Are you ready to scale the heights of your career in the tech world? Let's embark on a journey together to uncover the secrets of climbing the career ladder, as we dissect the critical role of performance evaluations and promotion timelines that could propel you from analyst to senior positions and beyond. Through the lens of the tech industry's number-crunching evaluation systems, we unwrap the stark truth: the climb to upper management is no easy feat, with success stories being more the exception than the rule. But fear not, for this episode is your compass, guiding you through the standard paths and timeframes to reach those coveted peaks, ensuring you're not just part of the crowd, but one of the few who stands out.
Transitioning into a management role or steering your business through the choppy waters of an inflationary economy? This discussion is your anchor. We navigate the delicate balance between growth and profitability, revealing how to shine in specific job aspects and excel as an employee or entrepreneur. I share my own career anecdotes and strategies for carving out a niche where your talents can shine brightest, making weaknesses merely a backdrop to your strengths. Whether you're a business owner leveraging your team's unique abilities or a professional strategizing your next career move, this episode promises actionable advice that will not only help you advance but also ensure your business thrives in challenging economic times.
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Network and connect with other Acquisition Experts!
Learn DIY Due Diligence Get training from an Acquisitions Attorney to become a DIY Due Diligence buyer!
Are you ready to scale the heights of your career in the tech world? Let's embark on a journey together to uncover the secrets of climbing the career ladder, as we dissect the critical role of performance evaluations and promotion timelines that could propel you from analyst to senior positions and beyond. Through the lens of the tech industry's number-crunching evaluation systems, we unwrap the stark truth: the climb to upper management is no easy feat, with success stories being more the exception than the rule. But fear not, for this episode is your compass, guiding you through the standard paths and timeframes to reach those coveted peaks, ensuring you're not just part of the crowd, but one of the few who stands out.
Transitioning into a management role or steering your business through the choppy waters of an inflationary economy? This discussion is your anchor. We navigate the delicate balance between growth and profitability, revealing how to shine in specific job aspects and excel as an employee or entrepreneur. I share my own career anecdotes and strategies for carving out a niche where your talents can shine brightest, making weaknesses merely a backdrop to your strengths. Whether you're a business owner leveraging your team's unique abilities or a professional strategizing your next career move, this episode promises actionable advice that will not only help you advance but also ensure your business thrives in challenging economic times.
Business Buyers Club Enter 070499 at checkout.
Network and connect with other Acquisition Experts!
Learn DIY Due Diligence Get training from an Acquisitions Attorney to become a DIY Due Diligence buyer!
All right, today's going to be some career advice, not so much in the gym, so we're going to talk about employees, how to get promoted, your day job and all that stuff, because you probably go through similar stuff or think about similar things as a business owner. So if you don't want to hear that, skip the episode. It's not for you. If you want to hear that, let's roll. So at my day job, for a little while I was a team lead, so I had one person reporting up to me, so big whoop, that's a big amount of people. But right now I'm a senior in my role, so no one reporting to me. I report up to a manager and he reports to a VP. So for people in the context, that's what it is, and we were doing the six-month check-in for how to do productive evals and feedback conversations with your, with people that report to you. And since management is something that I would love to do and it's on my radar, I still get invited and so one of the interesting takeaways there are a couple uh, so keeping it vague in the tech space. So we're in the tech space. A lot of my co-workers are california bay area, some new york city, so it's kind of like that mid-sized tech company, so very. That's just the background and something that they're doing.
Speaker 1:
I'm gonna I'm gonna smooth out the numbers, since some of it is probably their specific structure, but I've heard similar things from other folks in like financial industry. In the banking industry, it's almost like the same, but when giving evaluations and performance, there's usually like different categories, like a one, two, three, four, five. Five is like you're amazing, one is you are terrible at your job. Uh, and the way that we do it. We have like a name for it. I remember what the names are, but we have a one, two, three, four system where, like I think the top one is like exceptional or like superior or something like that, but like that's the, the, a player role, and the lowest one is like underperforming, and then there's two more in the middle. So I'll just make them up here exceptional, extremely good, good or like meets expectations, and then like underperforming, and the breakout was a 10. They're expecting at least, and this is what I've heard from other folks too what they've done is ballpark. About 10 will be exceptional, extreme performers, 10 we're going to be underperformers, and then about 40 are going to be above average as well as doing their role, doing good work.
Speaker 1:
Something that I noticed, though someone asked like hey, what do the promotion cycles look like? What does that look like? And a typical thing is it takes about three, maybe four years to move up a level in the same contributor role. So, if you're a stand like I'm a data, I'm a product analyst, a data analyst, so it takes someone about four years to go from analyst to like senior analyst, and then, if you want to move up, it might take another couple years to be like a team lead or like a principal analyst. There's different terms, but like the, the captain above, like all the seniors and it's, you're still not managing people. You're just a higher performer for like coding or whatever. Something that caught my attention, though, is there's like a three, two to three year, or like a three year time period to move up, as still like doing your work. But someone asked like hey, what is it? What's a promotion look like when someone has like capped out, they cannot be any higher in their contributor role once they move up in the pyramid of the company, get closer to manager or director or VP, and I don't know who, but someone said it takes only about 15% or so of individuals that want to move up or that are ready to move up end up moving up. So basically, 15%, that means about every six years.
Speaker 1:
If you're in a role you're doing well, you have a desire to get into management. It takes six to seven years to move up into management, and so it's the classic how do I become a manager? Well, you have to be promoted internally. Well, how do they hire managers? Well, you have to be promoted internally. Well, how do they hire managers? Well, they hire managers from other companies. So at some point you either have to get hired at a brand new job up into management, or you have to get promoted at your current company from a non-manager into a manager. You're now like directing and guiding your peers.
Speaker 1:
And looking at the qualifications to meet that upper 10% ratings group, it was surprising. You had to be exceptional at your work, exceptional in your stakeholder relations, exceptional in the quality of your deliverables, exceptional in your team collaboration and creating value. You had to be exceptional across the board, and anyone who's exceptional in all elements of their job that's really hard to do. That's probably only 10% of people they were estimating will end up getting that particular rating. It's not a hard and fast rule, but that was just something I noticed I'll like to say.
Speaker 1:
When you're an employer, you don't want it, but you should expect that people are going to ask for raises every year. Especially when you're in an inflationary environment like we are right now Inflation is at like 8% to 10% you should expect your people will ask you like hey, I want to afford my groceries, may I have a 10% raise? As an owner, you need to be ready for that conversation, because that money has got to come from somewhere, and if you're not increasing revenue or growing the company, it's going to come from your profit, your back pocket. So owner's comp is going to go down, and so everyone else gets a raise, but you. So all that means is the goal of the owner needs to be growing and expanding the company, so that you can be paying and affording these raises to your team.
Speaker 1:
Now, do they deserve them? Yeah, if they're doing good work, they're contributing, they're adding value, they're growing the business. They're helping you collect a draw or a salary or a distribution or a dividend. Yeah, they're working hard to help you get a paycheck, too. They should get that. It's your goal, though, is to grow the organization, and if the organization is shrinking and your cost of payroll is going up, something's gonna not last for very long. A business is either gonna implode, like you see with a lot of union situations, or you're gonna have to do laughs or have to cut vendor costs or something. But you have to find the money somewhere. Last thing you wanna do is close down the company because now everyone gets paid zero and so you gotta figure out how to do it. But it was interesting to see what it takes to move up as an employee and, candidly, it's surprising to see how much work it takes to move up.
Speaker 1:
I want to get into management, but I don't know if I'm exceptional in every element of my role. I think I'm above average. I think I'm exceptional on a couple of things. Know if I'm exceptional in every element of my role? I think I'm above average. I think I'm exceptional on a couple things. I know I'm average at a couple things Staying organized, attention to details, knowing when to initiate another stakeholder review. I'm not super good at that, but when it comes to analytical work assessing what is going on behind the numbers, relaying that and delivering that in a verbal presentation I can do that very well.
Speaker 1:
But, like I'm terrible at PowerPoint and my strengths and my weaknesses, how do I find a way to get promoted or work my way up in a job and shoot, took a wrong turn. And so, as an employee, how do I maximize my strengths? How do I handle my weaknesses but not gloss over them? But yeah, I know I'm not going to stand out from my peers having above average everything. I'm going to stand out by being exceptional at a few things and satisfactory at a few things, because historically in my life, whenever I've been cherry plucked into an opportunity or I get selected for leading something initiative, it's because they're looking for those couple of key strengths.
Speaker 1:
As long as you can own your mistakes or where you're not as naturally inclined for something, say, yeah, I am bad at PowerPoint, I am not fantastic at estimating work timelines, like when I'm given a project I don't know how long it's going to take. I'm bad if it's going to take three days or three weeks, I can estimate it. Sometimes I'm way off and that's a weakness of mine and I own that upfront. But yet to say, hey, I know how to raise the culture of the team. I know how to have a highly engaged team where 80% of people show up to like the team event at the weekend. I know how to elevate the satisfactory scores for staff members.
Speaker 1:
I know how to collaborate and do a buddy system, but just own your strengths and so, as a business owner, how that carries over your job is to find people that are exceptional at a few things. Equip them to do those things well and, in my opinion, don't try to get them to be better at their weaknesses. Help them to live with their weaknesses, but acknowledge, if you want, folks that are incredibly good at sales, incredibly good instructing a gym class, incredibly good stacking paper and making binders and folders for for sales meetings or incredibly good at organizing parties and events, find those people and celebrate where they're really quirky and good at what they do, and I don't think it's worth trying to get someone who's a great party planner to all of a sudden be really good at assembling steering wheels onto vehicles at the factory. I would rather have them focus on party planning, team events, collaboration, employee engagement and to stay in their lane of excellence, because people want to do what they're good at and they don't want to the things that people are not good at. They take longer, it's less enjoyable and it's a less quality output. And so it's, across the board, just loss on loss on loss. People are not working in the things they enjoy and that they're good at. So that's what I learned I worked sitting in on a manager meeting at a tech company. It's about a thousand people, so it's not really big, it's not really small, it's not like mid-sized to larger company, I suppose.
Speaker 1:
But learn that your job as an employee is to do fantastic work, stand out in where you can and own your advantages and be really freaking good at your advantages and to acknowledge yeah, this is where I'm struggling, this is where I'm bad at stuff, here's how I cope with it, here's how I handle it and I'm working to get better on them. But I'm not going to make them a strength, I'm going to make them an area where I can improve and grow as a human. That's what I'm learning. If you want to become a manager, that's the timeline. If you want to rise within a company, that's what it takes. If you want to grow your business like 20 or 30% a year, afford those raises for your staff of 10% 20% a year and then keep deploying capital and resources where it's most valuable, whether that be an ancillary product, a side business that supports your main business, like a marketing or a sales agency, growing the business itself or starting something new that has higher growth potential.
Speaker 1:
But the goal is to ultimately be able to provide and advocate, expand good things that are needed. That's where I'm at, that's where I'm going. That's how to be a better employee. That's how to stand up for yourself, how to stand out for yourself, how to contribute and be the no-brainer go-to person when the right thing arises. You don't want to be. I would rather be the top pick for a couple of specific things than the number three pick for everything, because you'll never get the pick. You need to be the top pick in a few key areas and to stand out just enough to have those shots. That's where we're at. That's where we're going. Be a great employee, be a great entrepreneurial business owner. Let's rock and roll.
