Wendy knew she needed help. Things had gone poorly at work recently, so poorly that Wendy could see the handwriting on the wall that she might soon no longer have a job. Indeed, her company had already brought in a temp worker, ostensibly to “help” her, when Wendy suspected that the temp would soon have her job. To make matters worse, everyone loved the temp, while they hardly spoke to Wendy. Wendy was desperate to get help improving at her job. But to whom was she to turn, when no one seemed willing to help?
Control
Many of us want to do better at our job but don’t know to whom to turn to do so. Doing better at your job isn’t all on you. If job improvement were always within your sole reach and control, then you could focus on your own interests and development, to just get after it. But doing better at your job isn’t entirely within your control. Sometimes, others need to do differently or do better for you to do better, too. And even if job improvement is entirely within your control, you might need the help of others to know what to do to improve. If you’re struggling with your job, or even if you’re not struggling but just want to do better, then consider on whom you might rely for help, whether that help involves them doing something for you or just advising you what to do for yourself.
Team
Here’s another way to think about this subject of who can give you the best job help: the best performers in any job tend to have a strong team around them. You may not be a famous athlete, actor, or musician with an entourage of agents, trainers, nutritionists, public-relations managers, and financial advisors. But no matter your job, industry, seniority, standing, or role, you can still assemble a team around you. As a young lawyer, my first client of my own was a teenage businessman without a high school diploma who had just bought himself a beat up old tow truck and needed advice on a tow contract and state authority. That young man had little idea of what he was doing, except that he knew he needed a team of people around him who cared about him and knew at least a little more than he did. That young man is now a rich and unimaginably successful older man because he knew to choose and rely on people who would help him.
Spouse
Your spouse, if you have one, or if you’re not married then a significant other with whom you live, who knows you well, and who depends on your love, care, or support, is a first person to whom to turn for job help. You may think it strange to turn to your spouse for job help when your spouse may know little of what you do or with whom, for whom, and how you do it. Spouses may also lack any relevant technical knowledge or skill. But they know you better than anyone else in the world. And your job success depends only in part on the technical aspects of your job. Your job success depends equally as much on you. You have probably also shared with your spouse, directly or indirectly, what you’re thinking about work and how work is affecting you. A spouse isn’t simply a cheerleader. To put it bluntly, your spouse knows your faults, too. If you’re struggling at work, your spouse may know your character or personality traits that are contributing to those struggles. If, instead, you’re doing fine at work but wish to improve, your spouse may know your character and personality traits on which you could draw to improve. Spouses lacking any technical or professional expertise can still be founts of wisdom and insight when the subject turns to why their spouse may be languishing at work. Consider turning to your spouse for help. Your spouse may also be able to relieve you of something in the marital relationship or home that is interfering unduly with your work. Don’t demand and accuse. But a gentle discussion of your work struggles may spur your spouse toward home reforms that can help you.
Children
Children are another potential, if unconventional, source for job help. Your children, like your spouse, know you well, too. If you have adult children, they may have their own insights into both you and the work world that could guide you. Even if not, they may care so deeply about you that they can offer you the warmth and encouragement you need. If, instead, you have teenage children, they may be interested in learning from you about your job including its opportunities and challenges. Sharing with them simply to instruct them in the ways of the work world may help you discern what you have going on with your job that’s bugging you. Sometimes, you just need to hear yourself speak to someone who cares about you, to discern your own issues. Don’t burden your children with your concerns. But sharing with them about your work, in instructive ways, may help you put your job in a better perspective. Your children may also better appreciate and respect what you do, which alone may contribute to resolving your work issues.
Parents
Parents can also be helpful with job issues. Your parents inevitably have greater life experience than you. That experience may not necessarily make them wise as to your particular job issues. And you shouldn’t burden your parents with your job problems, just as you shouldn’t burden your spouse or children. But your parents, like your spouse and children, know things about you that others don’t know. Your parents may be able to use their general life experience and their specific insights about you, to give you a tip or two. You can even gain perspective on your job from your offhand comment or two to your parents about it and their offhand responses. If you have a closer relationship with one or both of your parents, and you value their insights on work and other life issues, then you might arrange to take some time to check in with them on your job progress, opportunities, challenges, and issues.
Friends
Friends can also be a surprising source of insight and experience relative to one’s job issues. Once again, you don’t want to burden your friendships with deep dives into your job struggles. Keep your friendships healthy. But a friend in need is a friend indeed. One’s friends are generally others in similar stations in life to your own. Your friends generally know what you’re going through because they’re going through the same things, too. Their familiarity with your challenges and their natural insight into you can give you fresh perspectives on your job issues. It doesn’t have to take an hour of intense discussion and review. The insight of a friend can follow a thirty-second mention or five-minute description of what’s going on at work for you, followed by their admonishing, cautionary, encouraging, or guiding comment or two. That’s how friendships can work, when we check in with one another to see how we’re each doing. You don’t have to hide job challenges from your friends, especially if you can pick and choose the wiser and more trustworthy of your friends to share a little more of what’s going on at work for you.
Supervisors
You’d naturally think that your job supervisor would be a good one to help you with your job opportunities and issues. And that may be so. Supervisors generally have direct and immediate knowledge of the work they supervise. A supervisor’s role is to know what you’re doing at work and to measure that work against the employer’s standards. Who better, then, to help you understand your job opportunities, challenges, failures, and successes? Cultivate the best relationship you can with your supervisor so that you have your supervisor’s interest, respect, and trust. Ask your supervisor how you’re doing, and listen carefully to your supervisor’s assessment. Ask your supervisor how you can improve, and then ask your supervisor for the time, resources, training, or equipment you need to make those improvements. Don’t wait for your employer to impose a corrective action plan that is often the first significant step toward termination. Instead, enlist your supervisor’s help to form an improvement plan before you face any formal job action. Then, use the plan to show your supervisor your improvement and get your supervisor’s support for further improvement.
Co-Workers
Co-workers can also be a great source of help for job improvement and success. When you express to your co-workers that you want to succeed at your job through continuous growth and improvement, you can enlist their admiration and support. You can positively influence not only your work relationships but also your workplace’s culture. Your expressed desire to improve may relieve your co-workers of their annoyance at your current limitations and doubts over your devotion to or skill at your work. You may also get their immediate help, which might begin with some key job advice but could also include their active job support and relief. You may find your co-workers willing to do their own jobs differently in ways that help you. If your co-workers are doing the same work as you or similar work to you, your co-workers may know more about the work you do than anyone else, including your supervisor. A few tips, tools, and methods from your co-workers, and maybe a little adjustment in their own work, could make a huge difference in how well you do. Take a co-worker to lunch or bring donuts to work, get some friendly job advice, and then offer to help them, too.
Owners
Your company’s owner or owners may also be a source for your job advice and improvement. Owners can be heavily involved in a small business, especially one that they founded and built from the ground up. They may know everything about every role and function, and how the entity must bring those roles and functions together into an integrated business. Your company’s owner or owners may also know you, your gifts and talents, and your defects and faults. In that sense, they could be good job advisors for you. If they are not your direct supervisor, then whatever they may have to say to you in the way of encouragement, confirmation, or correction could be especially valuable, giving you insight outside of your supervisor’s direct oversight role. Owners can have a heart for their workers, when supervisors may only have a mind for ensuring the fitness of the supervised work. Your company’s owner may be able and willing to share something with you that you could not hear from anyone else in the company. Don’t go around supervisors and managers to complain to an owner. You could get fired for doing so. But if your employment brings you into natural contact with your company’s owner, and the owner inquires directly of you about your work or offers job advice, then listen for what you can learn.
Mentors
A prior chapter already suggested the value of finding a job mentor. A mentor isn’t usually going to tell you how to do your job better, in the way that a supervisor might. But a mentor might be able to communicate, in words or through modeling behavior and demeanor, a better way to approach a job including the right attitude to hold. Mentors are generally those who had sufficient success in a job to distinguish them for their aptitude, insight, and wisdom. A mentor might not be the most skilled at a job but would generally be the most wise about the job. Look for one of those mentors. The wisdom a mentor imparts may help you adjust your attitude or expectations, and reset your overall course. A mentor’s wisdom may alternatively help you see your employer’s interests in a new light or give you a tip on how to resolve an employment issue or dispute. If you can’t find a mentor among your company’s senior or retired personnel, then look for one at your school or place of training, or among the leadership positions in your trade, industry, or profession. And yes, those leaders will take an earnest and committed worker under their wing. Don’t sell yourself short. Desire often means more than talent.
Educators
Another way to get help is from those whose job is to prepare others for success in the workplace. Whatever formal or informal program of training or education you had to complete to make your way into your current job depended on instructors who knew the job. If you lack the knowledge or skills to do your job well, you may need additional training or education. Going back to school, even nights, weekends, or online, to complete an undergraduate or graduate degree, or a certificate or vocational program, may be all you need to take the next step in your job role. Compare your educational credentials to the most-successful individuals doing your same job in your workplace or a similar workplace. If they have training or education you lack, consider completing that program to advance your job knowledge and skills. Even if you cannot pursue a full program, taking a single course or seminar may be enough to make significant differences. If you had instructors with whom you were especially close in your program of education, you might even be able to get a tip or two from them about your current job issues.
Reflection
Make a list of who cares the most about your job success. Next to each name, record the reasons why they care. Then make a plan to approach each of those individuals, using your understanding of why they care about your job success to invite them to help you become more successful in certain job areas. As to each of those individuals, project where they might be able to help you before you ask them to help, so that you have something to address with them if they don’t understand the nature of your request. In other words, why they care about your job success will be different for each of them. And their reasons for caring may point you to how they might be able to help. Use your insight about why they care about your job success as an opener or introduction for why you’re asking them to help. Even if you don’t approach them all or any of them immediately, just thinking about the people surrounding you who care about your job success may give you encouragement to improve.
Key Points
Success may only be partly within your control, depending on others.
The best workers tend to have a strong supporting team around them.
Your spouse may be able to play a significant role in your job success.
Sharing job interests instructionally with your children may help you.
Hearing what your parents think of your job approach can help, too.
Friends are another potential source of job insight and guidance.
Your work supervisor is principally responsible for your job success.
Your co-workers can be reliable sources of job insight.
Your company’s owners may be willing to share job advice.
A mentor can help you adjust your attitude and approach to work.
Vocational instruction can be another way to get help with job success.