HOW TO BE A STAR AT WORK

HOW TO BE A STAR AT WORK
_Nine breakthrough strategies you need to succeed
by Robert E. Kelley

Be frankly, I didn’t expect much from this book in the beginning. It has been in my shelf for over half year since I bought it. Recently, I finally got the chance to read and I was really surprised with its profound.
I thought it was like the books we normally see in the book store: a quick fix guide or self-help, feel-good ones. However, what sets it apart is its solid research base: with more than one decade involvement in the intensive study of star performers. Even though this book is more focused on the Bell Lab workplace study (well, this has been well-known when it comes to organizational/workplace behavior study). The goal is to unveil the secret of star performer: what exactly set them apart from the rest of average performer?

An “astounding” answer: the data shows no appreciable cognitive, personal-psychological, social, or environmental difference between starts and average performers. Those are all factors that people believe in contributing to the difference. This really intrigues me to going forward …So, what exactly is it all about?

(highlights from the books: the nine strategies)

1. INITIATIVE: blazing trails in the organization’s while spaces

· Getting beyond: Seek out responsibility above and beyond the expected job description
· Helping out: Undertake extra efforts for the benefits of coworkers or the larger group
· Following through: Stick tenaciously to an idea or project and follow it through to successful implementation
· Risk taking: Willingly assume some personal risk in taking on new responsibility

Choosing the right initiatives: steps
1. Do you current assignment well
2. Follow the initiative value trail: who benefit? need to have payoff for someone other than you. (if there is nothing in it for someone besides you, don’t call it an initiative)
3. Stay close to the critical path (e.g. reduce the cost, increase the revenue; get the bottom line)
4. Choose high level initiatives: moving from “horizontal” to “vertical” initiatives’ solves whole set of similar problems not only in the same category, but throughout the entire system; capturing the high-level systems perspectives by going from local to corporate-wide optimization
5. Determine the probability of success and the cost of failure: start out from smaller more private setting and seek support from others; also know when to cut the losses

Final word
· Have a keen sense of how initiative is defined in workplace/by manger and peers
· CHOOSE WISELY
· Work efficiently in their own jobs to have more time pursue initiatives

2. KNOWING WHO KNOWS: plugging into knowledge network
· The knowledge deficit: knowing what you don’t know matters!
· Networking: the critical path goes from mule trail to autobahn; work a network, not just do it by yourself
· Networks of the stars: mutual benefit; one-to-one interactions
· Networking fundamentals: stars have the networks with better quality and operate faster through the connection of knowledge itself, organizational support and technical/physical environment

Skills of the stars: the eight network nodes
1. Mental models of networking:
o Knowledge is not a public resources and access to it is not a basic right; it’s privilege that must be earned (or traded)
o It is a critical personal and community infrastructure that must be carefully maintained
o The first skill the star performer demonstrates early is the ability to establish some kind of expertise – a specialty area that will be of value to others by reducing their knowledge deficits exist in the department and which ones they can help fill
o Trades with a shrewd sense of cost and benefit
2. Weed and Seed
o Shrewd ability to choose their trading partners – identifying qualified knowledge givers and making them part of their network
o taking the opportunity to observe/searchà identify and seeking out/ask
3. Proactive One-Way Trading:
o Give first; build it before you need it
o Laying the connection groundwork from work related issues to personal
4. Networking etiquette on the critical path (courtesies and considerations in the networking process): earn your place by acting as solid vouchers and reference pointers (help all parties involved)
5. Do your homework (make a good impression and set the stage for a long-term networking relationship): link their problems to a discipline or an area of interest that intrigues the expert.
6. Credit lavishly
7. The benefit of newness
8. Be a good network citizen: taking and giving

Final word
· Social networking (benefit your organizational savvy) vs. Knowledge networking (more central and critical to your success and productivity)
· Choosier in what types of networks and in the extent to which they will be involved: settle into the networks and recruit experts with an eye toward getting the best job done on the critical path!

3. MANAGING YOUR WHOLE LIFE AT WORK: self management
· First step to star-quality self-management: managing to work only on activities directly tied to the critical path (evaluate “important vs. unimportant” first and then “urgent vs. not urgent” on important tasks). Their success in doing this depends on a deep understanding of what the critical path is in their organization and where they should be positioned on it to contribute in most productive way.
· Cannot depend on traditional management structure to put them on the critical path. “I realized just because they wanted me to do something, it didn’t mean it was on critical path. I had to be responsible to getting myself on the critical path. So, finally I took control of my to-do list”
Proactively getting on the critical path
· Understand the company’s goals and bottom line
· Tie your efforts to the firm’s bottom line, self-manage your way and transfer your skills to a more value-directed job, form reactively problem solving to proactively drive the business
Self-knowledge in self-management
· Stars who develop good self-management techniques have incorporated them into the mix of traits and quirks that define them as individuals in the workplace. There is no single personality trait that will make you a star performer
Self-managing and job satisfaction
· Know yourself wellà know the kind of work you do best and that you want to doà take control of your career path by developing a plan to connect yourself to the work you enjoy most and to connect that work to the company’s critical path
Managing flow: the productive state of mind
· Find meaning and enjoyment in the workà create a work environment that gives you the mental space to get into your work
· Organized self-management: getting the job done
· What star performer do differently: they have evaluations come earlier in the process; have a early warning system and a fallback plan in the event of crisis; tend to build a lot of forward-thinking behavior into their self-management system. (the constant weighting and analysis of the work has implications down the road for both short-term and long-term career choices)à The stars, in effect, take controls of both daily work routines and career choices, knowing the days when a paternal hand would reach down from upper management to guide the way are long gone
Organizing self-management: Company and career
· Stars do proactively be involved in managing their work flow and career paths. Care what project they do? Who would be great to work with? How the project fits well into critical path? By sculpting a piece at one time. [Foundation of work relationship: increased productivity and value added to organization]

4. GETTING THE BIG PICTURE: learning how to build perspective

· Sat performer seeks out learning experiences that pushes the limits of their knowledge and make sure they learn from it by internalizing patterns and forms
· Star performer develops a deeper more well-rounded understanding of their field, which in turn leads to pattern recognition skills that form the foundation of perspective
· Pattern recognition is the essential foundation for star perspective and it can only be attained through experience
· But what makes a difference is whether they incorporate their pattern recognition ability into the kind of perspective and strategic thinking that leads to expert judgment!

Getting outside the box with the five Cs’ perspectives
· Colleague
· Customer
· Competitor
· Company-management
· Creative dissonance

With the ability to recognize patterns, to think creatively outside the box, to exercise expert judgment, and to discern the changing games and their changing rules, you have the essential perspectives keys to gain entry to star performer ranks.

5. FOLLOWERSHIP: checking your ego at the door to lead in assists

“Brainpowered Followership” means
· …being actively engaged in helping organization succeed while exercising independent, critical judgment of goals, tasks, potential problems, and methods
· …having the ability to work cooperatively with a leader to accomplish the organization’s goals even when there are personality or workplace differences
· …being key players both in planning the courses of actions and implementing in the field
· …use other productivity-model skills to choose the matter and timing

Work strategies of the star follower:
1. Self-leadership: know how to lead themselves, and demonstrate personal reliance
2. Focus/Commitment/Incentive: a passion that engages their hearts as well as focusing their minds, emotionally fueling their everyday work activities
3. Competence that leads to credibility: always have higher standards for themselves; sharp observers of new technology and societal trends, working to stay up to date; first to take advantage to improve their performance
4. Courageous conscience
5. Disagreeing agreeably: steps to control your ego to work cooperatively with the leader: be proactive
o be a fact finder
o be an advice seeker
o be a system player
o be persuasive: speak in the language of the organization; frame the message in consistent with the values and vision of the organization and back up by solid and objective information
o be courageous: go over heads when absolutely necessary; work on the confrontation and courage-building skills on a daily basis, practicing insightful, positive challenges to small directives in order to establish both a reputation and an experience level that prepare them for the heavy crisis that will eventually present themselves
o be a collective follower to plan well to stand alone

6. SMALL-L LEADERSHIP IN A BIG-L WORLD
To be an effective small-l leader, a team member must secure the respect of coworkers in at least one of three areas covered by the critical skills of Knowledge Quotient, People-Skills Quotient, or Momentum Quotient.

7. TEAMWORK: getting real about teams
· The culture of teamwork: see if the people at the top act as a team
· Choose team wisely: learn to be selective (How close it is to critical path? Benefit you? Don’t just be one person in the team, make sure it would add value to your company as well as your development)
· Contributing to the team: making sure the team knows its purpose
· Getting the team’s job done
· Paying attention and contributing to group dynamics

8. Organizational Savvy: street smart in the corporate comfort zone
· The ability to manage competing workplace interests to promote an idea, resolve conflicts, and most important, to achieve a goal
· The savvy surveyor: getting the lay of the land à organizational chart vs. real power
· The savvy insider: culture, attitude, symbol, quirk, etc.
· The savvy apprentice: finding a mentor; you need to surround yourself with people who are going to be really direct with you, not fawning “yes people”; seek out assignments where you can work closely with potential mentors
· The savvy explorer: experiencing the land you’ve map; the star lobbies to get the assignment, find ways to get experience in different parts of the company, seeing from different perspectives, ground themselves indentified knowledgeable colleagues to gain the valuable insights and build working relationships.
· The heart of organizational savvy: it’s all about relationship buildingà do understand the organizational etiquette and create an environment of conflict
· Create a niche: find an expertise niche that adds value to the organization, not only in their position, but in the rest of the workplace à take advantage of daily opportunity to publicize your niche area
· Advertise your expertise in different ways: bottom line is to advertise to the critical path and paying attention to organizational protocol; respect the niche-area boundaries of colleagues
· Developing the credibility: combined with other rules to build the reputation of integrity and credibility

9. SHOW-AND-TELL: persuading the right audience with the right message
· Know your audience
· Craft your message to that audience
· Make your message relevant and interesting to your audience.
· Put it in human terms, not purely technical ones: telling a story, not transmitting the factsà a good story engages the listener with something worth listening to: an intriguing plot, a human drama with twists and turns, fascinating characters, tension and conflict that get resolved, humor, and crisp visual images that capture the imagination; then the imaginative process kicks in
· Use props to enhance your story, not to steal the show