Are you looking for positive and tangible ways to increase your real and perceived value to your current company? If so, congratulations on your wise decision! Increasing your value can help avoid layoffs and job instability. It can also serve you in terms of excellent job reviews and potential salary increases.
Not only will your focus pay off in real time, but also in the future! If you love your job and want to protect it, here are 3 easy tips that you can take action on right now, for increasing your value:
Tip One: track your accomplishments
Do you ever catch yourself feeling like your boss should just be making mental notes of every accomplishment you make? Avoid making this potentially costly mistake simply by making a note of each of your accomplishments in real time, When your annual job review comes up you can present your employer with a list of challenges and what action you took. They will love it and appreciate your focus of attention.
You can then repurpose your list through updating your resume with lots of quantifiable accomplishments you may have missed by not writing them down! Don’t be tempted to overlook what you may see as small accomplishments that “are just part of your job.” Often what you see as mundane others see as marked improvements and demonstrations of your skills. Trust me on this one!
Tip Two: take on projects
Asking your employer for additional projects in areas you excel is an excellent way to demonstrate additional value into your position. Taking on a volunteer effort, being a part of a research or innovation committee or involvement in a special task force – lets say to “green up” next years operations, are valuable contributions and also serve to keep you motivated and challenged. It may even inspire a renewed enthusiasm for your company or position. You may be surprised on this one!
What if you are “too busy” to take on any additional work? Well, many professionals feel this way initially. However I would challenge you to look at how you are spending your time and see if you can find one thing you can give to someone else to manage in order to free up your time to do something where professionally, you stand to bring more value. Examples of this include administrative duties and repeat managerial or operational tasks that other support members of your team could take on as an additional personal challenge for them.
Tip Three: provide solutions
You know that glaring problem or issue in your company that keeps getting ignored either because it’s too large or too small for anyone to take care of right now? Proactively provide solutions to gain additional visibility by providing tangible value and demonstrating your positive initiative. Make sure when you present your idea; to present it to more than one person (3 or more is best) and just give enough information initially to garner some real interest. Don’t worry if initially you don’t have all the answers. That’s what teams are for! Progress towards active and positive change should be the goal – not perfection.
Using these simple steps will help you plan and achieve your goals faster and easier as well as increasing the value you bring to your company!
