Your Next Promotion Doesn't Live in Your Job Description

Your job description is a trap. 

Most people think if they just do their job well, they’ll get promoted. Keep your head down, execute, and eventually it works out. In reality, that keeps you exactly where you are. 

In this episode, I break down why your job description is only the baseline, and what actually drives promotions. This includes how to align with your boss, how to start operating at the next level before you’re given the title, and how to build real leverage in your role. 

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Transcript

SPEAKER_00 0:04

Your next promotion does not live in your job description. And look, this podcast above anything else is about you. It's about you getting promoted. It's about you getting that job you want. And I hope you do. But a lot of people think, well, if I go to take my job and I just keep my head down and do my job description, that's enough to get promoted, right? And what I'm saying is no, it's not. And that's not only based on my experience, but also too watching people on my team. Which is why I think your job description is the biggest trap in your career. And nobody talks about it. But that's exactly why we're going to talk about it today. And more importantly, what are the things within your control to change about it? My name is Bobby. I'm the founder of New Game Careers, and this podcast exists to make you more promotable and more hireable. But if you want exact yes or no actions on how to make those things real, you can find out more about my system at NewGamecareers.com. But for today, let's talk a little bit more about why your job description is a trap that nobody talks about. And I think nobody talks about it for obvious reasons. Here, if you do this, you'll be successful, right? Makes sense, face value. But here's the thing. Let's be real. First, let's start by how many times have you ever read a job description that you're excited about? Because you already know that they all sound like they're written by the same person, right? This high-profile, high impact job at a dynamic, fast-paced, yada yada yada. Like, and look, I'm not faulting anybody for that. I'm not anti-establishment, but come on, let's be honest. This is probably written by somebody, an HR, seven years ago, who had 400 things to do that day, and this was a box they checked. And they probably have never done that job. And I'm not faulting them for that either. Look, that's just how it goes. But the fact remains, most of the time, it's not 100% accurate to begin with. So when you look at your job description, really what that is, and what I want you to think of it as is like that's pretty much a wish list and loose guidelines. And honestly, it's the bare minimum of what you should be doing. You should look at your job description as not as if I do this to a T, I'm gonna get promoted. You should look at it as if I do this to a T, I'm probably not gonna get fired. Right? Like, as long as you're not a behavioral wreck, that's what it takes to keep you in your chair, to keep you in your seat. But honestly, if you just stick to that, that puts you in a box. That makes you labeled as a person who, yeah, you're a role player. And there's nothing wrong with that. I'm not saying if you don't want to set the world on fire, like, hey, cool, that's your prerogative, right on. But this podcast is about leveling up. This podcast is about what you can do to differentiate yourself to make you the person that the hiring manager says, Yep, that's the person. That's the person I want sitting in my chair when I move to the next level. And most of the time, most of the time, your job description is just not enough. And so, with that said, I want you to understand the phrase that's not in my job description. If you want to move up in your career, like that phrase is poison. You have to understand that is killing you and your opportunities to move up. And I'm not saying, I'm not saying before people are like, whoa, whoa, I shouldn't do it to my job description. Like, no, it's not that. But if somebody asks you to do something and you have the ability to do it and you have the bandwidth, 100% of the time, like you should look at that as a learning opportunity. You should say yes. Because if your goal is to move up in your career, sticking to your job description, being confined to that box, to that small space that was written by somebody seven years ago in HR, that's not going to get you to the next level. So I'd rather spend more time on the things that you should focus on than saying what you shouldn't do. But the long and short of it is this the phrase that's not in my job description, throw that out the window. That phrase should be dead to you. So let's talk about the things that you should prioritize. The first thing is understand with your boss, like align with them what are your primary job functions. Because really, at the end of the day, what I say in terms of how I operate in my job, and this will be a whole nother episode. My job is to make my boss's life easier. Because I know that's the gatekeeper. But to me, I don't go into my job looking at it as I'm confined to a one-page sheet of paper. I think, okay, what does my boss need me to do? Because I work for them, right? And like, how can I get as good at that as humanly possible? Because to me, at the end of the day, if I'm going to get promoted or I'm going to level up in my career, like I'm going through them. That is an inevitability. That's never going to change. Now, the next level up is if you want to be promoted at your job, here's what you should be learning. You should be learning the job that you want. Because if you can prove that you can already do that job, it's going to make you a lot harder to challenge when it comes time for you to say, you know what? I want to be promoted to strategic account manager or whatever the position is, right? Because if you're already doing those things and it's indisputable for you, look, like that's gold. And I've even gone as far as saying, what is the job description of the job above me? Now, take it with a grain of salt for everything that I just said before this, but if you can get a general feel for that, that's a really good starting point for understanding. Okay, now not only how do you do the bare minimum and get in cahoots with your boss, but what do you start doing to gain leverage in terms of that next conversation about your next promotion? But if you can start doing the job above yours, that's a ton of leverage in terms of your next promotion conversation with your boss. And also another way of doing this would be sitting down with somebody that you get along with well at work that has the job that you want and say, Hey, what do you do differently in this job than you did in the job before it? And what are the things that you would say make you really good at this job? And what are the things that you would say are big challenges about this job? Because if you can show up to the table with your boss when you're asking for a promotion or a raise and you say, Hey, I want to be promoted to strategic account manager. And look, I understand. That's gonna require me to go from A to B. But here's what I would say to that. The other day in this meeting, I did this. This project, I did that. If you come to the table and you can anticipate the questions surrounding whether or not you're qualified for the job, but you can already dispel that before they even start, that gives you a massive, massive advantage. So to summarize, if you want a new job or a new role within an organization, don't do your job description. Do that job description. But even more than that, align with the people that are really good at that job and understand what's their secret sauce so you can start doing the same thing. I've had exact conversations, which will also be another podcast someday, which is look, like when I was able to define what my boss really cared about and do those things, that's 100% what got me my first big promotion. And so why do I believe this works? It's because those are the exact same steps I've done every single time I've gotten promoted. Identify what the goals are, take daily actions to make those goals real, and eventually it's gonna happen. But that's a hell of a lot sooner than sitting around doing your job description waiting for something to come to fruition that just may never happen. Now, let's lean into that concept just a little bit further into the final level of like Jedi master mind trick. Like, if you do this, I will guarantee you, I will guarantee you your promotion is going to happen dramatically faster than it otherwise would have, which is learn your boss's job. Now, this is pretty nuanced because depending on how many levels above you your boss is or how many people that they manage, this could look completely different depending on your situation. But what I will say is this, just as a general like point of advice, your boss, if they are trying to move to the next level, is always going to have to rationalize who is taking their spot, or they are always going to have to rationalize what cohort of people is going to complete the functions that they're doing today. So if you go to your boss and you say, Hey, you know, I've gotten to a point where I'm really good at my core functions based on the conversation we had earlier, like I had alluded to five minutes ago or whatever. But I'd really like to take on some more. And I'd really like to understand a little bit more about what you know about insert something here. Maybe it's forecasting, maybe it's coding, maybe it's, I don't know, but something that's above your pay grade, right? And if you approach them with that and you say, I want to take on more, and you can start learning that, they're gonna look at you differently. They're gonna look at you as a partner, they're gonna look at you as somebody who wants to understand more instead of just brings them problems, because that's what a lot of people do. And that's what bosses are there for. I'm not faulting people for that. I'm just saying, like, it's very rare that you have somebody coming to you as a leader saying, What can I take off of your plate? So if you continue to do this and you develop that level of rapport with your boss and you can do the things that you do on a daily basis, but you can also do the things that they can do, and you repeat that process until you say, Hey, honestly, I I think I can do most of the things that you can do in your role. And of course, humbly and graciously, you never want to piss the boss off by saying I'm as good or better as whatever as you. Like, don't do that. That is never going to be the right answer. But if you can go to your boss in your review or in three months or six months or whatever, and you say, Hey, you know what? If you look at this over this last X amount of time, I've learned these four things that you can do. Like, what else can you teach me? Eventually, you are going to be the person that pops into your boss's head when they're having a conversation with their boss about, hey, they want to get promoted. And you know what their boss is going to ask them? Like I said earlier, they're going to say, Okay, well, what do we do about your role? Because that opens up a hole. And if you want to build incredible leverage with your boss, if you can be the person that sure as shit, you're the first person that pops in their head, like that's a pretty powerful position to be in. So let's review those three things that you should do. One, you should align with your boss and what your job description really is. And you should get really good at it because, again, that's the bare minimum, but you have to be able to do that. Secondarily, you should be able to do the job description of the job that you want, not the job that you have. And a really good way of doing this is A, getting the job description, but B, going and finding somebody that's really good at that job and figuring out what it is that they do to differentiate themselves from their peers. And third, it's going to your boss and learning how to do their job as good as they do it themselves. Will it happen? Maybe, maybe not. But at the end of the day, if you can do that and you can complete enough functions of what their job is, they are going to look at you as the natural successor to their job. And it makes it a real easy decision for them when they're having a conversation with their boss about who replaces them. And the last thing we're going to go over is just a little bit of a bonus, which you don't really have to do this, but if you're trying to go above and beyond and you want to really be a force to be reckoned with, it is absolutely something that you should do because it makes you more well-rounded. And for me, my position on being in any job is how do I absorb and learn as much as I possibly can to make me as valuable as possible for when I want to reach the next level of my career. And so one piece of advice that really stuck with me that I was able to learn pretty early on in my career, fortunately, was learn how to do everybody's job better than they can do it themselves. So we just talked about doing your boss's job better than they can do it, right? If you can, and that should be the priority. But take a step back and look at your organization as a whole. If you can learn everybody's job better than they can do it themselves, it's going to make you more well-rounded. And if you understand where you fit in an organization in terms of the life cycle of, let's just say, an order for simplicity's sake, that makes you a lot more dangerous. And if you understand, hey, there's 19 departments in our company. I fall right here. This is what happens before it gets to me. This is what happens after it gets to me. If you understand things like that, you can anticipate what's going to go sideways, which look, things are inevitably going to go sideways on you. Or you can anticipate what you need to do to not screw it up for somebody further down the chain. And a really good way of doing this is identifying who are the really critical key players cross-functionally in terms of like who you interact with in a day, and just sit down with them. Sit down with your peers. And even more importantly, one pro move that I found works really well finding the department heads, or maybe it's a senior manager or something like that, and saying, Hey, would you mind if I pick your brain one day just on how your department works? And they're going to be most of the time, like, yeah, of course you can, unless it's, you know, super crazy busy organization. And I'm not saying it's impossible that they'll say no. But most of the time, people like being experts. They like being asked questions, they like getting to display their knowledge. Everybody is susceptible to flattery and saying, hey, can you show me your knowledge, whether you like it or not, is a form of flattery. Now, I'm not saying to do this for the sake of your own personal benefit at their expense, but I'm saying they'd probably be happy to do it. And it does a couple things. First, it increases your knowledge of the organization. Second, you never know what you're gonna learn from that person that could change your life. Because it might. Because if they know things that you don't know, look, they're gonna give you an advantage over your peers if they have tunnel vision and they're just stuck with their head down doing their job description every day, right? And one of the unintended effects that I would say is probably most underrated is you're building your social capital. So when your boss is sitting at the lunch table or whatever, or in a meeting with their peers from those cross-functional departments, and they say, Hey, you know what? Sarah, she set up a meeting with me the other day, and she's super solid. Like, I was really impressed by not only her knowledge of what she does within your camp, if he's he or she is speaking to your boss, but like the fact that this person wanted to learn more was really impressive to me. And if you get that reputation and people are talking about you behind closed doors, that is extraordinarily powerful. Because I'm gonna tell you right now, those rooms do exist. The room full of managers talking about employees does exist. I'm not saying it's bad necessarily. I mean, if shit goes sideways, sure, maybe. But like those things do happen. And to get your name brought up as a thought leader and someone who's curious and a problem solver, that can get you a pretty long way. And that's not to mention all the additional knowledge or whatever it is you gained from that conversation. And for all you know, it might be the most valuable thing you've learned that day. So to summarize, your job description is a trap. It's a starting point, nothing more. If you want to move up in your job, do the job that you want and get in good with your boss and get in good with the other senior leaders and learn everybody's job better than they can do it themselves, or at least make that your goal. Is it realistic? Probably not. But at the same time, if you can use those things and those principles as just a general guiding light towards your day, I'm gonna promise you you're gonna start noticing changes in your career in terms of your ability to advance. Because promotions don't happen to people that are really good at their job description, they happen to the people that are already operating at the next level. And I'll leave you with this closing thought. Your job description and even the next job description, those aren't the things that promote you. The thing that promotes you is your boss. That is cheat code number one of your career, which is why that's gonna be the next episode of this podcast. So if you found value in this, share it with a friend. Subscribe, repost it, put it in front of somebody who would find value in it. That would mean the world to me. But until next week, I'm gonna leave you with this. Your career is gonna have problems. But you always have a choice as to whether those are the problems that are gonna move you up in your career or keep you stuck. And you always have a choice. Thanks for listening. Talk to you next week.