By James Bugden, Career Coach · Senior Recruiter @ Uber
·Based on "Secrets of the Career Game" by Kendall Berg
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Kendall Berg is a former director of technology strategy who worked with Capital One, JP Morgan Chase, Samsung, and AT&T. She was offered a CFO position before she turned 30, managed diverse teams across global financial services, and built a network of C-suite leaders. She now runs That Career Coach, where she shares the career playbook most companies never give you.
Her core message is simple: the career game has rules. Most people never learn them. The ones who do move up faster, burn out less, and stop leaving their progression to chance.
I sit on the other side of the table. I'm the person reviewing your resume. I'm in the room when hiring decisions get made. I see who gets promoted and who gets stuck. These 36 secrets match what I've watched play out across thousands of hiring decisions.
This guide is my recruiter's breakdown of her framework. Every concept is from the book. The recruiter reality checks are from my 15+ years of hiring experience.
The templates are designed to be screenshotted or printed. Fill them in. Put them on your desk. Come back to them every 90 days.
The ground rules most people never learn
Here's an analogy I love. Imagine someone asked you to play a game you've never seen before, refused to tell you the rules, and then asked you to bet your livelihood on the outcome. You'd walk away.
But that's what most people do at work every day. They show up, do their job, and hope someone notices.
Here's the reframe. Think of yourself as a business owner. Your skills are the product. Your boss and company are your clients. Your network is your prospect list. When you run your career like a business, you start making decisions differently. You stop saying yes to every request. You start thinking about where your time generates the most value. You evaluate whether your current "client" (employer) is a good fit, or whether you need to find better ones.
This is the hardest truth in the book. And it's backed up with story after story.
Take Erin, a star employee who worked 80-100 hour weeks. Never dropped a ball. Picked up slack from other teams. On paper, she was the top performer. But Erin had burned a bridge with a senior stakeholder named Bob early in her tenure. That one damaged relationship held her back. Bob eventually hired someone on his own team to do Erin's job so he wouldn't have to interact with her. Erin never got promoted. She left the company.
Then there's Stacy. The most knowledgeable person on the team. An absolute subject matter expert. But nobody liked working with her. She hoarded information. She refused to delegate. She used abrasive language in meetings. When Stacy came up for promotion, her manager made a strong case. Everyone nodded along with her technical accomplishments. Then someone asked a simple question: "Does anyone actually like working with her?" The room went quiet. Stacy went from promotion candidate to "needs improvement" in a single meeting.
The book shares a confession I respect. The worst feedback the author ever received was, "You are great at your job, but you aren't great to work with."
Eight years later, the best compliment she received was: "I aspire to communicate as well as you do in difficult situations."
That turnaround took years of intentional work. Communication isn't about defending your opinion. It's about framing your work in terms of what your audience cares about. Their pain points. Their priorities. Their goals. Before your next meeting, write out who will be in the room and what each person's biggest priority is. Then prepare two or three data points that connect your work to their priorities.
When I do screening calls, communication is the first thing I evaluate. Not what you say. How you say it. Do you explain your work clearly in 60 seconds? Do you connect your accomplishments to business outcomes? Most candidates give me a laundry list of tasks. The ones who get advanced to the next round tell me a story about impact.
This section is blunt. If you stay in a toxic workplace, you're the one who gets hurt. If you accept the first offer every time without evaluating fit, you're the one who gets held back. If you stay loyal to a company that doesn't promote you, you're the one who stays stuck.
Think of job searching like dating. Your resume is a dating profile. Interviews are speed dates. Getting hired is "going steady." If you ignore red flags, you end up in an unhealthy marriage.
Write three "passion statements" that describe what fills your cup at work. Not tasks. Core needs.
"I am passionate about having a broad scope of influence and being able to work on different tasks each day."
"I am passionate about leading and developing a team."
"I need to see the output of my efforts directly."
Then map your interview questions to those passion statements. If the answers don't align, the job isn't the right fit, no matter how good the offer looks. One more piece of advice: if the hiring manager is the person you liked least in the interview process, don't take the job. Your direct manager has more influence over your career than almost anyone else in the company.
I tell every candidate I work with to interview the company as hard as the company interviews them. Ask to speak with peers on the team. Ask about turnover. Ask what the manager dislikes about the role. The candidates who skip this step are the same ones back on the market in six months.
Those are the four ground rules. Now let's talk about the work itself. Because not all work is created equal.
Not all work is created equal
All work falls into three categories. This framework changed how I think about what I look for in candidates.
This is your core job. The tasks listed on your job description. Running reports, managing systems, responding to requests. It's the work that maintains your position but rarely gets you promoted. BAU is defined as: tasks core to your job, work isolated to your direct team, repeatable or trainable tasks, and anything that could be automated.
This is the work that drives the company forward. It involves multiple teams. It aligns with company strategy. It solves a key problem. And the outcome is measurable. The criteria: it drives the organization forward, involves three or more teams, aligns with your key skills, solves a key problem, and the outcome is measurable.
This is investing in yourself and your team's culture. Getting certified. Reading. Taking a course. Leading team engagement initiatives. Mentoring.
Track everything you do for a week. Tag each task. The ideal split: 40% BAU, 40-50% high-impact work, 10-20% self-development.
How to divide your time for maximum career progression
Core job, repeatable, team-isolated, automatable
Cross-team projects, drives strategy, measurable outcomes
Training, mentoring, certifications, culture
Too much BAU? Use the Prioritize-Bundle-Rebrand framework:
Prioritize
What's highest value?
Bundle
Combine repetitive requests
Rebrand
Reframe tasks as impact work
If you're highly technical (engineer, scientist, developer), your BAU percentage will be higher. That's expected. But the goal is still to shift as much as possible toward impact work.
The goal isn't to work more. Or to work harder. The goal is to structure your time better. That starts with boundaries. Write them down. Examples: No work on weekends. No work after 5pm. Always take lunch. No work when family is sick.
Here's a three-step process for when your plate overflows.
Prioritize:
Stop saying "Sure, I'll take that on." Start saying "I appreciate this is high priority. Given what's on my plate, A, B, and C, are you comfortable with me deprioritizing C to make space?"
Bundle:
Take repetitive requests and combine them. If you're getting dozens of data requests, build a self-service dashboard instead of answering each one individually.
Rebrand:
What was "running a weekly report" becomes "enabling data-driven decision-making through automated dashboards." Same work. Different framing. Bigger impact.
Here's a personal story from the author. She had 12 projects due on a Friday, the same day as a team offsite. She was crying in an office, planning to skip the event. Her boss sat her down, made her list every task, and they crossed out three, circled two to finish before the offsite, and spread the rest over two weeks. His response: "I wish I'd known you were working on so many different tasks. I could have delegated some."
Full stop. Even amazing managers don't track all of your tasks. It's your responsibility to keep them informed.
30 minutes. Three sections. Every meeting.
Share the impact of your work. Not a task list. Focus on: revenue increased, efficiency gained, risk reduced, problems solved. Drop stakeholder names. Flag upcoming deliverables that will affect your capacity.
Share risks, roadblocks, and decisions you need. Don't wait until things are on fire. Ask: "I need your input on X before I proceed." Flag capacity constraints early.
Discuss your development and get feedback. Ask: "How am I tracking against my goals?" Bring up promotion timelines, skill gaps, and opportunities you want to pursue. Make sure you and your boss are in sync.
If you don't have regular 1-on-1s: Stop reading. Open your calendar. Schedule one now. Biweekly minimum. Weekly is better.
Outside of those meetings, CC your boss on emails related to high-profile projects. Loop them in on changes. Keep them aware.
When I check references, I ask managers about specific projects the candidate listed on their resume. You'd be surprised how often the manager says "I didn't know they were working on that." If your boss doesn't know about your wins, they're not advocating for you in the rooms you're not in.
A project manager could describe their work two ways.
Option A
"I babysat stakeholders to get information by deadlines, tracked budget spend, and created project documentation."
Option B
"I delivered a streamlined solution for technical delivery, increasing development efficiency by 20%, by collaborating with key stakeholders, driving clarity on business requirements, and influencing the business toward the most optimal solution within budget."
Same person. Same project. Completely different perception. The rule: stop describing what you did. Describe what couldn't have happened without you.
This is the difference between a resume that gets a callback and one that gets skipped. I scan resumes for impact language. "Managed a team" tells me nothing. "Grew team revenue 40% by restructuring the client pipeline" tells me everything.
You know the types of work. You know how to talk about them. Now you need to figure out what you're best at, and make sure your company needs it.
Find what makes you exceptional
Take Steve. Great data skills. Good reputation. But he was rarely chosen for high-impact projects. He was known as "the data guy," not as someone who delivered results. When the author put him on her team, she asked everyone to throw out ideas for what was going wrong in the organization. Steve came up with a brilliant idea. She assigned the project to him. Steve partnered across stakeholder groups, created a framework, iterated quickly, and validated results with business partners. The project saved the company millions of dollars and drove a 30% efficiency gain. For the first time, Steve wasn't just the data guy. He was the person who delivered impact.
The point: doing your job well is not enough. You need to drive measurable impact. And then you need to make sure the right people know about it.
Here's a question I love: "If a tree falls in the forest and no one is around to hear it, does anyone care?" If you have a skill but no one around you needs it, it won't get you promoted.
The author thrives in chaotic environments. Structure bores her. She adds the most value when things are messy and nobody knows what to do. She chooses companies in overhaul, disarray, or rapid change.
Here's a mismatch story. The author left a startup-like culture for a "golden ticket" company, a name everyone recognizes. She turned down a CFO offer at a smaller company to take a VP role at this bigger firm. It was a terrible fit. The company was bureaucratic, slow-moving, and resistant to innovation. Leaders treated her natural strengths as problems. They saw her results orientation as impatience. They called her networking inappropriate.
The takeaway: take your strengths where they are most needed. Don't force yourself into an environment that doesn't value what you bring.
Here's a 20-skill scoring exercise. Rate yourself 1-10 on each skill (10 = you're better than anyone, 1 = never displayed it). Then get three other people to score you: your boss, a peer, and a stakeholder. Average the scores and rank them.
Your "spikes" are the skills that stand 1-2 points above the rest. These are your differentiators. The areas where you go from average to extraordinary. Two skills require special attention regardless of where they fall: communication and collaboration. If either of these lands in your bottom four, fix them first. Nothing else matters if people don't want to work with you.
When I evaluate candidates, I'm looking for spikes. I don't want someone who's "pretty good at everything." I want someone who's exceptional at two or three things. Tell me what makes you different. If you don't, I'll move on to someone who does.
Package your spikes into something people remember
Here's a simple exercise called the 11-List. Write out: Five things you want to be known for at work. Five things you don't want to be known for at work. One mission statement.
Mission example:
"I want to help companies solve complex problems and drive improved efficiencies while building the next generation of leaders."
Compare your 11-List with your spikes from the self-assessment. You should see overlap. People who value productivity tend to spike in drives for results. People who value empathy tend to spike in integrity and moral character. Your personal brand should align with who you already are. Not who you want to be. The goal is not to create a personal brand that is vastly different from who you naturally are. You want to stick closely to what you are good at and then become great.
I don't fully agree with this one. You don't control what people think of you. People bring their own biases, moods, and assumptions to every interaction. But the spirit of the idea is right. You should try to influence perception even if you don't control the outcome. If you never describe your value, people will fill in the blanks themselves. That rarely works in your favor.
Once you have your 11-List, create a one-to-two sentence elevator pitch. Memorize it. Use it everywhere.
Brand statement example:
"I am the individual who you put in the black hole of your business, where you have no idea what is going on. I bring organization, results, and clarity to that part of the business so it can scale. I do this as a passionate people leader who is focused on creating the next generation of great leaders for the company."
Then pick three to five words from your mission statement. Keep them on a sticky note at your desk. Weave those words into every introduction, kickoff meeting, and accomplishment discussion. Over time, something powerful happens. This is called the echo effect. When you describe yourself consistently, people around you start using the same language to describe you. They echo your brand back to you and to others.
95% of conversations about your career, promotion, and growth happen when you are not in the room. Here's a story about advocating for a team member's promotion. The company required an executive sponsor, someone at the VP level or above willing to defend the candidate. The author didn't know this requirement existed until the paperwork was due.
Then something remarkable happened. An executive reached out and offered to sponsor the candidate. Over the next 24 hours, four more VPs offered. The candidate's personal brand had preceded him. Leaders across the business were eager to advocate on his behalf.
When a hiring manager tells me "I need someone who's great at [specific thing]," I immediately think of candidates who've described themselves that way. If you've never told me what makes you different, you won't come to mind. Your brand is your marketing. Do it well and opportunities find you instead of the other way around.
Imposter syndrome is not a lack of confidence. It's a lack of faith in yourself to learn new things. Most people only feel confident when they know all the answers. But confidence should be about trusting your ability to figure things out. You've learned every skill you currently have from scratch at some point. You'll learn the next ones too.
When you don't have the answer, try these phrases:
"That's a great question. I'm fairly positive the answer is X, but let me confirm and send a follow-up."
"That's an interesting perspective. Let me bring the stakeholders together to deliberate and we'll provide an update by Friday."
"Good question. [Colleague X], you're the expert in that space, would you take this one?"
Your brand is built. Your spikes are clear. Now you need to understand how the promotion system works behind closed doors, so you stop hoping and start planning.
How decisions really get made
Five out of six standard competency categories are soft-skills-related. Your company scores you more on collaboration, culture contribution, and working well with others than on your technical ability to do the job. This is a wake-up call for anyone who's been focused purely on technical performance. Overtime hours and training don't matter if you can't work well with people.
The pushback to the "I don't want to be fake" objection: this isn't about kissing up. It's about treating communication, delivery, and personality as skills you develop, like any other.
The people who get promoted are the ones who asked for it, had a plan, and built their own advocacy resources. They didn't walk into their year-end review expecting a surprise.
The competency exercise: Get the competency framework for your role. Score yourself against each competency by seniority level. Then give your boss a blank chart and ask them to score you too.
Scenario 1: Your boss scores you higher than you scored yourself.
You should be having targeted conversations about promotion. What's holding it back? Timeline? Budget? Ask directly.
Scenario 2: Your boss scores you lower.
Understand where the gaps are. Ask for specific examples. Create a plan to close those gaps over the next 6-12 months.
Scenario 3: Scores roughly match.
You're in sync. Now ask: "What would it take for you to feel comfortable advocating for my promotion in the next cycle?"
You're not bragging. You're informing. Think about your last workday. What percentage of your activities did your boss witness? 20%? 50%? For the remaining percentage, your boss has no idea what you did or the effort it required. Start an accomplishment tracker. Update it weekly. Use it in one-on-ones to connect your work to business outcomes.
Cover your assets. When you make a mistake, come to your boss with a plan. Don't hide it and hope it goes away.
"Hi. I wanted to make sure you were informed about a small mistake in the report that went out yesterday. We've already resolved it and will resend. Moving forward, we've done X, Y, Z to prevent this from happening again. Wanted you to be aware."
This shows problem-solving, ownership, and prevention. Your boss hears about it from you first, not from an angry stakeholder.
Here's what happens behind closed doors at most large companies:
Phase 1: Performance review
You and your boss score you against competencies. You have about 80% control here.
Phase 2: Promotion submission
If you're up for promotion, your documentation goes in. Some companies require executive sponsors. Some require "promotion packets." Google, for example, requires a write-up of your work mapped to company values, reviewed by a panel that doesn't include your boss. You have about 60% control here.
Phase 3: Calibration
Leaders bring all reviews into a room and compare across teams. Companies aim for a bell curve: 70% scoring a 3, 10% scoring 1-2, and 20% scoring 4-5. If too many people are rated 5, they move people down. If your score is on the bubble, the number of people in that room who know you and think highly of you determines whether you stay or get bumped.
I've been in these rooms. I've watched people get bumped down because nobody in the room knew who they were. I've watched people stay at the top because three leaders spoke up for them. Your network isn't optional. It's your insurance policy in the rooms you're not in.
Performance is about how well you do your current job. Potential is about how high and how fast you can grow. They're different measurements, and most companies weight potential more heavily for promotion decisions.
Performance vs. Potential: How Companies Secretly Evaluate You
3. Dysfunctional Geniuses
Great vision, zero follow-through on work.
7. High Potentials
Soft skills outshine output. On the leadership radar.
9. Stars ★★★
Top 1-5%. Fast progression. Mastered the game.
2. Up or Out Dilemmas
Strong talkers, weak delivery. Running out of time.
6. Core Players
Good work, good soft skills. Will reach mid-management and plateau.
8. High Performers
The SME in every meeting. Huge workload, high proficiency. Move up 3-4 yrs.
1. Bad Hires
Low everything. Get managed out or fired.
4. Up or Out Grinders
Strong delivery, poor communication. Grinding with no recognition.
5. Workhorses
Go above and beyond. Told "we couldn't do this without you" but never promoted.
Where most people get stuck:
Box 4-5: Working hard, not moving up = soft skills gap
Box 6: Comfortable, no urgency to grow = the "plateau zone"
Where you want to be:
Box 7-8-9: The only boxes that lead to senior leadership
Box 1, Bad hires: Low performance, low potential. Get managed out or fired quickly.
Box 4, Up-or-out grinders: Strong work delivery, poor communication and self-advocacy. They grind all day but get little recognition. Managers take advantage of them with more work instead of investing in their growth.
Box 5, Workhorses: Great at their job, going above and beyond, but can't operate without their manager. They're told "we couldn't do this without you" but aren't included in leadership meetings or cross-collaborative projects.
Box 6, Core players: Good work, good soft skills, will reach middle management and plateau. They're the steady-state players who keep things running.
Box 7, High potentials: Good at their job, but their communication and soft skills outshine their core performance. Brought into high-profile projects often.
Box 8, High performers: The SME you see in every meeting. Handle a huge workload with high proficiency and strong soft skills. Move up every 3-4 years.
Box 9, Stars: 1-5% of the population. Excellent soft skills, fast progression, high-caliber work, naturally good at the game. If you're in this group, you know it.
Companies usually won't tell you which box you're in. But you should be able to feel it based on the feedback you receive.
When I recruit for leadership roles, I'm screening for potential, not performance. Does this person grow into the next level? Do they lead a team? Do they handle ambiguity? I don't care if you ran a perfect report every Thursday. I care if you step into a room of senior leaders and hold your own.
This is the bridge between knowing where you sit and doing something about it. Your individual skills got you to this point. Leadership skills get you to the next level. It's not enough to do your job well and help your team do theirs. You need to grow and develop yourself and your people while keeping your leadership informed about that work. This allows you to move further in your career and bring your team alongside you.
Your insurance policy in the rooms you're not in
Think of your network like a tree. The trunk is your direct leadership chain (your boss, their boss, up the line). The branches and leaves are your lateral, diagonal, and cross-organizational relationships. Most people build a strong trunk and stop there. But the branches are what make you stand out and give you access to resources (opportunities, visibility, advocates).
Take Jim, the best networker in any career book I've read. Jim has never applied for a job. When Jim found himself in a dead-end role after a company restructuring, he didn't submit applications. He hosted and attended events. He joined newsletters and community groups. He did cold outreach to anyone who might know someone in his target space. In two months, he expanded his network tenfold. He had connections at five major players in his target industry. When it came time to formally look for roles, each contact had potential opportunities. Jim had his pick.
Score 20-25 people in your organization across eight criteria: Relationship strength, Seniority, Risk to your progression, Power in the organization, Ability to give you exposure, Fear factor, Validation power, and Future influence on your career. Total and rank everyone. Remove anyone more than two levels above you (put them on a "reach" list). Focus on your top five accessible contacts.
Schedule coffee chats or mentoring sessions within 30 days. If reaching out directly feels inappropriate in your company culture, ask your boss: "As part of my desire to continue to grow, I'm trying to expand my network. I've noticed that [X person] is great at [Y skill]. I'd love to meet with them to learn. Would you be willing to help me make a connection?"
This is counterintuitive but backed by psychology. When someone helps you, they view you as an extension of themselves. They've invested in you. Recommending you feels like recommending their own judgment. The advice: when networking, seek to learn first. Don't offer to help. Ask them to teach you.
Your first conversation with a new connection should achieve three things:
Communication frameworks for difficult situations
Three reasons disagreements go sideways:
1. Your leadership doesn't always want the most direct solution.
Politics exist. Your solution might require collaboration with a team that's unwilling to cooperate. Or leadership is making a play for more scope that your solution doesn't support.
2. Your leadership has context you don't have.
Your solution might fix your problem but create issues elsewhere. Tunnel vision makes you miss the bigger picture.
3. You're not bringing people along on your mental journey.
Natural problem-solvers jump to solutions. But if your solution is three steps ahead of where the room is mentally, people won't follow.
👑
Mindset: Everyone exists to serve them and make their life easier.
Works with you when: They need something from you.
Your role: Support their goals. Remove obstacles. Make them look good.
Key strategy: Support, support, support.
Say this: "I'm here to help you be successful. What exactly do you need?"
🧠
Mindset: They know everything. Decisions without them fail.
Works with you when: You acknowledge their expertise first.
Your role: Defer to their knowledge. Include them early. Do pre-reads with them.
Key strategy: Defer, defer, defer.
Say this: "You have great knowledge. Can you talk me through why this wouldn't work?"
Understanding which type you're dealing with prevents conflict before it starts.
There's a Japanese concept that applies here: nemawashi. It translates as "turning the roots" but means "decisions happen in the hallways." The idea: don't wait for a big meeting to present your idea for the first time. Do pre-reads. Have one-on-one conversations. Build alignment before the formal proposal. If the first time your boss hears your idea is in a meeting with 20 people, your chances of success are low. Do the pre-work instead.
1. Ask a ton of questions.
Phrase your feedback as questions. Instead of "That won't work," say "Can you help me understand how this aligns with the operations team's needs?"
2. Acknowledge before you respond.
When someone proposes something you disagree with, start with "Thank you for bringing that up" before explaining your concern. This makes people feel included rather than steamrolled.
3. Disagree without saying no.
Say "I understand why we'd want to do this, but I have a few concerns..." Share concerns rather than flat disagreement.
4. RASI framework.
Restate the problem. Ask qualifying questions. State your solution. Include others for buy-in.
5. Everything is a yes.
Nothing is impossible if you have enough people, time, or money. Instead of saying no, frame the cost: "We can absolutely do that. It would require adding two headcount and pushing the Q3 timeline back by six weeks. Would you like me to put together those options?"
A framework for communicating with leadership or difficult stakeholders (yes, the acronym is intentional):
Thank them for reaching out. Greet them formally if they're senior or external.
Repeat their question in your own words. Add context to show you understand what they're asking.
Present a solution. Answer the question. Provide next steps.
Show appreciation. Acknowledge their expertise. Remind them you're available for follow-up.
This is Amazon's "disagree and commit" practice. Share your concerns early using the five tools above. If leadership still chooses a different direction, let it go and work to make the project successful.
Triggers matter too. Look at the five things on your "don't want to be known for" list. Those same traits are what trigger you in other people. When a coworker drives you crazy, it's likely because they exhibit a trait you've rejected in yourself. Knowing your triggers lets you prepare.
The biggest skill jump in your career
The jump from senior manager to director is one of the most difficult across all industries. You don't make it without learning to lead, not manage. Many managers know how to manage but not lead. Those become micro-managers. Many leaders don't know how to manage. Those become absent bosses. Finding someone who does both well is rare.
I once hired a senior manager for a team lead role. Strong technical skills. Great interview performance. Within three months, half the team had requested transfers. The problem? He did everything himself. He rewrote his team's work instead of coaching them. He attended every meeting instead of delegating. He was a high performer as an individual contributor, but he had zero management skills. His team felt invisible. When I recruit for management roles now, the first thing I ask is: "Tell me about someone you developed on your team." If the answer is vague, that tells me everything.
What to develop at each stage of your career
Focus: Developing strategy (Rule of Threes). Building a team brand. Comfort with the unknown. Decisions with limited info.
Invest in: An executive coach. At this level, outside counsel is almost a requirement.
Focus: Setting expectations (CODS). Delegation. Check-ins. Understanding each team member's learning style and goals.
Invest in: Coaching or management training. Books and podcasts. Don't wait 11 years for your first training.
Focus: Interpersonal relationship building. Networking with intention. Navigating conflict without saying "no."
Invest in: Getting a mentor. Learning to mentor others. Building relationships before you need them.
Focus: Proactivity. Core work delivery. Asking qualifying questions. Email and meeting etiquette.
Invest in: Certifications. Lateral moves across divisions and industries. Learn your core job inside out.
Effective management requires only three things:
Master these three and you'll be better than 90% of managers.
Why does this work matter? What question are you trying to answer? What stakeholder requested it?
What does the deliverable look like? A pivot table? A dashboard? A slide deck? Be specific, especially with junior team members.
When is the first draft due? The final? What checkpoints exist in between?
Where can they get more information? Who should they partner with? Where's the data?
If you set your team up for success when you assign the work, you'll spend less time fixing things on the back end.
Too many managers are afraid to share credit with their team. They worry the employee will look better than them. This is backwards. As your team does better, you look better. Your goal as a manager should be to constantly replace yourself. When your team can operate without you, you're freed up for more strategic, visible work.
Forget "problem employees." Focus on problem patterns. Like a doctor diagnosing a disease by its symptoms, managers should identify root-cause patterns and treat those.
Three rules for building a team:
Two tools for building strategy:
1. The vision question:
"How would I run my team if I had unlimited money and resources?" Then walk it back to reality and create a roadmap from today to that future state.
2. The rule of threes:
Organize your goals into three categories. More than three overwhelms people. Fewer than three looks like you didn't think it through. Three is the ideal number for people to digest in one sitting.
Protect your energy so everything else works
Mental load, not hours worked, is the real predictor of burnout. Someone working 30-35 hours a week might have a high mental load if they're carrying the planning, follow-up, and quality control for their entire team. Someone working 50 hours with a clearly defined, repeatable scope might have a low mental load.
The best way to manage your boss is to lighten their mental load. Do the thinking upfront. When requesting a raise: research market rates, create a presentation, outline your value and your ask. When advocating for promotion: create a one-pager showing your scope at the next level and the competencies you've demonstrated. When proposing a solution: present three options on a single slide so they can make a decision quickly.
Here's a checklist for identifying a toxic workplace:
If any of these ring true, the advice is direct: quit your job.
Like recovering from a bad relationship, you need time to rebuild after leaving a toxic environment. Go back to your spikes and your 11-List. Rediscover who you are without the toxicity shaping your self-image. Build your brand statement fresh and start weaving it into conversations again.
The honest question most career advice skips
This isn't harsh. It's practical. The skills required for executive leadership can all be learned, but most people won't want to invest the time and discomfort required. The author was offered a CFO position before she turned 30. She turned it down. Her goals had shifted. She no longer wanted long hours. Her problem-solving skills were more impactful in operations than finance. A CFO role no longer aligned with who she was.
Watch out for the "accidental career," taking whatever comes your way without intention. But typical career advice gets flipped. It's not always a straight ladder up. It's a career lattice, moving up, sideways, and diagonally. The most successful people profiled held jobs in multiple departments, industries, and seniority levels. They followed their skills into whatever role allowed them to make the biggest impact.
There's a concept called "ghost culture." This is the culture a CEO thinks exists. The one printed on posters, posted on websites, quoted in interviews. The reality: the culture most employees experience is the subculture of their direct team and supervisor. The broader company culture might exist at the top, but it rarely trickles down consistently.
Strong interview questions for evaluating culture:
"How do you give constructive feedback?"
"How often does the organization allow for progression conversations?"
"What's the average tenure of team members on this team?"
"What's the thing you dislike most about the company and this team?"
And her strongest recommendation: ask to speak with a peer on the team. If the company refuses, that's a severe red flag.
The final secret speaks directly to leaders. One bad hire poisons a team's culture. One bad manager creates a toxic subculture that's hard to undo. As you move up, the culture of your organization depends on the leaders you bring in. Hire for values alignment. Hire for culture fit. Technical skills are teachable. Values are not.
Turn this guide into action today
The candidates who progress fastest are the ones who treat their career like a project. They set goals. They track progress. They adjust every quarter. They don't wait for their annual review to find out where they stand. Do the work in Steps 1-6 and you'll be ahead of 90% of your peers.
1.You are an entrepreneur, and your career is your business.
2.Relationships matter more than the work.
3.Communication is key.
4.No one is responsible for your career but you.
5.You must have and maintain healthy boundaries.
6.Your boss does not know what you are working on.
7.How you talk about your work matters.
8.If you do not have an impact, you will not see progression.
9.An unneeded skill is unvaluable.
10.What people think of you at work is directly in your control.
11.Your brand will enter the room long before you do and leave long after you are gone.
12.People prefer to work with people that they like.
13.A desire for a promotion without a plan will land you exactly where you are now 12 months in the future.
14.Work that your boss doesn't know about doesn't matter.
15.Most conversations about your career will take place without you in the room.
16.Your potential, not your performance, is what gets you into senior leadership.
17.Building your leadership skills allows for not only your success but the success of your team.
18.Your network must extend beyond your own team.
19.Without a network you will fail.
20.People who help you will think of you more fondly than people you help.
21.How you communicate your disagreement is more important than your opinion.
22.Catering your communication to the individual will prevent conflict and disagreements before they arise.
23.You are not always going to get your way.
24.Managing and leading are not the same.
25.Success starts at assignment, not at completion.
26.A successful employee begets a successful leader.
27.Negative patterns are more problematic than negative people.
28.You can't compensate for your team.
29.Strategy is essential.
30.Managing your mental load should take priority over managing your workload.
31.A toxic workplace isn't good for anyone.
32.It takes time to recover from a toxic workplace.
33.Most people will never be executives.
34.The right path for your career is a natural alignment to your skills and interests.
35.Only the culture of your direct manager matters.
36.The leaders you hire determine your company culture.
Keep levelling up your career
"Secrets of the Career Game: 36 Simple Strategies to Win in the Workplace" by Kendall Berg
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This guide is based on Kendall Berg's book "Secrets of the Career Game: 36 Simple Strategies to Win in the Workplace." All framework concepts, secrets, and core methodology credit goes to Kendall Berg. Recruiter perspectives and reality checks are from James Bugden's 15+ years of hiring experience.
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