and that shows enormous talent, grit and hard work, but without some relevant experience, it alone will not land you an executive job.

In addition, balance the ratio of impressive feats to those that are most relevant for what you want to do next. Include details on the scale of your work and success metrics that show the reader you will be able to perform well in this new role. The scale and scope of your oversight and highlights of your accomplishments are helpful, especially if talking to private investors who care more about EBITDA and not just revenue.

3. Add in “the what” and “the how.” Context and culture are often neglected in résumés, but are critical in painting the full picture of your leadership experience. Admittedly, it is legitimately hard to add context to resumés, but I always love it when someone unpacks even a little bit of a story around an accomplishment. Compare these resumé bullets:

• Re-energized the management team and employee base with significant double-digit improvement in engagement scores, and dramatically reduced employee turnover.

vs.

• Re-energized the management team and employee base after three years of cost-cutting and layoffs. Aligned the management team around a new strategic plan; reduced silos; de-layered the organization; introduced a regular cascading communication plan and promoted an executive to lead internal communications; worked with HR to develop clear performance metrics to outline accountability for every employee; and introduced regular engagement surveys and “any question is fair game” employee forums. Achieved double-digit improvements in engagement and retention — and promoted a cultural shift toward enjoyment and learning so that everyone had a lot of fun along the way.

And:

• Restructured company debt because the balance sheet was over-leveraged.

vs.

• Restructured company debt to provide the runway to complete the cloud services transformation; created long-term equity value because the balance sheet was over-leveraged. Worked closely with the board and finance team to develop options, and aligned stakeholders around the successful option.

Which candidate do you feel like you understand better? Who would you rather work with? Whether it is the context of the situation, the culture of the organization or the steps you took to achieve an outcome, these nuances can help someone understand who you are and what you can do for them.

Dos and don’ts:

• Skip the long cover letter. Many still write these and most people don’t read them. Spend the time either getting a warm introduction or writing something short, punchy and data-oriented vs. a long, philosophical narrative.
• Write a compelling introductory paragraph. Most people I know who read resumés often skip this section entirely. However, they can be important when they truly are a high-level executive summary of you. A summary filled with aspirational comments about what you want to do (but haven’t) or adjectives like “risk-taking” or “results-oriented change agent” makes me want to learn more.
• Don’t shrink the font to fit on one page. If what you are writing is impactful, relevant and tells a story, add a page … or two!
• Dedicate more space to more significant roles. Is the airtime you’re giving a role proportionate with the time you spent in it? The description of a role you had for 12 years should be longer than one you held for 12 months.
• Use keywords that are common in the marketplace. If you are looking for a more technical leadership role, incorporate terms that will be captured by automatic screening or anyone searching for someone with a specific type of experience (e.g., e-commerce).

4. Don’t assume people know what you mean. One of the biggest assumptions people make in a resumé is that other people will understand the technical or company-specific terms they are using. Terms or language that are not universally understood can be cause for confusion. I find it helpful when someone adds a very brief description of the company, its ownership structure and the essential responsibilities of the job — unless you are the CEO, the scope for top functional roles like CFO and CMO can be quite varied.

Then take a copy of your newly edited resumé to a friend or family member. It should be someone who isn’t in your industry or function but has some general understanding of business — and above all, who will be completely honest with you. Then go (somewhat painfully) bullet by bullet and ask them what each one means to them. I will warn you that people will not want to admit when they have no idea what certain acronyms mean, but trust me when I tell you phrases like “Ran a transformational PMO to manage OKRs to reduce churn and 8x TTM” are not universally known terms. From abbreviations to specialized industry terms to company-specific names for divisions, stick to basics.

5. Who are you anyhow? Usually when we begin our careers, we have a lot of extracurricular achievements on our resumé. Over time, usually to cram everything on to a single page and appear more professional, we lose a lot of these experiences. If you feel comfortable sharing more about who you are and what motivates you, please do. Especially in a first conversation, these tidbits can break the ice and tell a story about who you are. As I said earlier, winning an Olympic medal won’t get you the career gold, but it sure does help me understand more about you as a person.

One final note: Many people don’t realize that the process of updating their resumé can be just as valuable as the end product. Rarely do we have time to take an inventory of our careers. Updating your resumé offers an opportunity to reflect on what you’ve learned and accomplished — and, most importantly, what makes your leadership story unique.

Jason Baumgarten helps organizations across industries to find and assess CEOs who drive results and inspire senior leadership teams to perform at the highest levels. He also works with boards on director recruitment, CEO succession and identifying next-generation leadership.

Life is short but it’s the only thing you’ll ever do. You get one shot. When reflecting on life in old age, many people’s memories are full of regret. To make the most of your life – of which over 30% is spent at work – it may be possible to activate your best self more often.

The 1.7 million employees, in 101 companies from 63 countries, in Gallup’s database were asked the question: at work, do you have the opportunity to do your best every day? The results were humanistically appalling. Just 20% said they had the opportunity to be their best. In fact, the data showed that as people reach higher levels of seniority and responsibility, they’re less likely to do work that plays to their strengths. Many leaders feel trapped in work that isn’t meaningful to them, to make money to buy things they don’t need, to impress people they don’t even like.

Put into perspective, the average person feels unfulfilled for 72,000 of the 90,000 hours they spend at work over their lifetime. Add to the mix 13 million lost working days in the UK caused by stress-related illnesses and you begin to see the problem for people and the organisations they work for.

There’s a growing body of research to show that best-self activation can improve people’s emotions, physiology, cognitive functioning, and relationships. When people are affirmed and feel better about themselves, they’re more resilient to stress and more resistant to disease. People become better at creative problem solving, performing under pressure, and they’re more likely to form stronger long-term relationships with their employers.

What is the self?

Psychologist William James said that the self is the source of wilful action because “connecting an idea or an action with the self implies making it self-relevant, moving it from the vague, the global, or the abstract to the personal, the individual, or the concrete”. It means that the self isn’t a “fluffy feeling”: linking an action to the self increases the chance of change occurring and sustaining.

Here’s the sweet spot. I believe that the competitive organisation of the future is one that builds a partnership with people and unlocks their human potential in a way that goes beyond the immediate job or even the organization. What are the benefits to organisations when they create environments in which employees can be their best? My research, co-authored by Francesca Gino (Harvard Business School) and Bradley R. Staats (University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill) with Wipro BPO, a business process outsourcing company in Bangalore, India, revealed telling insights.

The organisational benefits of best-self activation

Wipro, which provides telephone and online chat support to companies like HP, had a quitting problem. Imagine hiring all of your staff from scratch approximately every 18 months. That’s what Wipro was dealing with back in 2011. How can a company expect to delight its customers if it’s continually training new workers?

Wipro’s onboarding process was typical of many organisations we see today: it focused on job processes. For example, employees learned about the products they needed to support, and they received voice training to ‘westernise’ their voices. So our study looked at what happened to performance and retention when new employees were offered an alternative approach on their first day at work. As well as measuring a control group that received the normal introduction, we implemented two methods:

Organisational identity – where organisational values were emphasised. Afterwards, employees were asked to discuss which values made them proud to be part of Wipro

Personal identity – where new employees were asked to reflect on and then discuss who they are when they are at their best.

After six months, the results showed that when the organisation focused its initial welcome on new employees’ personal identities, the newcomers were much less likely to quit their jobs – 57% less than the control group — and there was statistically greater customer satisfaction.

Asking “who are you when you’re at your best?” takes one hour, and it’s free. Why does it work so effectively? When people alter their unique values to fit into an organisational culture, they can suffer from identity conflict. When people are empowered to express their authentic best selves, they are less anxious and less likely to suffer from exhaustion. Employees who are stressed and unwell are less likely to perform effectively and more likely to quit. Meanwhile, the customers they serve are also dissatisfied. When people activate their best selves, they bring more energy into the workplace and invest more in the company they work for.

Physiological, creative and performance benefits

Best-self activation has the ability to change the narrative that employees develop about work and about them. The study with Wipro, combined with many other studies, shows that best-self intervention has lasting personal and organisational benefits.

So if it’s so good, why have societies and organisations not excavated routes for telling others when they’re at their best? Why is it so hard, and so rare, to tell someone about the times they make their best impact? Despite the benefits, we save the best stories about people until they’re dead, which we call a “Eulogy.” Wouldn’t you like to hear a description of your best self from people you love before you die?

When others tell us who we are at our best, it creates a chemical chain reaction of positivity. You might feel positive emotions like joy, enthusiasm, excitement, pride, awe, inspiration, and compassion. I’m fascinated by how these positive experiences and emotions can change who we become, and how we act. New research published in top Science journals shows that positive emotions change the very way our cells perform to keep us healthy.

A body of data is beginning to suggest that when people’s signature strengths and extraordinary contributions are made more salient:

• Their physiology changes for the better
• Creative problem solving improves
• Their ability to perform under pressure increases
• Social relationships become more effective

According to the psychologist Barbara Fredrickson, positive emotions not only feel good but build people’s resources for survival – known as the ‘broaden and build’ theory. When we broaden our minds, we’re more likely to experience an undoing effect, so that positive emotions wipe out the negative effects of stress. This means that when organisations invest in activating the best selves of their workers, people are healthier, happier and more efficient. In reverse, if you’re making your team unhappy, you’re making them unwell.

A staggering 40% of employees at work say their job is “very or extremely stressful”. Physiologically, best-self activation can undo the cardiovascular responses associated with stress and therefore increase people’s resilience and performance under stress.

So improving performance doesn’t start with a focus on people’s weaknesses. Psychological threat and fear doesn’t spark innovation. Highlighting people at their very best could be just the competitive advantage your organisation needs.

There are many questions to answer. For example, if we only bring our best selves to work, is it possible to overuse it, so that it becomes brittle? Are there ethical issues with organisations commoditising employees’ best selves? But, I believe that companies should be in the business of unlocking human potential, and helping employees understand who they are when they are at their best so they can be their best selves more often.

Reproduced with permission:  Dan Cable June 2016

Dan Cable is a Professor of Organizational Behaviour at London Business School. He is a two-time winner of the “Best Article in Organizational Behavior” from the Academy of Management and author of  ‘Alive at work: The Neuroscience of Helping Your People Love What They Do.’ Published by Harvard Business Review Press  ISBN: 9781633694255

However, writing in CBI’s Business Voice, Benoit Becar, Head of Practice at Carmichael Fisher offers some hints for those that want to make it to the top. Benoit argues, ‘becoming a visionary leader requires crossing the Rubicon. It’s about taking that leap from being an excellent and productive employee to inspiring teams, impressing senior colleagues, and moulding the future.’ As this resonates well with the advice we often share, we sought Benoit’s permission to repeat the remainder of his article here:

1. Being willing to step off the well-trodden career path

Doing something just because it’s the traditional way of progressing a career is not the way to become a modern leader. Often, these well-establish paths don’t give you the tools required to become the leader modern organisations need.

Becoming a leader isn’t something which can be bolted on. Authentic leaders need to understand themselves and their motivations. Understanding why you want to become a leader and what you can offer is the starting point for an important journey.

2. Being unafraid to fail

Albert Einstein said: “Imagination is more important than knowledge. Knowledge is limited. Imagination encircles the world.” He also said: “A person who never made a mistake never tried anything new.”

The fear of failure leads to us staying within our comfort zones. And the tendency to measure ourselves by what other people think can encourage a conservative attitude.

Anyone wanting to move to the next level needs to overcome a fear of risk. They need to be able to see things from different perspectives, to think laterally to solve problems, and to have an in-built resilience. They need to go the extra mile and take calculated risks.

Developing a growth mindset is an important part of leadership. The idea was first established by world-renowned Stanford University professor of psychology, Carol Dweck. And people with a growth mindset see every decision as either a potential success or an opportunity for learning. There is no failure. They also believe talent can be enhanced by hard work and practise. A growth mindset encourages the resilience and problem-solving organisations need from their leaders.

3. Developing sound judgement

The ability to weigh up a situation quickly, to think through the consequences of potential actions, and to have the confidence to take calculated risks is much sought-after among leaders. It’s not acting on intuition, but it is quickly assessing problems and opportunities. It’s also the ability to understand not everything has to be solved by one person. Understanding your own strengths and weaknesses, and those of the people around you, will assist you in building an effective team and finding creative solutions. A reputation for sound judgement will get you noticed.

4. Creating and maintaining your personal brand

In the UK, we avoid “blowing our own trumpets” at all costs. But creating a personal brand is vital for leaders. It’s so important to show and share our knowledge and expertise.

There are ways of doing this without seeming arrogant. One of the key ways is to help the people around you rise by sharing your skills and expertise. That way, as they rise, you rise.

Communication is an important part of this process. Being an excellent link in a chain of internal communication helps to inspire your team, gives confidence to your senior managers, and impresses your peers without the need to shout about your achievements.

Leaders understand that succeeding isn’t just about what you know, who you know, or even who knows you. It’s about the work for which you’re known.

5. Developing Emotional Intelligence (EI)

Psychologist Daniel Goleman’s 1998 article ‘What Makes a Leader?’ stressed that all effective leaders have one thing in common: a high level of EI. Without it, a person with technical prowess, creative ideas, and analytical skills, would remain an excellent and valuable member of staff but they would not be a great leader.

There are five basic planks of EI: empathy for others, self-awareness, social skills in building and managing relationships, self-regulation, and a passion for the work itself – something which is not tied up in status or money. Developing these soft skills are the most important thing anyone can do to become an authentic and effective leader.

In a competitive field, excellence in communication and emotional intelligence will set you apart from the rest of the field. People such as Bill Gates and Steve Jobs, people who can see beyond the traditional, transactional method of leadership with empathy and vision, set the gold standard. In my experience, I have found it is extremely hard to come by these skills.

In essence, anyone who wants to lead effectively must inspire, engage, and develop the people around them.

Author: Benoit Becar, Head of Practice at Carmichael Fisher, Executive Search, Talent Acquisition and Management Consulting EMEA & US

Reproduced with permission:

Click to visit:  Carmichael Fisher

When thinking about how to develop in our careers, most of us tend to focus on promotions, projects, courses, certifications. We seek out expanded roles, more senior titles, extra money. We overlook one very key piece of the learning puzzle:  proactively surrounding ourselves with people who will push us to succeed in unexpected ways and, in so doing, build genuinely rich, purposeful lives of growth, excellence, and impact.

Back in the 1990s, when I was working full-time as a partner in our executive search firm, I pursued one such friend—a leading researcher and writer—and cultivated the relationship for several years. And then, in 1998, during a walk along the Charles River in Cambridge, he surprised me with a challenge. He suggested that, in addition to my client practice and internal leadership roles at Egon Zehnder, I could find even more meaning (and have a larger reach) by using my knowledge of and passion for talent-spotting and development to also become a writer, teacher, and public speaker.  I took his advice, and it has drastically changed my life, both professionally and personally.

We typically spend at least two decades in our formal education and, in developed countries, hundreds of thousands of dollars. We carefully choose our places of employment and invest significant time and effort in training within them.  However, few of us engage in a deliberate, determined search for those wise individuals who, through their inspiration and advice, can literally make us new.

My dynamic circle of advisers and confidantes has included, in addition to my wife María and my Charles River friend, several other academics in the United States, an undergraduate professor in Argentina, a McKinsey director in Spain, and colleagues working in Egon Zehnder offices across the Americas, Europe, and Asia.  They have, throughout my career, successively inspired me into different possibilities I would never had envisioned, from teaching statistics to applying for an MBA, from becoming a strategic consultant to spending three decades and taking on global leadership roles in executive search, from publishing books to teaching executives at Harvard.

They have been companions on my journey, offering honest feedback, helping me to discover new identities and pushing me to become a highly different yet significantly better version of myself.  How can you find a similar group? The following guidelines should help:

Think about the people who inspire you.  These can be teachers of certain disciplines; inventors; entrepreneurs; business, social, or public leaders.  I have always been moved and inspired by specific people, not just abstract professions.  I “met” them originally in many cases by reading their work or about them, but also via social media and at conferences.

Don’t be afraid to chase.  Conferences are a great place to get inspired, approach, and start a relationship with some of the people you’ve identified.  Likewise, contacting even top academics is usually much easier than you think. Other cases may require a much more determined investment. For example, I flew back and forth from Buenos Aires to a little town in Massachusetts just to meet my Charles River friend. While this double red-eye may sound excessive, think how little time commitment it was compared to what we invest in our education, or to the opportunity cost and frustration of a poor career choice or wrong job decision.

Aim for a mix of people inside and outside your organization.  Lots of healthy change can and should ideally happen within your own company.  However, external contacts can potentially have the benefit of greater independence, a broader perspective with radically new horizons, as well as potential connections across both worlds which will benefit everyone.

Be candid about the reason for your interest.  Most truly great people live their lives with genuine passion and want to expand their missions.  Most times, they will be delighted to both inspire you and help you see how to close the gap between dream and reality.

Ask them specifically about how to get started.  After suggesting my new potential persona, my Charles River friend gave me some invaluable advice about what I had to do.  He said to me: “You need three Cs:  capability, which you have; connectivity, which at least initially you can do through the global network of your firm; and credibility, which you don’t have yet.  In order to achieve it, you need to publish a great article in a credible magazine and ideally a book.”  He then put me in touch with a senior editor at HBR, with whom I worked to make that first article happen.

Proactively offer them help.  These great companions who lead us to greater lives deserve our very best.  I have always offered them that, with no strings attached.  That included becoming a pro bono assistant professor, conducting intensive research for a full year for someone’s new book, becoming the critical reader of a best-selling author, and much more.  And whenever I get a message from them, I drop everything I’m doing and respond right away.  I have constantly done this out of gratitude but, as always, I also gained in the form of more learning, opportunities, and deeper friendships.

Have crucial conversations in the right settings.  Meeting face-to-face with no distractions will help you reach a level of intimacy which simply can’t achieve remotely.  I would add that many of my life-changing moments have occurred while walking with my trusted friends in beautiful surroundings – whether by a river, in the countryside, on the beach, along a snow-covered mountain, or across peaceful villages.  One of my Egon Zehnder colleagues and I have done this in more than 30 different parts of the world.  The combination of exercise and nature makes me particularly energetic, enthusiastic and positive – and therefore more willing to consider new possibilities.

Don’t hesitate to ask the truly big questions.  What shall I do with my life?  What really motivates me?  What am I doing that I really don’t like to do?  While pondering these questions, in addition to checking my capability, connectivity and credibility, I also engage my friends in conversation about three other Cs:  contemplation (Am I in touch with my inner compass?), compassion (Do I show it for myself and others?), and companions (Who else might inspire me to new growth?)

Proactively seeking out and cultivating those who will help us become better versions of ourselves is, by a wide margin, the key for living a truly happy and meaningful life. I sincerely hope these guidelines help you.

Claudio Fernández-Aráoz is a senior adviser at the global executive search firm Egon Zehnder, an executive fellow at Harvard Business School, and the author of It’s Not the How or the What but the Who (Harvard Business Review Press, 2014).

In Impression (Mis) Management When Communicating Success, published in Basic and Applied Social Psychology, Dr Janina Steinmetz investigated how people attribute their success on dates and job interviews, and how well these attributions went down with their audiences.

She found that success alone may not be enough to make a positive impression. Instead, she suggests that people should talk about the struggle behind their story to appear more likeable.

Dr Steinmetz conducted three experiments with participants from the United States and the Netherlands, with people from all age ranges (18-75) and with an even gender balance between male and female. Two of the experiments emulated job interviews (using working adults) and one emulated a date (using students). Participants were asked to imagine themselves in the role of the impression manager (interviewee or ‘sharer’ on a date) or the receiver (interviewer or ‘listener’ on a date).

The ‘impression manager’ was asked to speak about themselves in in a positive way and feedback was given by the receiver detailing what they wanted to hear more about – the talent and success, or the hard work and effort behind it.

All three experiments found the impression managers over-emphasised their talents and successes and did not share the effort and hard work behind them – something that the receivers wanted to hear about.

It was clear from the study that communicating success and talent in job interviews or on dates is important but it is just as important to tell the story of the hard work and effort behind it to create a warmer, positive, more relatable first impression.

Dr Steinmetz says “A success story isn’t complete without the hard work and explanation of why we were successful. Did the success come easy, thanks to one’s talents, or was it attained through hard work? Both of these attributions can be part of successful self-promotion, but my research shows that emphasising effort is more likely to garner a positive impression and people really want to know the story behind your success.”

“For example, if you’re on a date and talking about a marathon that you recently ran, perhaps talk about all the training that helped you to cross the finish line. Or, if you’re in a job interview and are talking about a successful project that you led to completion, include a few details about the challenges along the way, and how you overcame them.”

The full paper can be downloaded at Basic and Applied Social Psychology

Reproduced with permission: Dr Janina Steinmetz – Cass Business School

Where you’re going is far more interesting to your next boss than where you’ve been.

Too many job candidates, though, focus on the rearview mirror, describing every detail of everything they ever did. As a CEO who has interviewed countless people, I can tell you that your next boss (whether in your current employer or a new organization) is most interested in your contribution to the journey ahead.

Here are the 5 things you must do to ace your next job interview.

Accomplishments, Not Activities: No one wants to know your job description. The hiring manager you’re meeting with (who probably scanned your resume for less than a minute) doesn’t want to hear about your day-to-day activities. Accomplishments, though, speak volumes not only about what you’ve done, but most important about what you bring to your new job. Prepare and rehearse specific examples and tell a brief story that shows how you’ve made a difference to your company and the customers it serves.

What Gets You Up in the Morning? Of all the qualities I’m looking for, motivation tops the list. I want to know what gets people excited about their work—their passion and hunger to make a difference. I can also tell you that most leaders aren’t looking for the smartest people. (A study found that those with the highest IQs aren’t necessarily the best hires, especially for a leadership position.) Rather, they are looking for savviness, culture fit, and authenticity. So ask yourself: what gets you up in the morning? Be able to showcase your motivation by talking about what you’re passionate about.

Connectivity-Master the Small Talk: When I interview someone, I always meet the candidate in the lobby or reception area, then take the person into the office kitchen. It’s not about getting coffee or water. I want to start in a familiar environment to help people relax so they can be themselves. (In an interview, authenticity rules!) We might stay there for ten minutes making conversation, but never about work. We’re getting to know each other, establishing rapport and connectivity. Whether your next interview includes a “kitchen chat” or you spend a minute or two with a “getting to know you question,” you need to be a master of small talk. Be comfortable giving short responses (30 seconds, maximum) about where you’re from or your family (which can mean anything from family of origin to your children). And, don’t be afraid to ask the same questions of the interviewer (although never “go personal” until the interviewer does). This give-and-take shows your comfort and confidence and sets the tone for a successful conversational interview. An interview, after all, is not a pop quiz—it’s a conversation between two people.

Know the Company and the Position: One of my favorite questions to ask early in the interview is, “So, tell me what you know about our company and the position you’re seeking?” It’s astounding how many people can’t give a straight answer to this one. You’ve got to prepare—read the company’s website, press announcements, earnings announcements (if the company is publicly traded), and analyst reports on the company or industry. Look up the LinkedIn profile of the person you’re meeting. You might find an interesting connection, e.g. having the same alma mater, a shared passion for sports or a social cause, or other common ground. (But don’t fake it—you can’t “pretend” that you belonged to the same fraternity/sorority and know the “secret handshake.”) Bottom line—do your homework!

Culture Fit: The more senior the position being filled, the more the interviewer will emphasize culture fit. Technical skills at a senior level are assumed—it’s all about fitting in and being able to lead and motivate others. Culture fit matters at more junior levels as well. Studies show that nearly half (46 percent) of new hires fail within the first 18 months, largely because of cultural incompatibility. Understand what suits you best, from your ideal work environment to the type of boss you want to work for and learn from. The more you know about yourself, the better you can demonstrate fit to your prospective employer.

No, you can’t drive the interview. But with these five must-do tips you’ll be able to help steer the conversation to showcase your savviness, your hunger and drive, how well you fit with the culture, and your authenticity. You’ll navigate forward to what you bring to this new job, instead of staring in the rear view mirror.

A version of this article appears on Forbes.com. Jan 02 2019

Over the past year we have been writing the HBR Leader’s Handbook — a primer for aspiring leaders who want to take their careers to the next level. As part of our research for the book, we interviewed over 40 successful leaders of large corporations, startups, and non-profits to get their views about what it takes to become a leader. We also explored several decades of research on that subject published in HBR; and we reflected on our own experience in the area of leadership development.

Our research and experience have shown us that the best way to develop proficiency in leadership is not just through reading books and going to training courses, but even more through real experience and continual practice.

Take the case of Dominic Barton, who served as the Global Managing Director of McKinsey & Company from 2009-2018. In an interview with us, reflecting back on his own development as a leader, he didn’t cite education programs or books he had read, but rather described several “learn-by-doing” experiences that would shape his successful career.

As the office leader of McKinsey Korea, for example, he realized he had “a small playground to… try new stuff” — and against all advice of local colleagues to be cautious and follow cultural norms, started writing a provocative newspaper column that challenged traditional ways of working among local businesses as their markets continued to globalize. “I took a risk, and it helped put us on the map, as never before.” His tenure in Korea also taught him that he was better at some things than others: “My performance evaluator used to beat me up regularly during those days, because I was better at opening up new initiatives than bringing them to completion. When I later became head of McKinsey Asia, he helped me see that I had to hire a solid COO to work with me—which substantially increased my leadership effectiveness in that bigger role.”

Our research also pointed to six leadership skills where practice was particularly important. These are not mysterious and certainly aren’t new. However, the leaders we talked with emphasized that these fundamental skills really matter. Aspiring leaders should focus on practicing these essential basics:

• Shape a vision that is exciting and challenging for your team (or division/unit/organization).
• Translate that vision into a clear strategy about what actions to take, and what not to do.
• Recruit, develop, and reward a team of great people to carry out the strategy.
• Focus on measurable results.
• Foster innovation and learning to sustain your team (or organization) and grow new leaders.
• Lead yourself — know yourself, improve yourself, and manage the appropriate balance in your own life.

No matter where you are in your career, you can find opportunities to practice these six skills. You’ll have varying degrees of success, which is normal. But by reflecting on your successes and failures at every step, and getting feedback from colleagues and mentors, you’ll keep making positive adjustments and find more opportunities to learn. Research by Francesca Gino and Bradley Staats published in HBR shows how important this reflection can be to your improvement: they found that workers were able to improve their own performance by 20% after spending 15 minutes at the end of each day writing reflections on what they did well, what they did wrong, and their lessons learned. Leaders often have a bias for action that keeps them from stepping back in this way — but it is the reflection on your practice that will help you improve.

Don’t wait for learning opportunities to be handed to you. Seek them out and volunteer to take them on.  And if you don’t see the opportunities in your own organization, find them outside your professional work in a community group, a non-profit, or a religious organization, which are often hungry for leaders to step in and step up. For example, Wharton’s Stew Friedman has described how one young manager who aspired to become a CEO joined a city-based community board, which allowed him to hone his leadership skills; three years later, he was on a formal succession track for CEO.

Eventually, as you progress, you’ll reach a level of capability in these areas such that you’ll start seeing results: you’ll successfully make things happen through the people who work for you on your team or in your division. As you succeed, these results will begin to build upon one another—you’ll oversee a new product that becomes a runaway hit or take charge of a transformational initiative that redefines a major market. More and more people will want to sign up and work with you. Clients or customers will ask for you by name. You’ll be invited to represent the company at major industry conferences. Whether you use this momentum to guide a new initiative or to start your own company, you’ll have begun to truly deliver major impact. You’ll have become a leader, capable of rallying an organization of people around a meaningful collective goal and delivering the results to reach it.

This article was co-authored by Ron Ashkenas and Brook Manville and originally appeared in Harvard Business Review Oct 2018.  To download a copy, click here:  Harvard Business Review: The 6 fundamental skills every leader should practice – Oct 2018

Ron Ashkenas is a coauthor of the Harvard Business Review Leader’s Handbook and a Partner Emeritus at Schaffer Consulting. His previous books include The Boundaryless Organization, The GE Work-Out, and Simply Effective.

Brook Manville is a coauthor of the Harvard Business Review Leader’s Handbook and Principal of Brook Manville LLC, a consultancy in strategy, organization and leadership development. His previous Harvard Business Review Press books are Judgment Calls and A Company of Citizens. He also blogs about leadership at Forbes.com.

In the article below, Members of Forbes Magazine Human Resources Council share their views on how the development of leadership skills  can be encouraged and supported within any business.

1. Share Resources And Be A Role Model 

Offering incentives for leadership development and setting an example as a leader yourself are both great ways to get employees excited about continually developing their leadership skills. Managers can also regularly share articles and courses available in leadership development, and encourage team members to share their experiences and struggles as leaders to prompt valuable group discussion.- Laura Spawn, Virtual Vocations, Inc.

2. Enable Continuous Feedback And Inclusivity 

I think that continuous feedback and learning where their weak areas are is important. Make sure your leaders know that you want them to continue to grow with the company and that their growth is important to you. Give them the opportunity to introduce ideas or take courses they feel will help them be better leaders, and also include them in discussions to show their opinions are valued. – Tracey Ellisson, Hilton Software

3. Provide A Path and Timeline

Many job seekers prioritize leadership development in their career, and employers that show a clear path to advancement will score higher in talent attraction and employee retention. Once dedicated and skilled employees are identified, employers should be able to show what steps are necessary to advance and reach their professional goals, and approximately how long is required to do so. – John Feldmann, Inspirity.

4. Hire Great Leaders 

Supporting leadership development requires having great leaders in place at all levels of the organization. It needs to be part of the culture and happen organically. Leaders should be evaluated on how they develop their teams, support continuous growth and recognize others for contributions. Provide access to external coaches to personalize leadership development and reinforce its importance. – Shelli Nelson, Madison Industries

5. Create A Coaching Culture

Many organizations build formal leadership development programs largely aimed at future-proofing their organization. More than formal programs, people need inspiring and knowledgeable coaches at every level. Giving opportunities to everyone to either be the coach or be coached creates a culture where knowledge is intended to be shared and feedback has a real impact on performance. – Kerri Higgins Bigelow, LivingHR Inc

6.Give Opportunities To Lead 

One of the best ways to encourage leadership at every level is to give everyone permission to lead. Once you’ve communicated your desire that all employees should feel comfortable leading, managers can start creating opportunities within teams to place individuals in a position of leadership. That can come in many forms such as leading a meeting, a presentation, a project or a team. – Charles Ashworth, Zendrive

7. Demystify Leadership 

Leadership is not a title, but a responsibility we all have. Hierarchy is needed, but it should be clear that we’re all leaders at any level. Leadership development can be mapped out in leading self, leading others and leading the business. When leadership is a foundation versus the mountain top, we can create a culture where employees are given leadership development at every phase of their careers. – Candice McGlen, The Rinker Group

8. Value Continuous Personal Learning  

Continuous personal learning is imperative for success of employees at all levels, who now balance role-specific expertise and industry and global economic knowledge to compete in today’s market. Set development goals, increase focus on personalized coaching and feedback, consider projects and stretch-assignments that improve resilience and the ability to lead through uncertainty. -  MJ Vigil, PEMCO Insurance

9. Give People Room To Fail 

Leadership requires an ability to inspire people and lead people toward a direction. Leadership is also a “learn by doing” activity, and as a leader developing other leaders, give them room to fail by providing them opportunities where they have to step up to the home plate. They may swing and miss. But you cannot hit a home run unless you have the opportunity to swing. – Srikant Chellappa, Engagedly

10. Define What ‘Good’ Looks Like 

Knowing how a company defines how a leader acts, thinks and values, within the context of the company’s culture, sets a foundation for productive leadership development at every level. A leader on the shop floor is different than a leader in the C-suite, but all leaders at a company should be aligned to what behaviors, mindsets and priorities will drive executing results for the organization. – Jessica Delorenzo, Kimball Electronics Inc

11. Focus On Proactive Commitment 

Utilize a variety of tools to engage employees at various levels: online resources, internships, mentorships, coaching, leadership development programs, informal support networks, books, conferences, professional associations, etc. Scout talent at every level and from all backgrounds. If personal betterment is part of your culture, leaders at every level should model and support this growth- Courtney Pace, FedEx Employees Credit Assoc.

Access the original article here: Forbes Expert Panel – 11 Ways To Encourage And Support Business Leadership Development

In the business world, with its time pressures, competitions and an ever-changing cast of people with whom you need to interact, human-to-human contacts are indeed precious. Each of our business interactions need to be conducted free of misunderstanding

In this age of reliance on impersonal devices, such as computers and the like, I submit that it is ever more important to make sure that what personal interaction is left is as effective, fruitful and rewarding as possible. If the number of your human-to-human interactions is to be reduced, then let’s make sure you get as much out of each one as you can.

In the business world, with its time pressures, competitions and an ever-changing cast of people with whom you need to interact, human-to-human contacts are indeed precious. Each of our business interactions need to be conducted free of misunderstanding and with as much read of your interlocutor as you can muster.

One of the ways you can accomplish this is by increasing your emotional intelligence, the higher level of which can be called “emotional wisdom.” Is there a difference between “emotional intelligence” and “emotional wisdom,” you might ask? I believe the difference is a matter of depth. Just as “wisdom” implies intelligence tempered by experience (rare is the individual who is born with it), so it is with “emotional wisdom.”

Achieving Emotional Wisdom

Increasing emotional wisdom takes place in two different stages: The first is understanding, and the second is adjusting.

• Understanding in this context means we understand and have integrated the fact that emotional wisdom is based on recognizing each of our emotions. We must not only understand that our emotions exist but also make that fact an integral part of our way of thinking.

• Adjusting means we logically and properly adjust our behavior based on a proper read of our emotions. For example, if we see that a particular approach is not working with a colleague, the emotionally wise person doesn’t continue trying the same failed inducements. Instead, they adjust and come up with a different and more effective way of addressing the matter.

The end result of going through these stages and the resulting “emotional wisdom” is, among other things, an improvement in decision-making effectiveness, as well as better human relations in general. The leader possessing emotional wisdom is the leader who not only possesses emotional intelligence but also has the experience, seasoning and ability to reflect. These are the hallmarks of the introspective individual. It is this type of leader who inspires others to follow and produce the best of which they are capable.

However, before attempting to implement these two stages, it would be helpful for you to be aware of the deep internal connection between your brain and your body, which makes it all possible. This means you also need to understand the difference between feelings and emotions.

Feelings Versus Emotions

While the brain, where emotions are produced, is, of course, located inside the skull, the feelings resulting from those emotions have their loci in several places in the body. Communication between the brain and those loci is carried out by the vagus nerve.

It is this connection between the brain (emotions) and the body (feelings) that allows you to feel frustrated, scared, abandoned or loved in different parts of our body, all of which has been confirmed by the National Academy of Sciences. Also, because different emotions have different intensities, the feelings resulting from those emotions also have different intensities. Researchers have developed an atlas of the human body to show where different emotions are felt.

The way it works is that outside stimuli (i.e., something you see, hear, taste, etc.) cause a response in the amygdala, a set of neurons in your brain that helps you process emotions, survival instincts, memories and motivations. The amygdala produces hormones that helps you react to the stimuli appropriately. Although you’re usually aware of the stimuli, the remainder of the process is automatic, and you can’t control or manage it.

What you can control or manage are the feelings you become aware of after the hormones have done their work. However, in order to effectively deal with these feelings, you must understand and label which feelings you are experiencing and trace them back to their causes. Think of your feelings as symptoms: Like a cold, simply treating the symptoms does nothing for the root cause; you have to treat the source.

Here’s How You Do It

First, put a label on the event that you believe caused the emotion. Then, describe how it made you feel. Sometimes, determining the cause won’t be this simple, but if you ruminate on it, I have found that you’re very likely to identify it. Once you have done so, you can move on to the following steps:

1. Think about whether the emotion you’re experiencing is warranted. If you’re feeling angry because you were fired, for example, most likely that emotion is fully warranted. On the other hand, if you just heard a rumor about someone you hardly know, you shouldn’t be grieving about it.

2. If you determine that the emotion is warranted, then you can move on to the remedial process, which basically means being proactive in addressing the stimuli that caused the emotion. If we continue with our previous example of feeling upset because you were fired, you might choose to improve yourself in the areas that resulted in you losing your job or even seek comfort from a loved one.

But I know this is not always easy to do at first. Even identifying why you feel bad can be challenging. However, if you take your time and process how you’re feeling — instead of letting yourself dwell on the initial meaning you gave to the event — you can make the best that can be made out of perhaps a bad situation.

Also, you will be creating a new paradigm by which you can learn from negative emotions and advance to other, more productive and healthy uses for your time and energy. Your leadership skills, interpersonal relations and decision-making abilities will all benefit, thus making you emotionally wiser.

This article was reproduced with permission from Svetlana Whitener, Emotional Intelligence Executive Coach -InLight Coaching.