never in church

Well you are certainly free to take any advice on this board. But I suggest you emulate people who have been successful in the business world, specifically large organizations. Perhaps even people who have degrees relating to the subject.

For you, On Ramp, I suggest you look up the definition of enlightened self interest. You might not disagree with me if you knew what I was talking about.

Being "successful" in the business world, and "climbing the corporate ladder" are not necessarily related imo. The larger the organization, the worse it gets and I've been with some of the largest. If you aspire to get "to the top", then MRM offers sound advice, but that's not the only way to play the "corporate game" ...to each his own.

I've got two equally highly qualified candidates for one great, high paying job with my company - Off Kilter and MRM. Please excuse me while I take a nanosecond to decide who to hire.

I've never had to toot my own horn.
Also, I've typically found that those who do, need to.

that's good news for me. I wouldn't accept your corporate job, anyway. I don't do the "full time 9 to 5" gig. that's the sheep mentality. baaahhh :)

I don't need someone to tell me when I need to show up at a building and what time to leave. I do it my own way. To each his own, I guess.

Can't argue with that. I do too (but wouldn't if I was a corporate kinda guy in a corporate situation - which is what this post is about...I think).

Give it up and get self employed; no tooting required, just results that speak for themselves.

Otherwise, toot away, cuz nobody else is gonna toot it for you.

Storytime:
A wild fox meets a dog in the forest and the dog convinces the fox to come back to his home where he has a nicely secured yard, meals provided, warm bed, etc. The fox enjoys the comforts for a day or two and then the dog finds the fox jumping over the fence. The dog yells out to the fox, "hey, where are you going?". The fox says back to the dog, "I can't live like this, sorry I must be on my way."

Fox or Dog?

So how do the self-employed drum-up business? They never have to sell themselves, or provide examples of results?

Two things:
1) Pick your battles very carefully. Only fight those that can be won and that are worth winning.
2) Always try to make those around you sucessful. If your team suceeds, you suceed. If they fail, you fail no matter how much better tjhan them you might look.
If you do that they wil lreturn the favor and will support you and toot your horn for you.
you will end up looking much better than if you tooted your own horn.

Every sucess I've achieved was in no small part due to the support of those around me. The biggest failure in business i ever had was when I was a lone wolf and only cared about myself and those around me knew it. They managed to shoot me down in flames quickly.

There is one other way that works, but it may be viewed as some as being a tad sleazy.
Approach your boss or someone high up in the company you respect, usually someone who is older or more experienced.

Set up a private meeting with them and tell them that you respect them and their work and ask them if they would consider taking on a mentor role, helping you develop to your potential.
If they say yes you have it made (as long as you make the effort).
not only will you get valuable advice, they will share with you certain lessons that may not be apparent. they will take an interest in your success and will take steps to ensure it. their ego will take over. If someone successful takes on a mentor-ship role they would consider it their failure if you fail.

I've done this and it works, and I am currently acting as a mentor to two young up-and-comers. I told my wife about it and explained that I was training my next boss. She asked why i would do that, I said that if they do climb that ladder I would prefer they consider me a valuable ally and resource than a hindrance.
Not only that, it's good for the company and the right thing to do. Most companies today and very weak in developing the next generation of leaders.

Sammy, you're in a different "role" than I've ever been in, but I've seen lots of this "mentoring" too over the years, and it's not all that "rosy" from my perspective. From my experience, most of the time, the "mentoree" is designated before they are even hired, and the candidate is placed on a management "fast track" regardless of other consequences. While it may work out well for the mentor, and the "mentoree", guess what it does for the morale of everyone else who's not in "the club"? While a bit idealistic, I'm a proponent of a "level playing field" for employees, and your version of "corporate america" is what's wrong imo. Serious question for you: would you promote (or give special favors to) one of your "mentorees" over a candidate with higher qualifications due to "your" vested interest (or maybe you just like the candidate better)? That's the reality that I've experienced, and it's not better for the company in the long run. Don't get me wrong, I'm not bitter, but I've seen too many "qualified worker bees" have their career paths squashed due to the type of favortisim that you have described. If I come across as having a "bad attitude" towards management...it's learned behavior :).

Sure they do, but action speaks louder than words.

Toot, Toot!
 

Legion,
I could tell you, but then I'd be tooting my own horn now wouldn't I???:eek:
Looks like Milt chimed in for me anyway!
I am a volunteer teacher at our local high school; I teach an "entrepeneur/business" introductory course there. I actually take this stuff VERY seriously, as its a passion of my life. Took me over 30 years of being self employed to actually feel successful enough to talk about it. I have many philosophies on the subject and I'm somewhat of a "Lifestyle Evangelist" too.

I believe success should be clearly evident in your day to day calendar; and not from your jaw jacking. I believe in setting goals, having dreams and continually developing yourself. (living things either grow or die)

If you haven't read "Rich Dad, Poor Dad" by Robert Kiyosaki, do so.
Also other books I've enjoyed along this topic are:
- Why We Want You To Be Rich; by Kiyosaki & Trump
- Buy it by the acre, Sell it by the foot; by Sam Allman
- Real Estate Investing in Canada; by Don Campbell

For self development in the leadership role; the absolute bible is "Developing the Leader Within You" by Dr. John Maxwell (my favorite author); he also has tons of books published, all worth reading.

Success is your daily habits (here I am lurking on Pelican again - oh no!), make reading part of your daily habits... just 15 minutes a day!!! (Pelican Board doesn't always count?)

As for tooting your own horn, there is a childish desire in each and everyone of us that has children uttering the words "look at me Dad, look at me!" It is a natural human characteristic to want to share and be recognized for our achievements. Recognition is probably the biggest motivator of men in the World today! For the average person, their successes will not be that many, or that outstanding; but for the high achiever, they will be Daily. Therefore, the high achiever has to learn (wisdom) the skill of letting their actions speak for their achievements; as screaming "look at me" all day long is bound to annoy everyone else; people don't want to know about all your Success, they want to know that you care about them first..... People won't care what you know, until they know that you care.

It is very easy to be successful; kind of like a Porsche 993 Twin Turbo racing against a Chevette, the race is really unfair and heavily sided to begin with; meaning that becoming Successful today is really very simple ........ "Funny, the harder I work, the Luckier I get" concept. How do you work hard?

First; you'll need to define "Success" as it applies to you?
What's the point of being successful if you dont even know what success is? What is success to you? Write down your full definition, then start working towards it. I have achieved 'success' many times over (oops a toot); as my personal definition is constantly changing; yours will too.

Now I'm off topic......... probably another thread down the road......

I've read many of your posts Legion, and you're a smart guy that respects others; I thought I'd take a proper minute to reply here, some of my personal thoughts for the infamous OT Board.

Have a great day today SmileWavy

Robert, thank you for the insightful post.

manage up.

Very good question.
An answer? I dunno. I'd like to think that I would be impartial and fair but I can't say it wouldn't have some influence.
Fortunately I haven't put myself in that situation. My "mentorees" are young mechanical engineers with very little experience. I work with them but they do not report directly to me and probably never will. If anything I may end up reporting to them someday if I'm not retired by then. In that case I would think it would work in my favor.

When i was a youngster my mentor was the department manager. It was in informal aggreement but it did work in my favor. Did I take the promotion? Yep. Was I qualified? Yep. did the mentoring role have some influence on my getting the promotion? Probably a little, but I never lost any sleep over it. I considered it smart business. Now if I got a promotion I didn't deserve or wasn't qualified for, that would be a different story.

Realistically this happens every day. Suppose you were a department manager that hires a new guy. You want him to do well because if he doesn't, it makes you look bad because you hired the wrong guy. So..... you try to make sure he does well so it reflects possitively on your hiring ability.

I do not support a formal structured mentoring program, but if a young guy needs or asks for help getting to learn the ropes I am glad to help.
that goes back to my first statement of helping the team suceed helps me suceed.

Now back to the second part of your post:
If you see the fast-track newbies getting a better deal, what would it take to get on that side of the fence? Being on the other side and getting stepped over isn't where you want to be, is it that exclusive of a club that you can't cross lines and play their game? I know it might leave a bad tase in your mouth but it tastes better than bitter resentment.

I see something similar all the time based on what degree a person has and where they went to school. I used to resent the heck out of it until one day I wised up and went back to school. I've been going back to school for 20 years ;) I hate having to listen to professors who have no real-world experience talking about something I've been doing for nearly 3 decades but other than that it's kinda fun. It has opened doors for me and I'm almost done getting my second degree. It won't do me any good at this company tho unless I get an MBA and I'm prolly too old and too close to retirement to fit into that mold here.
Plus I don't want to be a department manager. I'm pretty much happy where I'm at.

I have no resentment whatsoever, but was really just making an observation about "corporate life" as I have experienced it. I'm a "techie" through and though, and although I had the "management path" carrot dangled in front of me many years ago, I have no regrets about my career path choice. I disdain meetings, politics, etc. and simply would not be a "good fit", and I KNOW IT :)!
I do think my observations are a bit "jaded" due to the fact that I've had more managers (1st, 2nd, 3rd level) in IT than I can recall over the years and this seems to be "by corporate design". I also think the IT field is a bit different than some...typically a bunch of ("techie" smart) IT geeks being managed by folks who aren't necessarily in the same league "technically", and have a fraction of the "real world experiences". Take that scenario, lay off half your work force, throw in some consultants, outsourcing vendors, etc. and it's not a pretty picture :(

What I have found in my corporate career is that the ones who do not know how to do their jobs get moved up and those who can do the job at hand remain. I came to the conclusion that those doing their jobs were not expendable to move up because corporate needs the jobs at hand taken care of and those who did not produce were less of a liability to take off the line so to speak. Anyone else experience this phenomena?

I wouldn't call that a phenomena... typical maybe :).