Power Skills and Hard Work

Recently, I was lucky enough to partake in mock interviews during work where we interview Year 10 students in a school to give them interview practise.

I was asked to spend sometime talking about my career at the start but I know that my career journey was a long time ago and spans 30 years of Higher Education and ten jobs. So I decided to focus on the attributes that got me to where I am today.

There are two I surmised to each mock interview candidate.

1 - Work hard and go the extra mile

2 - Use of power skills

Work Hard and Go the Extra Mile

I think many of you will see why I am in the business of customer service and call myself a Director of Customer Happiness. I was brought up with the mantra, work hard (and perform) and you will succeed.

I remember working towards my piano Grade 8, spending months and months of time practising for it; even the day before getting an ok from teachers to practise for it and spend study sessions doing the same so that I spent 10 hours the day before on the exam piano. It worked. I got Grade 8 Distinction - something I am very proud of still to this day.

Latterly, I decided to test myself in climbing one of the big seven - my first ever mountain abroad. I trained and trained for it - ensuring good nutrition, focused exercise and hydration. I did the same on the mountain and I succeeded (along with a little bit of stubbornness too!)

Throughout my working life and especially in my 20's when I had to prove myself, if someone asked me to help with an event I would be the first there and the last to leave sometime from 6am to 3am the next morning. I cancelled personal events to focus on work and support. If I was asked to do a piece of work, I went into great detail and over researched to ensure it was the best and most useful document. If I was asked to get in a little early, I would be there earlier to make sure I was on time and would stay until I was needed. Many of you will be thinking, what a loser, why on earth would you bother..... what about a work life balance, work is 9-5 etc and you don't get paid more. The latter you are right.... but now I feel I am compensated well for all that hard work I initially put in and am in a senior leadership role of a multi million pound organisation. This is something I achieved through hard graft and being reliable, showing leadership skills by leading by example, having resilience when times were tough, and being a team player.

Use of power skills

You can see from the last sentence, I dropped in a few power skills I used to be successful. I am a big believer in power skills. Qualifications and experience get you an interview; power skills gets you the job.

My power skills learning and development has changed in 30 years. I would say I am a much better collaborator, listener, mentor and manager/leader, decision maker, critical thinker, team player. And that should be so as I spent every day professionally honing these skills.

Power skills (formerly known as soft skills - but I think they are so important that the word 'soft' denigrates them too much) are crucial to career success. If you cannot

• communicate (present, mentor, support, be empathetic),

• be curious (learn, tenacity, resilience, integrity, and be ethical),

• collaborate (ensure time management for others, be a team player, make decisions and critically think), and

• celebrate (be kind and positive, be resilient, be a team player, develop and celebrate individuals and teams)

..... then you will not succeed.

So in summation, remember two things, hard work and developing your power skills through practise are the key ingredients of success* personally and professionally.

*success differs for everyone and we need to see success in terms of our parameters and needs for life.