This Is How To Get A Promotion At Work: 6 Expert Tips

Most of us enter the workforce like wide-eyed toddlers clutching a sippy cup of optimism, ready to “make a difference.” Then, one day, we notice that Becky in accounting is suspiciously good at turning other people’s ideas into her own ideas. And Brad in marketing keeps getting promoted even though he hasn’t responded to an email since 2014.

You try to focus on the work, but you realize that “the work” is just the background noise of this whole operatic farce. And then, slowly, the horrible realization dawns:

This place is less “Friends” and more “Lord of the Flies.”

Office politics: the grown-up version of high school drama but with more spreadsheets and fewer hormones. It’s like someone took all the worst parts of adolescence, threw in a dash of bureaucracy, and set it loose in a fluorescent-lit labyrinth.

We need to understand this game to get ahead. I know, it’s gross. But we’re not here to save souls; we’re here to get a raise and better health insurance.

You don’t have to become Machiavelli, but if you think you can “rise above” the politics, congratulations: you’re officially everyone else’s favorite pawn. You can play nice, but you can’t afford to be naive. This is less about ruthless scheming and more about having the basic sense to understand that power dynamics exist everywhere.

You’re probably not gonna like everything you read below but I don’t make the rules. It’s time to learn how to play the game better, how to be smarter with our behavior, and, above all, to be strategic without turning into a character from Succession.

Who will guide us through the dark arts? Marie G. McIntyre is the author of “Secrets to Winning at Office Politics.”

Let’s get to it…

 

Forget Fairness. Look For Leverage.

Fairness. It’s the false promise that if you just buckle down and make enough PowerPoints, you’ll be rewarded with a corner office and the right to use the fancy printer.

Nope. Not gonna happen.

“But that’s not fair!”

You’re right. It is unfair. The problem is that acknowledging this unfairness will not help you get ahead, Serpico. Fairness seldom determines what happens at work. Fairness is about as relevant as MySpace.

The Ultimate Organizational Fact of Life is this: The person with the most leverage wins. But stick with me, because this rabbit hole goes deep and it’s lined with the tears of mid-level managers.

Leverage is the ability to get people to help you achieve your goals. It’s the thing that turns you from a lowly drone into the workplace’s answer to a Game of Thrones character (minus the dragons and inappropriate family dynamics). It’s less about what you know and more about who owes you a favor.

What gives you leverage?

• Having a higher position
• Having something the other person needs
• Being the sole provider of a resource
• Having influence with people in authority
• Having other ways to get your needs met
• Having a good reputation or track record
• Having less emotional attachment
• Having a positive relationship with the other person

Like Pokemon, collect as many as you can.

(To learn how to get a raise, click here.)

Once you swallow the above bitter truth, the next logical step is to focus energy on the most critical thing you have influence over: your boss. That person holds the keys to your pay, your assignments, your advancement, and essentially your entire existence from 9 to 5.

Enter the mystical art of managing upward…

 

Manage Your Boss

For political success, you need to stop worrying about how your boss treats you and focus on how you treat them. Your goal is to make your boss feel like managing you is the easiest part of their day.

You don’t need to be a superstar; you just need to be really, really good at pleasing the person who decides your fate.

Be proactive. Solve problems before your boss even realizes there’s a problem. Make them believe you’re a magical office unicorn who poops rainbows of productivity. Never let them discover your secret stash of sarcasm and resentment.

Nobody’s going to hand you a pamphlet titled, “Your Boss’s Weird Pet Peeves: A Guide to Staying Employed.” Play the role of amateur anthropologist studying the mysterious Homo Managerialis in its natural habitat. Know their likes and dislikes, their priorities, how they like work done, their preferred communication style and frequency, etc. Don’t know? Ask.

And, above all else, make your boss look good. Become your boss’s personal PR agency. Your efforts reflect on them. Produce quality results, respond to people quickly, and never, never, never complain to others about them.

Sound hard? Oh, it is. But the biggest mistake people make is not thinking about all this from the boss’s perspective: Would you want your direct reports following the above advice if you were in charge?

Of course you would.

(For more on how to get promoted, click here.)

Now this might sound like I’m saying don’t “be yourself.”

And that’s because I am absolutely saying don’t “be yourself”…

 

Act Like The Person You Want Them To See

You might think that “being yourself” is a refreshing alternative to the endless masquerade, but let’s be clear: while “being yourself” is an excellent strategy for therapy sessions and writing snarky blog posts, it is not a mainstream career strategy.

Perceptions are reality in the workplace. And successfully managing perceptions = political skills. This is the kind of advice that’s both brilliant and so deeply depressing you want to punch a wall, but gently, so you don’t have to fill out HR paperwork.

Want to know how to act at the office? Look around.

Don’t listen to what they say will get you ahead. Watch what the successful people do. See who gets recognized, praised, or promoted and act like them. This is the Rosetta Stone of corporate values. This is where you get to witness the truth in all its ugly glory.

(To learn the 7 steps to acing a job interview, click here.)

The company says it wants “innovators” and “thought leaders.” Riiiiiiight. Instead, look around at what works, figure out why and do that. But Oscar-worthy performances don’t matter if nobody sees the movie…

 

Be Visible

In the twisted realm of corporate life, being the best kept secret is not a compliment.

We all want to believe that good work speaks for itself, but the truth is, good work often mumbles incoherently from the back of the conference room. It’s not enough to be good at your job; you have to be good at making sure everyone knows you’re good at your job. It’s like being a superhero but with the added challenge of having to write and sell your own comic books.

Look for opportunities to interact with higher-level managers. If they know who you are and think well of you, then you will have enhanced both your political power and your job security.

You can be the LeBron James of spreadsheets, but if senior management thinks your name is “Hey, you,” you’re feeding data into the void as far as your career is concerned.

Prioritize your work based on visibility to upper management. It’s not “work smarter, not harder.” No. It’s “work smarter, and also louder”:

• High Importance, High Visibility: For these types of projects, you need spreadsheets that dazzle and PowerPoints that could double as Super Bowl ads. It’s like you’re planning a surprise proposal, but instead of a diamond ring, you’re holding a quarterly report.
• Low Importance, High Visibility: These are like the reality show stars of the corporate world: they don’t really matter, but everyone is watching. Don’t waste your limited energy making these exceptional. Just get out your reliable template and make them neat and tidy.
• High Importance, Low Visibility: These are the equivalent of the bass player in a rock band: vital but destined to be overlooked. Solution? You need to make it visible. Don’t just complete the project; promote it. There needs to be email announcements, and maybe one of those annoying LinkedIn posts about how “excited you are to be leading this initiative.”
• Low Importance, Low Visibility: The “Terms and Conditions” page of your workload. What do you do with these? You punt them, that’s what. Do as little as possible.

(To learn more on how to win at office politics, click here.)

Okay, time to talk co-workers…

 

Accumulate Allies

Task-driven people often see interpersonal interaction as an unnecessary distraction from “real” work. But what they fail to realize is that some of those distracting relationships might actually help them produce better results.

I’m sure the Type-A introverts remain unconvinced. Okay, brass tacks, Bubba: People who avoid interaction have fewer allies. And people without allies are vulnerable. When the layoff lists get made you need someone saying, “No, not them. They’re vital.”

Winners increase their leverage by maintaining helpful connections with as many people as possible. And the introverts are thinking, “That sounds exhausting.” You’re right. It is. So prioritize:

What do you want and who can help you get it?

Seek out opportunities for interaction with them even if it’s just dropping by to get their “valuable advice.” Do your homework and find something you have in common to build a connection. It’s about being the person who remembers everyone’s kid’s names, but not in a creepy, “I have a dossier on each of you” kind of way (even though you absolutely have a dossier).

Then find out what their priorities are and be proactively helpful. No email offering needed assistance on a major goal is ever unwelcome. This is where that “access to scarce resources” comes in. Helping the right people with the right things is the path to success. Network like your career depends on it. Because, quite simply, it does.

(To learn the 4 secrets of high-performing teams, click here.)

And now that we’ve discussed the “good guys”, it’s time to cover the “bad guys”…

 

Handle Adversaries

All adversaries are bothersome, but not all bothersome people are adversaries. So make sure to ask yourself the question: Is this person really my opponent or just someone I find annoying?

Save your energy for the real adversaries, the ones who genuinely stand between you and your goals. Are they sabotaging your work? Do they go out of their way to make your life miserable? Are they the reason you drink before noon? If the answer is yes, then you’ve got a bona fide enemy.

There are four things to remember when dealing with an office nemesis:

• Try to develop a friendly relationship and show that you pose no threat.
• Stop rewarding bad behavior. Establish boundaries and stand firm.
• Reduce their influence on others.
• Increase your own influence on others.

The preferred outcome is to convert them to allies. For this to happen, your opponents must believe that your goals do not conflict with theirs and cooperating with you might contribute to their own success.

Never, ever forget: expending time and energy in an unnecessary war is for fools, especially when things are not zero sum. The more sociopathically inclined will be eager to remind me that Machiavelli said it’s better to be feared than loved. I’m eager to remind them that Machiavelli also said that you want to be feared — but never hated. In fact, he devotes an entire chapter to it. Hatred is passionate and enduring, and invites revenge.

(To learn the 4 secrets of being a great manager, click here.)

Okay, we’ve covered a lot. Time to round it all up and learn the single most important thing: how to avoid career suicide…

 

Sum Up

Here’s how to get a promotion at work:

• Forget Fairness. Look For Leverage: Abandon any notion that fairness is a cornerstone of corporate life. The workplace is not a meritocracy; it’s a glorified high school cafeteria with marginally better chairs. Focus on leverage.
• Manage Your Boss: The boss should break out in a cold sweat at the thought of you calling in sick. And make them look good. You are now the human equivalent of an Instagram filter.
• Act Like The Person You Want Them To See: Maintain the kind of calm usually reserved for royal families during scandals. And look at who gets promoted. Be like them or leave.
• Be Visible: Prioritize projects by their visibility to upper management.
• Accumulate Allies: Professional schmoozery is essential. I’m looking at you, fellow introverts. Even Batman has Alfred, Commissioner Gordon, and Lucius Fox.
• Handle Adversaries: Most people are not adversaries. They’re like landmines: they’re there, they’re annoying, and they’re best left unexploded. The best thing to do with real adversaries is to befriend them. Barring that, focus on accumulating leverage.

So how do you commit career suicide?

Above all else, you do not want to be seen by upper management as The Problem. What makes someone The Problem? Typically, one of two things:

1) Being seen as someone who makes life more difficult.

This is as easy as engaging in any behavior that consumes a disproportionate share of management’s time and attention. As soon as you start saying things like, “This makes no sense,” or complaining, you’re essentially waving a big, red “I AM DIFFICULT” flag.

“But this is important! It’s a real issue!”

You’re probably right.

Also, it doesn’t matter. They don’t see you as the long-suffering hero; they see you as someone making life around here harder. And that is Not Good For You.

2) Being a good person in a not-good place.

To be fair, sometimes the problem isn’t you. In a truly toxic workplace, anyone with even a shred of common decency or self-respect is quickly branded as The Problem. Your refusal to be complicit makes you the villain. If this sounds like your situation, the advice is simple: run. It’s best to leave and find a new gig where you will not be seen as a rogue agent of sanity.

Yeah, it’s a little bleak that we need to learn all these ugly lessons about office politics. It’s like finding out the Easter Bunny is also the IRS. But it’s also useful: you now understand how the game is played.

You can still be the person who remembers birthdays and brings in doughnuts, not because it’s a networking opportunity, but because doughnuts are delicious, and it’s fun to see people’s faces light up.

Understanding office politics doesn’t mean you’ve sold your soul; it means you’ve bought a better map.