The Evolving and Dissolving Career Ladder
Good friend and career development expert Julie Winkle Giulioni, in her book Promotions Are So Yesterday — Redefine Career Development. Help Employees Thrive challenges (and guides) us to rethink almost everything about supporting the growth of our team members.
The traditional career ladder is less relevant now. While advancement is possible, there are many other valuable career dimensions for us to explore and experience. Julie’s research highlights seven alternative ways to grow. Her core idea is that individuals must take ownership of their careers—don’t wait for your employer; actively pursue growth that fits your priorities. (Check our her excellent, free assessment for her Multi-Dimensional Career Framework and find out what your priority dimensions are.)
I agree.
Building on Julie’s guidance, I see in my coaching work—whether with executives or professionals reimagining their careers—that ownership and intentional design are vital. The landscape is complex, and determining your own direction is essential.
Own your career. Use design thinking as your guide.
The design thinking process moves through the stages of Empathize, Define, Ideate, Prototype, and Test. I’ve long believed we should DESIGN our career steps, and this framework offers powerful support.
Empathize — focus on understanding you deeply.
What do others view as your superpowers? When are you at your best in professional settings? (What role? What situations? What type of people are you around?)
Tuning in to you at this stage of your career helps identify options and points you to one or more of the dimensions Julie describes in her work.
Define — describe the problem you are striving to solve at this next career stage.
It helps to define what I call life-stage filters — the issues that are essential to you now — and use them to frame the parameters for your next step.
Fair warning: people’s default problem frame is too often “I need a new job.” While that may be true, this framing often leads others to define your next stage for you. For example, on a down day, a recruiter approaches you about an opportunity outside your firm. You engage, get a job, and wake up to find you just traded walls and logos for a solution that didn’t solve the real problem.
Ideate — cast a wide net and then converge.
I love this part of planning your next career step. If you’ve focused on one or two of Julie’s career dimensions, it’s time to dial up your divergent thinking and explore ideas that might fit your priority dimension(s) and meet your life-stage filters.
Fair warning: we tend to CONVERGE on ideas. I encourage you to go crazy with ideas at first. Ask for input from your significant other. Think about the things you’ve always wanted to do. Make a list. Keep it visible. Jump and build. Set a quota for ideas. (It turns out that if you want a good idea, you need a lot of ideas.)
As your creative juices run dry, cluster like-kind ideas, look for themes, and then run ideas through your life-stage filters. (I help clients build a multi-dimensional/multi-variate weighted model, which is way more complicated-sounding than reality. Reach out if interested in ideas for this.)
As you reduce to a few good ideas that fit your life-stage filters and tie to the career dimensions you are interested in, it’s time to Prototype.
Prototype — explore and examine options beyond the screen.
For career designers, this is much more about deeper exploration. Engage with people doing the work you are considering. Shadow them. Learn what they love and don’t love. Assess the skills required for success and gauge what it might take for you to enhance your skills or acquire new ones.
Fair warning: don’t get stuck behind a screen at this stage. Push away and engage.
Test — spend the time and walk the work
This is the step that too many of us skip. Interviewing for a job isn’t testing anything. You end up making a leap of faith, often with no net. If you are truly designing your next step, you are trying it on for fit.
An example I reference in my Career Re-Mix coaching is, if you always loved the idea of owning a hot dog stand, you should find one twenty miles from your home and work at it for a week. The fantasy and reality often don’t match.
In the workplace, create opportunities to get involved in projects that interest you. Volunteer as needed. Work with your manager to explore rotation opportunities in areas that you are interested in learning more about. And if you’ve done your diligence, consider internal shifts. Ideally, you are working with a supportive manager who is driven to help you and keep you in the organization, not hoard you in their function. (Sadly, this isn’t always the case.)
Final thoughts for now
The career ladder still exists in some form—organizations maintain levels and pathways. What’s changed is how we approach them: by investing in core skills and mindsets, you control your progression and open new opportunities.
Despite greater complexity than decades ago, you must own your career. Assert control, do the work, and drive growth and progress that fits your goals.
-For experienced professionals interested in changing careers, check out Career Re-Mix and drop me a note if you want to learn more.