If you feel stuck in your current career position, you’ll want to learn how to boost it. Focusing on boosting your career is more important now than ever due to the current lack of job security. It can be challenging to start career progression, but it comes naturally once you get the ball rolling.
Keep reading to learn the six ways to boost your career progression in 2023. Let’s get started!
1. Build on Your Skills
Building your employable skills is critical to move your career progression along. You can focus on learning new skills that make you more valuable to your employer or build on the ones you already have. Many employers look for similar skills, so you’ll want to familiarize yourself with them first.
There are many ways to build work skills, including the following methods:
- Read more newsletters, books, and articles on the skills that you want to develop.
- Take classes that focus on the skills you need to improve.
- Join an organization or group.
- Attend more work events.
- Talk with coworkers and do your best to learn from them.
- Volunteer for more projects to build skills.
Overall, increasing and enhancing your skillset will help you further your career. If you’re feeling stuck in a position at work, it’s likely due to you not having the required skills to progress. You’ll need to determine where you’re lacking and do your best to work on those abilities. Your employer will notice you are putting in the work. Obtaining certifications is a valuable way to build on your skills and advance your career. By pursuing certifications in your field, you can gain specialized knowledge and expertise that sets you apart from others in the job market. For instance, certifications like Project Management Professional (PMP) or Six Sigma can be instrumental in showcasing your abilities to manage projects and improve business processes. Similarly, certifications such as Certified Public Accountant (CPA), Chartered Financial Analyst (CFA), and Financial Risk Manager (FRM) are highly regarded in the finance industry and demonstrate your proficiency in specific financial domains. Regularly reviewing and reinforcing the study materials and resources for Series 7, and practicing with sample exams and mock tests can help you become familiar with the exam format and build confidence in your knowledge.
2. Work on Your Professional Network
Next, you must work on your professional network. Knowing more people in your field and having good relationships with them makes it easier to progress your career. Your coworkers might recommend you for more projects or higher-level positions, making it worth it.
Plus, networking gives you access to more resources to build more skills. You and those in your network can also go to each other looking for assistance with work tasks. When we feel comfortable asking for help, it builds a friendlier working environment, and teams complete projects faster and more accurately.
You can build your professional network by:
Talk to your coworkers more and meet people through them.
Go to networking events and other events at your workplace.
Join organizations and groups.
Volunteer your time and meet with new people on new group projects.
Talk with your Alumni association and other college groups.
Keep in touch with everyone in your network.
Build stronger communication skills, both written and spoken.
Establishing a solid professional network takes time, but being part of one can boost your career progression in many ways.
3. Update Your Resume
Boosting your career progression this year might involve moving to a new job. Achieving your goals will be much more difficult if your resume isn’t current. Save time and start updating your resume before switching to a new career. You should constantly be updating it.
Getting your resume writer certification will help you create an outstanding resume that boosts your career. You’ll learn what experiences to include, formatting, and more when working on getting the certification.
You can also reach out to professionals who are already certified. They’ll review your resume and tell you what changes you should make.
In short, having an updated resume will benefit you professionally. Resumes are often the first point of contact you have with a potential employer, so you want to show them your best qualities right out of the gate.
4. Work on Your Portfolio
Much like keeping your resume current, you’ll need to work on your professional portfolio. Collect all of your projects and organize them in your portfolio. It also helps to give your more perspective on how far you’ve come with your career.
Your portfolio would need to include your most successful projects, as well as information on the impact that they had. Including what you learned from the projects also gives potential employers more insight into your skills.
Overall, you should always be working on building your portfolio.
5. Practice Good Time Management Skills
Time management is something that we all can struggle with. Deadlines can be highly stressful, but managing your time better will make you feel more satisfied in your career. Plus, it gives you more time to focus on progressing your career by building your resume or giving more attention to your professional network.
You can start improving your time management today. As you build better habits, it will come much more naturally to you. Here are a few tips to start improving your time management abilities:
Set your priorities and work on the most critical tasks first.
Try not to multitask; you should focus on your current task.
Limit distractions.
Use timers and time management apps. You can also try the Pomodoro Technique with these apps.
Take a break when you feel frustrated. Stepping away and returning to a task is more helpful than forcing your way through it since you could make mistakes you wouldn’t usually make.
Sometimes, people can feel trapped in their current careers due to poor time management skills. If you can master this skill, career progression happens much more naturally, no matter your goals.
6. Learn To Set Boundaries
Lastly, learning to set boundaries and expectations within your career is essential. You’ll want to be able to say no politely and professionally and know when you should say yes. For example, you wouldn’t want to agree to a new project when you already have many important tasks on your plate.
Setting boundaries lets you focus on the tasks you need to complete so you don’t overwhelm yourself. Your career will still progress, even if you don’t take on every project offered to you. Instead, take the ones you’re the most confident will advance your career.
Start Working on Boosting Your Career Now
The sooner that you start working on boosting your career, the sooner you’ll start seeing benefits. If you put it off until next year, you might feel even more trapped within your current position.
To summarize, you should always start by working on your skills and professional network. You can then update your resume and consider switching to a new job if necessary.
