My obsession with buckets
Most of my clients are surprised to learn how obsessed I am with buckets.
Red ones, blue ones, green ones; I don't care what colour they are as long as you're willing to get your buckets out and use them to help boost your career!
And no, I have not gone insane, bear with...
Most people, when they start thinking about how they'll level up in their career, go straight to action without considering which actions make most sense.
This is where your buckets come in.
Let's say you're going for a promotion and you know you need to do more of something or less of something in order to get there so you start off doing what we'll vaguely call 'get me promoted stuff'.
You go into what you think is career activist mode and you do a bit of SOMETHING, a bit of THE OTHER, not so much of THING and before you know it, six months has gone by and you still feel no nearer to getting that promotion. And all the while a large amount of your brain space is given over to thinking that. you should be doing something about getting promoted but you can’t quite grasp a clear enough thought to get started.
A true career activist takes time to consider exactly where to expend precious time, effort and energy to move that dial.
So having a series of buckets laid out in front of you will help you see exactly what you need to do to progress.
Some buckets will be half full, some near empty and some will be overflowing.
Your buckets will be different from mine, which will be different from Jimmy Riddles', Jonny Bobsleighs' and Shirley Fanjulies'. Our needs are unique so it's time to reveal what's in your buckets.
Identify Your Buckets
First of all you need to work out what you need to do to get to the next stage.
A recent client, Mick, became clear on what was needed by:
• reviewing feedback he'd received
• looking at his company's leadership behaviours document
• speaking to his internal mentor
Next, you'll need to review where you are currently in filling the gaps or ditching what doesn't work.
I helped Mick out by laying out what I typically see as useful buckets to work on when you’re proactively managing your career:
Knowledge of Options
Network
Visibility and Brand
Self-Understanding
Knowledge and Skills
Self-Care
Personal Presence/Gravitas
Which buckets have a good amount already in them?
It's worth noticing here what you're already doing a lot of, are particularly good at or you have a healthy relationship with.
Sometimes it's really easy to do more of what comes naturally in the quest to improve. But when time is limited, it's worth focussing on those things which will actually move the dial. They're often the things we are unaware of, tend to avoid or just don't know how to do.
Or conversely we need to focus on what we need to put to one side for now to free us up to move forward.
Which Buckets Need Filling?
Mick worked out that what he most needed was to raise his internal visibility by getting more involved in the 'extra curricular' workplace initiatives and to get more face time with some of the senior leaders in his business unit. He also wanted to think through how he wished other people to see him and what he could do to push that forward.
So it was clear to him that his Visibility and Brand bucket needed work.
Which Buckets Need Emptying?
Sometimes the thing that's holding you back from getting to the next level is that all your time is tied up in activities that will never move the dial on your promotion. Reflecting on this, Mick identified he had a problem with saying no to new projects.
Looking more deeply into some of these projects that he'd taken on in the last year, it became clear that he was generally just picking up the slack that nobody else wanted to touch and it was neither energising him nor was it enhancing his development towards promotion.
So Mick added a bucket called EXTRA PROJECTS.
Work Your Buckets
Noticing how full various buckets are and which are overflowing gives Mick an opportunity to plan out and prioritise his precious time, effort and energy so that he can create an equilibrium between his buckets and make intentional and meaningful progress towards the promotion.
Review Your Buckets
It's important to check in with your buckets on a regular basis to make sure you're on track. When there's an option to choose, a fork in the road or a decision to make you can consult with your buckets and ask the question, where will this enhance or take away from what I'm trying to achieve? And then you can act accordingly.
Tending to your buckets intentionally will give you the best chance of succeeding in your next steps.