Latest / You're Overqualified Podcast - Career and Leadership Strategies for Women / 126. How to Make Your Work Visible Without Feeling Like You're Bragging
Transcript
- 0:00Hi, I'm Danny Tan and this is an episode of You're Overqualified
- 0:05because this is your friendly reminder that you truly are
- 0:07overqualified for what it is that you do.
- 0:10And so a little bit of background on what this show is
- 0:12about. If you are somebody who is a
- 0:14woman, a woman of color, first or second Gen. and eldest
- 0:17daughter, and you've always been kind of carrying the weight of
- 0:20the world on your shoulders in the sense of you can do it all,
- 0:23you can get it all done. You can overextend yourself.
- 0:25You're the executor on all ways, whether it's personal,
- 0:28professional, family, you name it.
- 0:30This episode is for you. Because nine times out of 10,
- 0:33really 10 times out of 10, we're overqualified at what we do.
- 0:36But sometimes we are just undervalued for what we do or in
- 0:39systems that don't necessarily support us and set us up for
- 0:41success. So some background on me, I'm
- 0:43Danny Tan. I'm a leadership coach and
- 0:45founder of She Belongs Here, an organization that helps promote
- 0:49women within corporate as well as within their businesses.
- 0:53And so I myself have pivoted careers five times, PR sales,
- 0:57merchandising, e-commerce, you name it.
- 0:59Also enter entrepreneurship full time.
- 1:01I used to be AVP of a multi billion dollar organization and
- 1:04then moved into entrepreneurship because I just saw what it looks
- 1:06like when you are one of few, not one of many.
- 1:11And what that feels like when you're working within a system
- 1:13that was not designed for you. And we have so many amazing
- 1:16ideas as women, we are so innovative and awesome.
- 1:20And so I just want to make sure that we are just resourced when
- 1:23it comes to being within corporate America, when it comes
- 1:26to exit in corporate America, I'm building something for
- 1:28ourselves. And so that's what I do full
- 1:30time. So I am first Gen.
- 1:32I am Asian, Latina, I'm Puerto Rican, Filipino, Chinese roots
- 1:35and I absolutely love it when it comes to helping others when it
- 1:40comes to their careers. All right, so today's episode,
- 1:43we're going to dive in to pulling up my notes here.
- 1:47How to make your work visible without feeling like you're
- 1:50bragging. Now here is the thing, when it
- 1:52comes to our work, you may be looking to just promote yourself
- 1:56in general and the work that you do within your business within
- 2:00your expertise within your personal brand, within the
- 2:03ability to want to get promoted and move to the next level.
- 2:05But it can feel like super uncomfortable, very cringy, not
- 2:09natural whatsoever. And so I want to talk about this
- 2:11because I have clients who come to me who have maybe been the
- 2:17hardest worker, the executor, the doer have been the go to for
- 2:20everything at work. And they know that if there's a
- 2:23problem, they're the first person people go to to help
- 2:25solve it, to help fix it, their managers and trust them with so
- 2:28much. But the problem is, is that when
- 2:32it comes to asking for what it is that they're looking for,
- 2:35which is either more visibility, whether it is trying to get a
- 2:37promotion, whether it is trying to move up, there is this rub of
- 2:41people being like, OK, yeah, but what have you done to help the
- 2:44business overall? And then it's like jaw drop,
- 2:47wait a minute, I've been the one you go to for everything.
- 2:49And so The thing is, is that I will break down that yes, you
- 2:55can do the hard work. That's amazing.
- 2:57But hard work alone within this system of corporate America
- 3:01isn't going to get you to move up or to get promoted without
- 3:06also having visibility. So it's really important in
- 3:10general to start practicing your visibility no matter what,
- 3:14right? Because visibility is a couple
- 3:15of things. Visibility is practicing that
- 3:17for promotions, it's practicing that for self advocacy.
- 3:20It's practicing that to be able to speak to what we do.
- 3:23It's practicing that for our value.
- 3:24So you're doing that in so many different things in life.
- 3:27You're doing it in networking, you're doing it in interviews,
- 3:30you're doing it for promotions, you're doing it for yourself,
- 3:33and you're doing it So even just communicate the value of the
- 3:35work that you're doing. And a lot of the times we
- 3:37believe that being visible feels like we are bragging.
- 3:40But that's the thing when we come from cultures that are that
- 3:45focus on the collective. So for example, a lot of Latino,
- 3:50Hispanic, Asian, black cultures are all collective cultures.
- 3:54It feels really uncomfortable at times and painful to focus on
- 3:59ourselves because a collective focuses on the group, the
- 4:01community, the individual will focus on themselves.
- 4:05And within American corporate society, it really is
- 4:08individualistic. And I'm not saying like
- 4:10abandoned your morals and your values.
- 4:11I'm saying thinking about what system you're in and how you
- 4:14want to leverage it for yourself if you do.
- 4:17If you don't, that's OK, But let's talk about it because even
- 4:21even if you come from a collective society, it doesn't
- 4:23matter. You need to be able to
- 4:25communicate your value and what it is that you do, whether it is
- 4:27for a job interview or whether it is for just being able to
- 4:30talk about the work that you're doing so people can know about
- 4:33it, right? And so let's start with this.
- 4:36I want you to think about when we hear the phrase, let your
- 4:39work speak for yourself. I know you've heard that.
- 4:42And it's just going to cost you so many opportunities and money,
- 4:45which is what you can use to leverage to help the collective
- 4:49later on. And so I just want you to know
- 4:51that you can be quiet and excellent, but that is just
- 4:55invisible excellence. And so you want to be able to
- 4:58find a way where you can speak to what you do and be visible
- 5:01without it feeling like you are showing off.
- 5:04OK, I have said so many different things to Sunday about
- 5:06that. Let's go ahead and actually
- 5:08break it down. So the Part 1 that I want to
- 5:10talk about this is letting your work speak for yourself.
- 5:12It's a little bit of a lie because if the belief is I do
- 5:16great work, people will notice. The reality is your manager is
- 5:20already busy. They're managing up, they're
- 5:22managing across. They have their own goals, they
- 5:24have their own problems. They're watching their own
- 5:26contribution. They're not necessarily watching
- 5:28every contribution that you're making, even though they are
- 5:31working with you and talking to you and having your one on ones
- 5:34with you. They're not necessarily keeping
- 5:35the receipts on what you're doing.
- 5:37I know that feels like what how could they not?
- 5:39But they're not because they're managing so many different
- 5:41things. And so people make decisions on
- 5:44promotions or on leadership months and months in and months
- 5:48in advance. And a lot of the times we wait
- 5:50till the promotion cycle that is too late.
- 5:52These are being planned not even like 3 months before, sometimes
- 5:556 or 12 months before. So you have to be very strategic
- 5:58on how you're doing this. And it can't just be that my
- 6:01hard work alone is making it happen.
- 6:03There has to be more pieces to it.
- 6:05People who are like high performing but staying visible
- 6:10will not move forward versus someone who is less qualified
- 6:13and a little bit louder. They will make move forward.
- 6:15And The thing is, it's not to become someone that you don't
- 6:18want to become. It's to learn that you can be
- 6:21strategic with visibility. And visibility is something that
- 6:24you can learn and teach yourself and is a skill, which is what we
- 6:27do inside coaching. And so I want you to know that
- 6:30by staying quiet, you're actually signaling to leadership
- 6:33that you're not ready to get promoted.
- 6:35You're also signaling to leadership that you're fine with
- 6:38where you are and you're comfortable with where you are
- 6:40you are, and also that you're good at executing tasks that
- 6:42maybe you don't have a vision or a strategy because how could you
- 6:45have one for the business if you don't have one for yourself?
- 6:47And so I want you to think about that Visibility is not about
- 6:50ego. It's about information and
- 6:52sharing data about the work that you are doing.
- 6:55You are giving decision makers the data they need in order to
- 6:59advocate for you. They can't do it if they don't
- 7:01know. They can't do it if they don't
- 7:02know. And so the next part I want to
- 7:05talk about is here are three different ways you can make your
- 7:08work more visible. The first one is I always want
- 7:11you to keep the receipts. You should be keeping the
- 7:14receipts on what it is that you're doing.
- 7:16So create a running document. I don't care if it is a folder
- 7:19that has screenshots. I don't care if it's a Google
- 7:21Doc where you're writing things down.
- 7:23I don't care if it is, you know, your journal where you're
- 7:26writing it down. I want you to keep a living a
- 7:28living document where you're tracking everything that you've
- 7:31done. It doesn't have to be just
- 7:32professional. It can be personal too.
- 7:34All the things you have done, whether it is a project, a task,
- 7:37positive feedback, an e-mail where you got a screenshot where
- 7:40you have saved revenue or time or you help somebody with their
- 7:43problems, where you got positive feedback from a higher up in a
- 7:46presentation. They sent you an e-mail after
- 7:48save all of this. And I would say do it once a
- 7:50month or do it 1/4 No, if you are somebody who's trying to
- 7:54believe in the believability of themselves and the evidence of
- 7:57themselves as well as become more visible, you have to do it
- 8:00every week. Like set the timer for 10
- 8:01minutes because if you're already having a hard time
- 8:04believing in yourself and being comfortable being out there, no
- 8:08one will believe you if you do not believe in you.
- 8:10I say this all the time. And so the best way to start
- 8:12believing in yourself is to start to keep the receipts.
- 8:15Or one of my clients and I make a joke and we say, how is your
- 8:18brainwashing going of brainwashing yourself of how
- 8:21amazing you are? A lot of them that I work with
- 8:24are extremely intelligent and a lot of them want to come in and
- 8:27be known as subject matter experts at what they do within
- 8:31their company and their industry.
- 8:32Now, if you're going to be a subject matter expert, that's
- 8:35great. You better believe that you're
- 8:36an expert then, right? You have to own that identity
- 8:38and step into that identity and create evidence and data for
- 8:41your brain so you do not panic and regress back to where you
- 8:44are. And this is one of the most
- 8:46important pieces. So no, it's not just like a keep
- 8:49the winds to be cute, it's actually creating a database and
- 8:53a Bank of evidence for your brain for when your brain starts
- 8:57to act up and be crazy to keep you exactly where you've always
- 9:00been, to help remind you of where you are going and who you
- 9:03are becoming for your identity when it comes to that.
- 9:05So that's super important. So 10 minutes on the clock, do
- 9:09that. The next part is you should be
- 9:10finding ways to do executive updates.
- 9:13If you are somebody who is only talking to their manager about
- 9:16the work that they do, you are falling short, like period.
- 9:19And so the big thing that we do in coaching, I do this in the
- 9:22first session, I'm asking you questions on what is the process
- 9:25for you to get promoted? Who are the key players in the
- 9:28ecosystem within your organization?
- 9:30Do you have those conversations? Do you know how to have them?
- 9:32So if you're not doing executive updates and you don't know who's
- 9:35within your ecosystem to influence, that's something we
- 9:37have to break because you could be doing your work, but no one
- 9:40could see you as, for example, you are putting on a play, but
- 9:44you haven't sold a single ticket.
- 9:45So then you think, oh, my play is not good?
- 9:47No, but have you done the marketing for your play for them
- 9:49to come see it? So being able to know that is
- 9:52really important. And the third piece is we think
- 9:54that it's just our manager or our manager's manager, but
- 9:57typically there are other key stakeholders that are important
- 9:59to influence as well within our organization cross functionally
- 10:02that will help move us through. If you are giving the keys to
- 10:05your future just to one person, that is a huge mistake.
- 10:08Something that I learned myself going through corporate and
- 10:11going from K to 250K, from being a coordinator to being AVP.
- 10:16It is so important that you have more than one person on your
- 10:18side cheering you on. And those conversations soon
- 10:21feel super uncomfortable. Like what I have talked to
- 10:24multiple people about what I do, How do I do that?
- 10:26Or can feel weird in the sense of what do I talk about or how
- 10:29do I be direct or how do I figure out how to collaborate
- 10:31them on a project. That stuff that we do inside
- 10:34coaching just because it's not like we're set up for.
- 10:36Do you remember going to like school and being told, hey, this
- 10:40is how you influence, this is how you strategically build
- 10:42relationships. This is how you communicate your
- 10:45value. This is how you learn how to
- 10:46collaborate and create projects that help the business case.
- 10:49No, you did not. That was on the school.
- 10:51I know because I was there and I majored in business
- 10:53communications and sociology and none of those things happened
- 10:56within there. They all happened outside the
- 10:57workplace that I learned. And so this is what I want you
- 11:00to know is that I call it, you know, the roadshow.
- 11:03So with my clients who are looking to figure out how to
- 11:05influence within their corporate ecosystem, I-1 have us do an
- 11:08ecosystem mapping exercise. And then two, I have them do the
- 11:11roadshow, which essentially will help them get that visibility
- 11:14across all different teams. So that way they're able to not
- 11:17just be seen within their own team, within other teams as
- 11:20well. This helps them level up in the
- 11:24sense of them being a subject matter expert, but also it helps
- 11:28them with their promotion process and it also helps them
- 11:30with opportunities. So I have one client, for
- 11:32example, where she was looking to make a change into a
- 11:35different department because she was ready to experience
- 11:37something new. This allowed her to have
- 11:39visibility with the HR team, with that department, with that
- 11:42overall career path, and he had her get a move.
- 11:45She moved within in four sessions.
- 11:47And so that's the stuff that's really important.
- 11:49I had another client who then got an opportunity on another
- 11:51project. By doing this exercise, she was
- 11:53able to move to that new project.
- 11:54That project helped leverage her to get promoted.
- 11:56So again, you are sleeping on so many opportunities by not
- 12:00thinking about different ways that you can connect with
- 12:02different people. And this is so much more than a
- 12:05coffee chat. We talked about and breakdown
- 12:07within coaching. What are the important key
- 12:09conversation points to have? How do you follow up?
- 12:12What are the things to talk about?
- 12:13How do you hide the work that you do without it feeling super
- 12:15cheesy, right? And knowing that that way, your
- 12:18goal overall is to build a relationship with somebody
- 12:20within that organization that can help speak about you and
- 12:23speak to your work outside of you being in that room.
- 12:26Essentially create like a PR or billboard person for you.
- 12:29The other amazing thing is that when you build these
- 12:32relationships and they go and they leave the company and they
- 12:34go somewhere else and guess what?
- 12:36That's a new opportunity or network that you have developed
- 12:39to seed into a new organization that you could potentially go
- 12:41to. I have one client where she was
- 12:44networking within her current organization.
- 12:46She decided to leave and go consulting and start her own
- 12:49business full time. Guess what?
- 12:51All the people that she built relationships with, She said,
- 12:54Danny, where do I start? First I said we're going to
- 12:55start on, we call it the networking bubble.
- 12:57In the networking bubble, we're breaking down what are the
- 13:00different layers people you can potentially connect with by
- 13:02doing that exercise. She found three different people
- 13:05at that are now work at three different organizations that got
- 13:07her jobs at where she got contracts for BuzzFeed, a huge
- 13:11beauty brand, another media company.
- 13:13And so she was able to go into her go from being full time and
- 13:17corporate to going full time and consulting and be able to more
- 13:20than cover her lifestyle living in New York City as a single
- 13:23woman. Like, yes, please, thank you.
- 13:25We love that. So just knowing that it's not
- 13:28just about schmoozing, it's about being very strategic and
- 13:30planned with what it is that you're building.
- 13:32So I could give you time and time again, I think I gave you a
- 13:35good amount of examples of my clients who are crushing it at
- 13:37what they do because they're working through these
- 13:39strategies. But just know that you're going
- 13:41to come into coaching and within the first the first session,
- 13:46we're mapping out your plan for what it is that you're going to
- 13:49do. So you're going to be super
- 13:50clear after 45 to 60 minutes on what you're spending on the next
- 13:5390 days to move you forward. I'm not into like fluff to be,
- 13:58as you can tell from my podcast episodes, I'm very much a mix of
- 14:01facts and feelings. So yeah, the feeling is a signal
- 14:03that we typically need some kind of system in place or some kind
- 14:06of support in place or some kind of strategy in place.
- 14:08And so that's what I'm here to do.
- 14:10So if you have been feeling like you're super stuck and you're
- 14:13working really hard, but it's not moving anywhere and it's not
- 14:16doing anything, that typically means that you need help on how
- 14:19to be strategic with your visibility and that you're
- 14:20probably nervous that you're bragging and you're not.
- 14:23Because remember, you are so freaking overqualified at what
- 14:26it is that you do. You just need a plan and support
- 14:29in order to get there. The women that I work with are
- 14:31brilliant. They are not, they're not dumb
- 14:33like period. They are amazing what they do.
- 14:36They have multiple degrees. They have multiple, you know,
- 14:39different kinds of interests and passions.
- 14:41You know, they are into what they do at corporate and their
- 14:44day jobs that they also want to build something for themselves
- 14:46outside of that. They are moms, they are single
- 14:49women living in the most expensive cities in the world
- 14:51and what they mostly need support when it comes to
- 14:53coaching is a plan, a strategy, partner thought, partner
- 14:58accountability. That's what's most important.
- 15:00So they're coming to me because they know that something is
- 15:03stuck. They know that something has
- 15:05been feeling the same and they don't want to feel that way
- 15:07anymore because they're very ambitious.
- 15:09You are ambitious, you are driven, you are motivated, you
- 15:11are a go getter, but you know that something is currently off
- 15:14and it's feeling that way for some time now.
- 15:16And I always say this, if something has been feeling off
- 15:19for months and months and months and now it's turned into years,
- 15:22that typically is a sign in the signal.
- 15:24You have to do something about it.
- 15:26You're not going to just shake it off, okay?
- 15:28Because if it's still sitting with us, it means we need to do
- 15:31something about it. And so them that I work with are
- 15:33very action oriented. So for example, if they want to
- 15:36achieve something, they are figuring out a plan in order to
- 15:40achieve that thing and developing and learning the
- 15:42skills in order to make that happen.
- 15:43Once they start to become stagnant or stuck, they start to
- 15:46identify what are the next goals that I want to do, What are the
- 15:48skills and the action I need to figure out in order to get
- 15:51there. Now here's the thing.
- 15:52If you go from being someone who's great at being a doer,
- 15:55executor, getting everything done, and now you want to be at
- 15:58a higher level. Whether that is functioning for
- 16:01yourself as an individual contributor and being at a high
- 16:04level within that. Whether that is being a people
- 16:05manager, whether that is building something for yourself,
- 16:08there comes a new set of tools and skills you need to learn.
- 16:12Hi, me too. And so when that does come, the
- 16:14important part is who do you have as a partner to help
- 16:17support you to develop those things and to call you out on
- 16:20your BS when that comes up. I get called a lot that I am a
- 16:23coach therapist because I will hold space for your emotions.
- 16:26But I'll make sure we take action like point blank.
- 16:29And so if you have been sitting on something that it is that you
- 16:32want to do, whether it is getting that promotion, whether
- 16:35it is becoming a subject matter expert at what it is that you
- 16:38do, whether it is building that exit plan out of corporate.
- 16:41Because you have come climb that ladder and now you want to go in
- 16:43to build something for yourself for your exit strategy in the
- 16:45long term. Then book a call to learn what
- 16:48it's like to work together and talk about coaching.
- 16:50So on the call at the call is 60 minutes long, you fill in an
- 16:53intake form, it's going to ask what your goals are for
- 16:55coaching, what you'd like to focus on.
- 16:57And then on that call, we get to meet and I will ask you
- 17:00questions about your goals, what you've worked to get towards
- 17:03those goals so far, maybe where you're getting stuck.
- 17:05And then I will give you a custom plan of what it's like to
- 17:07work together. I work with my clients
- 17:09exclusively one for three to six months.
- 17:11And the reason why is because I have found the most impact
- 17:14happens when we are working together one-on-one and we're
- 17:17diving in. I customize my strategies and my
- 17:19plans based off of what it is you need to do.
- 17:21So, yeah, have a help people who are in the nonprofit space, the
- 17:24for profit space, in tech, in healthcare, in all the different
- 17:28spaces within marketing, with consulting.
- 17:30Yeah. But The thing is, is that I
- 17:32always adjust the plan and the strategy to you, to your
- 17:35organization, to your manager, to your leadership, to your
- 17:37skill set, to your experience, to your goals.
- 17:40That way, you know within that first session what we're working
- 17:43on for in the next three to six months, and then we go from
- 17:47there. Every single session is action
- 17:49oriented. So we have the goals.
- 17:51I give you action items and I break them down on how to
- 17:53achieve them. We go ahead and have assignments
- 17:56of what you work on outside of those sessions when you're
- 17:58getting stuck. You have support between
- 18:00sessions. I always say you have me on
- 18:01retainer from the moment that you start.
- 18:03So while we have our biweekly sessions on Zoom, in between
- 18:07sessions, I use Slack. If you're familiar with it,
- 18:10something similar to Microsoft Teams.
- 18:11And so in there, we are dropping in voice notes, text messages,
- 18:15documents to review. So that way you continue that
- 18:17momentum outside of our biweekly sessions.
- 18:19And people love it. They say they get so many
- 18:23results just from those sessions.
- 18:25I've had clients who have gotten offers for new jobs and we are
- 18:28literally in the messages going back and forth negotiating the
- 18:32offer and then they're negotiating more.
- 18:34I mean, I have clients who have gone from 20 K 50K to doubling
- 18:37their salaries just by working together.
- 18:39And we've done that in literally messages.
- 18:41I mean, obviously hop on a call too, but just things to know or
- 18:44even prepping for like interviews or big high stake
- 18:46executive meetings. We've done all that too.
- 18:48So just know that you're always going to have me to go to and
- 18:51I'm going to have your back and essentially I'll be in your
- 18:53pocket there, you know, for anything that you may need.
- 18:56So that's what coaching looks like.
- 18:57It's one discovery call, figuring out if it makes sense
- 19:00for us to work together, if it's a match, right, your goals and a
- 19:03customized coaching plan. And then from there, when
- 19:05working together, we were together bi weekly on calls for
- 19:08three to six months. And then you have me as well on
- 19:10Slack in between sessions. And I am your go to on so many
- 19:13different ways to Sunday. But I've had clients do amazing
- 19:16things from getting 2 promotions in a year, to doubling their
- 19:19salaries, to getting 50 to 30 K salary increases, to moving
- 19:22across the country to to brand new jobs from San Francisco to
- 19:25New York. Vice versa to doing awesome
- 19:28amazing things to going full time in their businesses and
- 19:30leaving their job and being able to fully support themselves.
- 19:32One of the most expensive cities in the world.
- 19:34So why not? Why not?
- 19:35My goal has always been when I left my corporate job, making a
- 19:38quarter $1,000,000 and being AVP and being in charge of so many
- 19:41different brands to going into this business because I'm so
- 19:44passionate about being able to help women, especially in so
- 19:48many different ways to Sunday be able to build things for
- 19:50themselves that they really want.
- 19:52And it's not because we're broken or that we need help in
- 19:55some way. It's just that there's some
- 19:56things that are not necessarily spoken about or or tossed about
- 20:00when it comes to how we function within corporate America and how
- 20:03to help us set up for success. And to me, it's all about it is
- 20:06a system. So how can we leverage it for
- 20:08ourselves and how can we help ourselves and help each other.
- 20:11And so that's what I'm here to do.
- 20:13Hopefully found this episode helpful and go ahead and check
- 20:16out next week and I will. Talk to you soon.