No Resources? Get Resourceful
Very few of us have access to all the resources we might need to be successful. What do I mean by resources? These are the people, associations, tools, access, that we need at this time to propel us on our journey. In this blog, we’ll explore one type of resources — people.
I think back to the time when, early in my career, I was looking to transition out of the hotel industry. In addition to studying hospitality as an undergrad, I’d spent the first decade of my career in this industry. Naturally, my network was comprised of folks from within hospitality. All I knew was the business of running hotels.
And, because much of my career to that point had been built either through companies approaching me or promotions within the organizations I’d worked for, I had no idea where to start when it came to switching industries. I needed support in thinking about how to go about a job search — particularly one that branched beyond the industry I knew. I was limiting myself to what I knew, personally — both in terms of the types of jobs out there and the people in my network. It wasn’t until I was chatting about the situation with a peer who had recently come into the industry, and they mentioned having gotten their most recent role through a peer of their spouse, that I recognized that there were friends of friends who would be able to help me think about how to research industries and how to position my skills for other industries. This example demonstrates the power of expanding your external network. In the next example, we’ll look at what it means to continue to build your internal network.
Recently, I worked with an executive who was taking on a new division of the organization that he’d been with for a few years. While he had established himself in his current division, he had no contacts in this new part of the organization. We launched a plan to begin identifying peers of peers. In other words, who did he know who knew folks in the new division? As part of this, he worked with the COO (the person who had appointed him to this new role) to determine the key stakeholders for him in this new position. In speaking with each of these individuals, he made a point of asking them who else he should meet with. In this way, he was quickly able to begin establishing himself in the new division and to understand who to reach out to for what.
People are just one type of resource. There are a myriad of other types of resources such as skills, associations, tools, knowledge, access, coaching, etc. How are you identifying the resources that would help you to be more successful? And, where those resources aren’t easily accessible, how are you getting resourceful in tapping into them?
