Corporate Survivor with Mei Phing : Career Growth In The Corporate World - Ep237: Feeling stuck at your job? THIS IS FOR YOU.

Starting point is 00:00:00 Welcome to the Corporate Survivor Podcast, where we talk about how to grow your career confidence, build your skills and value, increase your salary, and the many lessons we learn in the corporate world. For more career support, click on over to www.mayping.com. This is Mayping, your corporate leader turned career coach. I hope you enjoy, like, and subscribe. Hey, welcome, welcome back to the Corporate Leader turned Career Coach. I hope you enjoy, like and subscribe. Hey, welcome, welcome back to the Corporate Survivor Podcast. It's me, Mei Ping, as Corporate Leader turned Career Coach and founder of the Corporate Survivor,

Starting point is 00:00:31 the ultimate career program for 9 to 5 professionals just like you. So today, I want to share with you my favorite quote of all time. And that is, if you are not moving forward, you are moving backwards. I repeat, if you're not moving forward, you are moving backwards. Now, the thing is that like, I don't believe in staying stuck. To me, staying stuck could be something that, you know, you decided that, okay, you know, I don't know what to do and therefore I'm not going to do anything or maybe I'm afraid that it's not going to work out and therefore I'm not going to do anything. Now, in your mind, maybe that's, you know, that's fine. Like, I'm just not

Starting point is 00:01:06 going to do anything. Nothing is going to change. But in the context of like how the world is moving, how your workplace is moving, you know, what your boss is thinking, the team environment, the working environment, actually a lot is moving every single day, right? Work never stops just because you feel like you are comfortable where you are or you decided to stay where you are because you are uncomfortable with what to do next so in a way it means that everyone else is actually progressing forward but you are where you are and because everyone else is moving forward and you are kind of like staying where you are it basically means that you are you are getting backwards like you are staying backwards and you continue to move backwards. So the act of not taking a step forward, it actually keeps you not just stuck, it keeps you continue moving backwards in that sense. So the other thing, the other code that

Starting point is 00:01:57 I personally really like as well is the take two steps forward, one step back, right? So it's take two steps forward, one step back. And? So it's take two steps forward, one step back. And why I also really love this code is because it pinpoints action, right? So taking two steps forward. So that would be maybe trying a new strategy, maybe trying a new working method, right? Maybe trying a new job strategy, or maybe getting a new perspective from a coach, or getting a different perspective from a mentor. So basically taking steps forward, trying something new, try something different. But the act of taking steps forward, that means that you are getting creative, right? You are in the problem-solving mode and you are in the

Starting point is 00:02:35 motivated mode and you want to do something and you are doing something. Now, why the one step back, right? Two step forward, one step back is also really, really important to take note is because we don't always get things right the first time. And that is fine, right? Mistakes happen. And maybe the first time you do something, right, you try this new working method and you feel that, hmm, you know, I didn't feel like I applied correctly. That's fine. So two step forward, one step back. And more importantly, the value of it is that you get feedback on what didn't go well and how to improve from that point on. So this is also learning as well. And that allows you to take the better next two steps forward, right?

Starting point is 00:03:13 So two steps forward, one step back. So this is something that you can actually apply regardless of your career situation or your work situation or even your job situation as well. So let me give you an example. So let's say currently right now, you are working very long hours. You feel like you're not really meeting your boss's expectation, but you are working really hard.

Starting point is 00:03:31 But at the same time, your work is a little bit disorganized. You feel like things are not really going that well. So if you continue staying where you are right now, which is basically doing what you have been doing, which is working hard and everything, nothing is actually going to change, right? So what's going to happen is then you will still not be able to meet expectations. Your boss might be angry. Maybe your team members are unhappy with you and you feel like the

Starting point is 00:03:52 relationship with your stakeholders are getting worse. So as time goes by, right, it's not that the work situation is going to continue to be a social situation. It's probably going to get worse. So that's kind of like what I mean by if you're not moving forward, actually, you're moving backwards, meaning the situation might actually continue to be worse as time goes on. And this is very similar with

Starting point is 00:04:14 in terms of like getting visibility, getting your work recognized as well. So if you believe that, hey, you know, I think I did a good job. I think my boss is supposed to recognize me. I'm just going to keep quiet. I'm going to wait till the year end or maybe next year

Starting point is 00:04:24 to see whether I get promoted or not. And maybe you realize that you didn't get promoted because you didn't speak up. So by staying still and just like basically doing nothing, the situation has gotten worse. And maybe you wait for another year. Now this is really the second year, the third year, and still nothing happens, right?

Starting point is 00:04:40 You're not getting increment. You're not getting a salary increment. You're not getting a promotion. So therefore, instead of moving forward, and you may see your other colleagues getting promoted or your friends or your peers moving forward in their career and you feel that you are still stuck where you are right now, which is not really the concept of stuck,

Starting point is 00:04:57 but in a way, you maybe feel a little bit behind. You feel like you are moving backwards as compared to your peers around you, your team members, or even with your friends as well. So this is, again, another example of if you're not moving forward, then you are gradually moving backwards. And this is also something that you can apply to your job search journey. So let's say you are someone who has been trying to look out for jobs, you've been making a lot of applications, but maybe you didn't get interviews at the start then you give up you're like okay you know nobody wants me and then i'm just not going to do anything i feel so demotivated i'm not going

Starting point is 00:05:29 to apply for any more jobs and guess what because you stop applying you stop assessing whether your job strategy works or not you stop getting creative you stop getting motivated eventually you will not get a job right because you have stopped applying and therefore no one knows that you have value to add no one knows that you are a good candidate and therefore nothing happens. Versus if you take that two step forward, then what that means is, okay, maybe re-looking at your resume to see whether am I actually positioning, articulating and selling my value correctly? Really thinking about how you are communicating with recruiters and HR. Are you convincing them that you are a good candidate? Can you clearly communicate that? Or maybe you have managed to get through the interview process, but you didn't manage to get

Starting point is 00:06:08 the job offer. Okay, great. Celebrate yourself for being able to get the interview in the first place. Then now let's dive deep into assessing what happened during the interview. What did the interviewer say? How did you respond? Are you satisfied with their response? What does hiring manager want to hear? Now, just by thinking about all these things right it helps you get creative it helps you be open to a lot more feedback that will help you to improve and therefore like i said your next two step forwards are gonna be a lot better right so of course you're right there's still a lot of learning then you may take you know one step backward from time to time and that's fine but overall you are still moving forward and that is something that is so so so critical because sometimes it's not just about the strategy, but it's your mindset of actually applying the strategy.

Starting point is 00:06:51 And this is actually something that I tell all my career program members. So I have a career program, it's called the Corporate Survivor. And one of the things I really encourage my members to do is to attend our monthly mentoring Q&A call. So even if you cannot attend, you can still submit a question and watch the recording because it keeps you sharp. It keeps you accountable. It keeps you motivated to want to try. And when you're surrounded in a community of other 9-to-5 professionals

Starting point is 00:07:13 just like you, also going through their own journey, having their own career workplace as well as job search challenges, it reminds you that, hey, everyone is also going on their own path. And some days we are progressing. Some days we feel like we're taking a back step. But overall, over a period of 12 months, you are still moving

Starting point is 00:07:32 forward. And eventually you're going to hit the career goal that you really want. You're going to get the job that you want. Your career situation will improve. Your boss will recognize you. Your relationship with stakeholders will definitely get better. And the reason is because you did not give up. You did not give up on yourself. You did not give up on my strategies. You did not give up on your own abilities. And what you actually really needed was just a little bit of feedback, maybe a different perspective, and more importantly, a lot of consistency, a lot of the attitude of not giving up, a lot of self-belief. And I think that is actually super duper important.

Starting point is 00:08:08 So I'll leave you with these two quotes today, which is if you're not moving forward, you're moving backwards as well as take two steps forward, but it's okay to also take one step backward. So two steps forward,

Starting point is 00:08:18 one step backward. So if you are in the Corporate Survivor Program, then I'll see you in this month's monthly mentoring call this weekend. So with that, I'll see you in the nextate Survivor Program, then I'll see you in this month's monthly mentoring call this weekend. So with that, I'll see you in the next episode. Bye.

Corporate Survivor with Mei Phing : Career Growth In The Corporate World - Ep237: Feeling stuck at your job? THIS IS FOR YOU.

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