The Unspoken Rules to Starting Your Career Off Right
The Unspoken Rules to Starting Your Career Off Right
While hard work is essential for career advancement, career advisor Gorick Ng emphasizes that understanding workplace dynamics and making your efforts visible are equally important for professional success.
Secrets to Showing Up Like a High Performer
In this video lesson, career advisor Gorick Ng explains how understanding unspoken workplace expectations—such as competence, commitment, and compatibility—can help newcomers navigate interpersonal dynamics, build trust, and unlock career opportunities.
Make Your First Day Count
Career advisor Gorick Ng shares four strategies to ease first-day jitters at a new job: research your workplace, build relationships early, volunteer to help, and actively ask questions to engage and learn.
Use Questions to Demonstrate Competence, Commitment, and Compatibility
Confucius's wisdom on questioning aligns with career advisor Gorick Ng's strategies for effective communication in the workplace, emphasizing that asking thoughtful questions and providing well-researched answers fosters collaboration and showcases your proactive engagement.
Take Ownership of Your Role
In chess, players think three moves ahead, a strategy applicable in the workplace where taking ownership of your role, proactively addressing team needs, and understanding the RACI matrix can enhance performance and contribute to organizational goals.
Prioritize Your Core Responsibilities
Stephen Covey's quote emphasizes that instead of merely following your schedule, you should prioritize essential tasks, a strategy career advisor Gorick Ng elaborates on by offering tools to distinguish between urgent and important tasks for a more effective workday.
Avoid Micromanagement and Create a Better Relationship with Your Manager
In this video lesson, career advisor Gorick Ng offers strategies to reduce micromanagement by clarifying project expectations and enhancing communication, ultimately fostering a more autonomous work environment and improving the manager-employee relationship.
Approach Meetings Deliberately
Meetings, while often overlooked, are crucial for workplace productivity and career advancement; by clarifying expectations beforehand, engaging appropriately during, and following up afterward, you can effectively showcase your capabilities and build valuable relationships.
Present Your Best Self In Person and Online
In remote work settings, "mullet outfits" reflect a blend of comfort and professionalism, and career advisor Gorick Ng emphasizes the importance of managing perceptions through clear communication and mindful presentation to ensure your hard work is recognized and respected.
Secrets to Getting Ahead and Getting Promoted
Gen Z workers are driving a focus on diversity and inclusion, yet many traditional norms persist, prompting Gorick Ng to advise new employees on how to navigate office dynamics and prioritize high-profile assignments for career advancement.
Hard work is important, but it’s not the only key to career success. According to Gorick Ng, workplaces frequently harbor unspoken expectations that (though often absent from job descriptions) demand specific behavioral norms. By uncovering these rules, early career professionals are poised to build valuable relationships, have their efforts noticed, and reach their full potential.
Learning Objectives
- Navigate unspoken expectations to advance your career.
- Ask and answer questions skillfully.
- Prioritize tasks effectively.
- Situate your work within the organization’s vision and demonstrate initiative.
- Contribute positively before, during, and after meetings.