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Transcript

Hard Work Isn't Enough: 4 Career Truths to Act On This Week With Roxy Couse · Loud & Lifted

• 0:00
  Welcome to Loud and Lifted Quick Lift, where
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  I recap a full episode by pulling out the key
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  takeaways and give you a few action items you
• 0:07
  can actually use this week. Today's recap is
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  from a conversation with Roxy Kaus, who was known
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  for her hard truths. And this episode was no
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  exception. If you were sold that great work speaks
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  for itself, then this episode is for you. Because
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  guess what? It doesn't. It never has. And Roxy
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  names exactly why. Today, I'm pulling out four
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  truths from that conversation and giving you
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  one thing to do with each of them this week.
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  Truth number one. Hard work isn't the strategy.
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  It's the price of admission. Roxy said something
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  in the episode that I kept coming back to. She
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  said, hard work gets you more work. It does not
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  get you more opportunity. Let that sit for a
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  second. Because if you're anything like the women
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  I know and the women I coach, you were raised
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  on the opposite. You were told to put your head
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  down. Do the work, be excellent, and someone
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  will just notice. And then you put your head
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  down, you did the work, and you were excellent
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  in what happened. You got more work. Not the
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  promotion, not the stretch roll, not even a seat
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  at the table. Here's the sting in what Roxy is
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  saying that's not a glitch, that the system's
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  working exactly as designed. The person who delivers
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  quietly becomes the person you give more to because
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  they can make your life easier. And they don't
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  ask for anything in return. Being good at your
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  job is the cover charge. It's not the night.
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  You don't get celebrated for paying the cover.
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  You pay to get in. Now you actually have to do
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  something once you're in the room. So the action
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  this week, write down three specific wins from
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  last month, not big things specific. What got
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  faster because of you or cleaner or cheaper?
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  What problem did you solve that nobody else was
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  solving? Write them down and hold on to them,
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  because I'm going to ask you to use them in a
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  minute. Hard truth number two. If you're invisible,
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  you're not in the conversation. Visibility is
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  one of those words that gets a bad rap, especially
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  with women. Because the second someone says you
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  need to be more visible, we hear you need to
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  be louder. You need to self -promote. You need
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  to be the person in every meeting saying, look
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  at me, look at me. That is not what visibility
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  means. And Roxy is the proof. She's an introvert.
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  She's not the loudest person in any room she's
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  ever been in. Her version of visibility was one
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  -on -one. It was deliberate conversations with
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  the right people about the right work at the
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  right time. Quiet, specific, repeated. And that
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  counts. And that counts just as much as the person
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  who's holding court in all the high hands and
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  actually sometimes more. And here's what I'll
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  add for my CEO seat. I've spent a lot of years
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  on the other side of those rooms, the rooms where
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  promotion decisions get made, where succession
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  plans get drawn, where someone says we need someone
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  for this role. Who do we have? And I'll tell
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  you what happens in those rooms. Good people
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  get passed over constantly. Not because they
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  aren't good, because nobody in that room can
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  speak to their work. If the only person who knows
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  what you're doing is your manager, and your manager
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  isn't in the room or not part of the conversation,
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  you're a name on the list. And that's it. Visibility
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  isn't a personality trait. It's a logistics problem.
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  Who knows your work? How recently? And in what
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  detail? Action, not going to be surprised here,
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  but pick one visibility habit you'll still be
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  doing in three months. Just one, not five. Not
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  a whole content strategy, just one thing. Maybe
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  it's a monthly coffee with a cross -functional
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  partner. A quarterly note to a senior leader
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  summarizing what your team did. A standing 15
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  -minute walk and talk with someone two levels
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  up. One thing that's just sustainable. The point
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  isn't to be everywhere. The point is to be somewhere
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  consistently. Hard truth number three, your manager
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  cannot be your whole career. This one I want
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  to take my time on. Roxy's line was, don't let
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  your manager get in the way of your career. And
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  the first time I heard her say it, I had a very
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  specific memory flash. Early in my career, I
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  had a boss who liked me. Genuinely, she liked
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  me. She said good things about me in rooms I
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  wasn't in. And she definitely tried to advocate
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  for me. And nothing happened for a long time.
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  Nothing happened and I couldn't figure out why.
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  I knew I was doing the work and I thought I had
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  the exposure and I had her sponsorship. And then
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  one day it clicked. It wasn't that she wasn't
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  advocating for me. It was that her advocacy wasn't
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  worth anything in the building. She wasn't respected
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  by her peers. She wasn't seen as a strong judge
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  of talent. So when she said my name and she did
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  say my name, it didn't carry. It was just noise.
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  That was a hard lesson because she was a good
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  person. She was trying. And her trying could
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  not move the needle because she didn't have the
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  standing in the building. So here's the rule
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  that I took from that. And Roxy said a version
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  of it in this episode. A manager's advocacy is
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  worth exactly their standing in the building.
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  No more, no less. If that person speaking your
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  name is respected, your name carries. If they're
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  not, Your name evaporates, which means one person,
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  any one person, as your only path to opportunity
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  is a single point of failure. It doesn't matter
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  how much they love you. It doesn't matter how
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  good they are. One person doesn't work. You need
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  more than one person in the building who can
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  speak to your work. Not because your manager
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  is bad, but because life is uncertain. Managers
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  leave. Reorgs happen. Companies change priorities.
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  Politics shift. The person who was your champion
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  six months ago can be marginalized tomorrow and
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  you didn't even see it coming. Action. Remember
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  those three wins I asked you to write down? Pull
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  them out. Now I want you to pick one senior person.
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  outside your reporting line, outside your manager's
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  chain, who should know about your work. It could
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  be a peer of your manager's, someone two levels
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  up in a different function, someone whose opinion
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  carries weight in your building. And I want you
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  to get one of those wins in front of them this
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  month, not as politics, just as ownership. You
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  own your career. Your manager's a piece of it,
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  but not all of it. Truth four, you cannot outwork
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  a bad boss. This is one I really want you to
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  think about because this is the one that I see
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  costing women the most time and time again. When
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  you're working for a bad boss, and I don't mean
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  a boss who's annoying or has a different style
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  than you, I mean like a bad boss. Someone who
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  is undermining you, taking credit for your work,
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  isolating you from the rest of the organization,
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  or just chaotic enough that you cannot do your
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  job. When you're working for that person, the
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  instinct is just to work harder. Because we've
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  been trained that the answer to every workplace
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  problem is more effort. If you just deliver harder,
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  perform better, exceed expectations more thoroughly,
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  eventually the situation will resolve itself.
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  The bad boss will see your value, or someone
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  above the bad boss will see your value, or the
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  work will speak for itself and you'll get pulled
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  up and out. Roxy's right. You cannot outwork
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  it. I have watched brilliant women burn themselves
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  down to the studs trying to outwork a bad boss.
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  And what it takes from them is not just the job.
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  It takes their confidence. It takes their sleep.
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  It takes their read on their own confidence.
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  Because when you're working twice as hard and
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  getting half the recognition, after a while you
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  start to believe the problem must be you. Because
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  what else could it be? It's not you. The work
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  environment is the variable. You are the constant.
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  If you were brilliant six months ago and you
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  feel like an imposter now, that variable, that
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  change, is not you. It's the room you're in.
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  The question I want you to ask yourself in Roxy
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  Asta version of this is, is this role stretching
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  me or is it shrinking me? Hard grows you, harmful
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  just costs you. There is a difference and you
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  know the difference. You feel the difference
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  in your body and you feel the difference every
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  Sunday night. Action, if the honest answer is
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  that the role is shrinking you, start building
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  the exit ramp now. Quietly, not dramatically,
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  update the resume. Reach out to two people in
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  your network this month. Take one informational
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  call. You're not quitting tomorrow. You're creating
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  options, because options are what give you leverage.
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  Desperate is not a negotiation position. The
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  day you have somewhere else you could go is the
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  day everything about your current situation changes,
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  even if you never leave. Here's what I want you
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  to walk away with. Your career is yours. It's
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  not your manager's. It's not your company's.
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  It's not your skip levels. It's yours. And ownership
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  is not optional. Ownership does not mean be fake.
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  It does not mean be loud for just the sake of
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  being loud. It doesn't mean play politics. It
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  means stop waiting. Stop waiting for the system
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  to be fair. Stop waiting to be noticed. Stop
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  waiting for the right manager to come along and
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  save you. Start being deliberate. The challenge
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  from this episode, and I mean this, is one move
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  this week. Not all four, one. Pick the truth
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  that landed the hardest and do that action for
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  that one. That's it. Roxy's truth, the one underneath
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  all four of these, is that no one is coming to
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  save your career. And I know how that sounds.
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  It sounds cold. It sounds like a slap. But I
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  want you to hear it the way she meant it and
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  the way I'm telling it to you now. It's the opposite
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  of cold. Because the day you really believe it,
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  the day you stop waiting to be saved, is the
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  day your career actually becomes yours. Go listen
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  to the full conversation with Roxy. There's so
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  much more in there I could have put into 10 minutes,
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  including the specific script she uses, the moment
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  she changed her own playbook, and the conversation
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  about what to do when you're the only one in
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  the room who looks like you. Link to the full
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  episode in the show notes. Until next time, stay
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  loud and stay lifted.