Dec 16 / Richa Bansal

How to Become the CEO of Your Career

Last year in the thick of the pandemic, I published a post on LinkedIn: “If you are not in the driver’s seat of your career, someone else will be.”

Someone commented: “Immense unemployment offers unique challenges for the career. Picking up choices or being in the driver’s seat?”

With mass layoffs in the Tech industry, it’s a dilemma that many are facing again:
“Should I take up any job that comes my way, regardless of my experience, education, and skill set?”

“With the threat of layoffs, should I stay put in my job, even though I now have twice the responsibility with no increase in pay?”

“Should I move my family halfway across the country to take up work in an industry that I’m barely familiar with?”

More than once in my career, I have faced a similar question. Here is a 5-step strategy that can help you take control and become the CEO of your career.

Have a Winner’s Attitude

What’s the difference between picking up choices or being in the driver’s seat:

OUR ATTITUDE.

We can pick up choices as a submission to our situation or as a means to grow into diverse careers.

Let me give you an example. When I worked in the US on L1 visa, that is my visa was tied to my job, I did not have the luxury to say no to the role I was given or to change jobs. But I was always cognizant of whether I was accepting that option passively or actively.

Active decision-making means you continuously strive to learn from your experiences (even if that means learning what you don’t like), seeing this experience as a piece in the large jigsaw puzzle that is your career.

Create a BATNA

I am inherently a risk-averse person. This means having a fallback option secured that’s better than my worst nightmare.

Here comes the concept of BATNA - The Best Alternative to Negotiated Agreement. It’s a term I learned in my MBA program, coined by Roger Fisher, William Ury, and Bruce Patton in their bestseller Getting to Yes: Negotiating Agreement Without Giving In.

A BATNA is crucial if you want to be the CEO of your career. But what does that mean practically? It means that you have built an external network to leverage if your current job goes south, taken steps to file your Permanent Residency/Greencard if you are on a visa, and built 6-month savings so you can shop for the right job.

Having a contingency plan gives you the freedom to make choices. If you don’t yet have a BATNA yet, it’s ok. There’s never a better day than today to start creating one!

Leverage, not only Build Relationships

Here’s another example from my personal life that illustrates the power of leveraging, not only building relationships. A couple of years ago, my husband met Sunil Garg, CEO of dataVedik, during an alumni meeting. They instantly connected and explored the possibility of working together in the future. Over many months, they met occasionally and exchanged meaningful ideas. When my husband got laid off 3 years later, he approached Sunil for a job opportunity and was hired instantly.

We often fall into the trap that if we leverage the relationship, the other person will think we are taking advantage of them. Whereas the fact is, every time I have taken the courage to approach my network, they have gone out of their way to help me get to my next role or that next sale.

Now, more than ever, it’s necessary to capitalize on the relationships we have worked so hard to build. Leverage professional connections, friends, and family to find your next role. This is one of the best strategies to keep driving your career forward, despite the obstacles presented by the downward market conditions.

Speak Up for What You Want

Have these questions ever crossed your mind?

“No one is hiring right now, so what’s the point of looking for new roles?”

“How can I ask for a new project when my company has no opportunities?”

“Isn’t it wrong to ask for a promotion if my company is laying off thousands of people?”

Though my LinkedIn feed is full of posts from those who have recently lost their jobs, it has an equal number of updates from those who have recently been promoted or changed jobs.

The problem with these questions is that they assume opportunities don’t exist.
It’s not entirely our fault for thinking this way. Our brains have been hardwired through evolution to focus on the negative. Traced back to prehistoric days, focusing on the bad was our brains’ way of keeping us safe, and it is still wired into our genetics today.

If you want to be the CEO of your career, don’t assume that there are no options. Don’t let the market conditions become an excuse for not having a difficult conversation about promotion or leveling up. If you want something, make the ask.

Be in Sync with Your Priorities

A huge part of being in charge of your career means being in sync with your priorities. These are the areas of your life that are truly meaningful and important to you.

For the longest time in my life, I struggled to define my priorities. I am a multi-passionate person, i.e., I want to do everything, usually all at the same time. But about three years ago, as I went through a quarter-life crisis (yes, it’s a real thing), I thought hard about my priorities in life. It came down to three things:

  • Make an impact on the world through my work
  • Build generational wealth
  • Teach my kids how to make good life choices
  • Being in sync with our priorities helps us reduce decision fatigue. It makes it a lot easier to determine the opportunity cost of a career choice presented to us.

Remember that priorities change with time. It is entirely possible that right now, your priority is to put food on the table. Making a conscious career decision that aligns with your current priority still makes you the CEO of your career.

As I pack up my corporate career and embark on a new journey as a full-time entrepreneur and career coach, I want to leave you with this parting thought:

You and only you need to be the CEO of your career. You do this by having a winner’s attitude, a strategic career plan, and the courage to take action. Internalizing this mantra makes it easy to make the hard choices for your career. This is the key to long-term career success.

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