All professionals seek success in their career although the definition of success differs from person to person. Paul Lyons, Group MD has met hundreds of senior executives during his career and outlines ten factors he believes are necessary for individuals to possess in order to achieve career success.

Any checklist of career success factors is necessarily subjective both in content and order of priority – these are his thoughts and observations:

A positive attitude to life and a strong desire to succeed

1. There is no doubt that if you have a passion for life and display a positive attitude to your work and to your life then you have a strong foundation on which to build your career.
2. People like to work with enthusiastic positive people as subordinates colleagues or managers. It is a character trait generally that you grow up with in varying degrees but you should work hard to develop it.
3. Similarly if you aren’t motivated and determined then become so quickly. Being motivated and determined to succeed will get you through the tough times and help you work through difficult situations and projects.

Knowledge

1. Knowledge is important. It helps you in developing capacity to solve problems but also because if you can convert this knowledge into educational and professional qualifications you are perceived by employers and peers to possess the required knowledge.
2. In this day and age a university degree and a professional qualification are pre requisites for climbing the corporate ladder. Without them your chances of success can be limited.
3. Increasingly people are finding that a second degree (eg an MBA or Masters from an accredited institution) or another professional qualification in a discipline relevant to their current career position can give their career a kick start as employers perceive they are up to date with current finance and management techniques.
4. On a slightly different tack, general knowledge is a vastly underrated quality but in my opinion very important as part of ones’ ability to communicate with clients or other non-technical people.

Skills

One of the key factors in your success will be to develop a range of aptitudes that will help you tackle your day to day work and successfully deal with situations you have never encountered before. An analogy with the game of golf would be that you have a bag full of different clubs that you use as different situations arise. You will use some clubs more than others but over time you will use all the clubs in your bag.

Often skills you use on a regular basis become your strengths and so it helps if you can also learn to use more skills more often so that they all become strengths.

The skills you should focus on are:

1. Technical – what people pay you as to be good at
2. Technological – technology and finance are becoming intertwined as organisations of every size and sector rely on technology to help drive their business, you should stay up to date with the changes taking place
3. Communication – you must be able to communicate clearly and effectively both face to face and in writing to users of the information you produce. Failure to do so will lessen your chances of getting your message and your personality across to your audience
4. Personal skills – if you have the ability to socialise and if you are able to combine confidence with humility, you are then part of a minority rather than the majority of people. Developing good personal skills can be time consuming and difficult, particularly if you are naturally shy and introverted, but to do so will pay handsome dividends during your career.
5. Analytical skills – the ability to sum up a situation and analyse the potential options including the desired option. Again these are skills that you can and should develop over time.

Experience

At the beginning your career you are “selling” your potential to add value to your employer or prospective employer. As you progress through your working life you “convert” your potential into experience. How you convert this potential and into what quality experience will obviously have an impact on your career success. This conversion process is vitally important.

Quality experience will be that which will put you in a wide variety of circumstances and situations. It will enable you to understand, analyse and then deal with these situations successfully.

You will gain better quality experience in larger, multinational or listed companies in an environment where opportunities exist to assume additional responsibilities or switch roles relatively easily. A responsive learning environment, an identifiable role model (your Partner or senior executive should be the key here).

Similarly when you have ten plus years track record you will have to explain your career logically to prospective employers. They will be more impressed with blue chip names on your resume, positions of responsibility, variety, complexity and so on. Two or three moves in ten years would suggest more stability than, say, seven moves. It’s an art rather than a science but quality experience with a quality organisation will help you progress in your career because you have a greater bank of experiences to draw upon. Employers and prospective employers will perceive this to be the case.

Balance

There is an old saying “All work and no play makes Jack a dull boy” which essentially means that too much work and study can make you one dimensional and less interesting. It’s essential to have contrasts in your life. While there are times you have to be focused and work long hours to prepare for exams or complete month end or year end accounts, it’s desirable over the long term to develop a passion for something else outside work. This is fun, can energise you for work and help you develop your personal skills.

Career planning and management

Your career is your responsibility and so you should take the time and the care in planning and managing your career. If you don’t, no-one else will and you can be subject to situations and events that could be avoided. There are techniques to plan and manage your career, you can read about these in this section.

Network

Again another old saying that is very relevant in Australia – it’s not what you know it’s who you know. Well, both are desirable. Developing a network doesn’t mean that you have to schmooze all over town and flash business cards at every opportunity. It just means staying in touch with old friends and contacts you met at school, university and through your professional studies. Attend university alumni and events and you can quickly form a friendship with half a dozen or so likeminded people. During your career there will be times when you need to ask a favour, when it will help to know someone in another organization that can help you with a problem or query. Similarly those people will want to rely on you to help them in some circumstances.

Mentoring

As part of your network it’s also useful to develop a friendship with someone probably older and more experienced who can provide another perspective on your career and where it’s going. Often this person will be a family friend or relation that knows you and the business world and can help you make decisions independently from your family or your employer.

Ethics

This is the jewel. As a qualified professional you hold a special place in society. Whether working in a consulting or corporate environment your clients and colleagues understand you to be trustworthy, professional, truthful and prudent. Do everything you can to reinforce this view – it’s an invaluable reputation.

Luck

You can’t plan for luck but everyone needs it in their career – being in the right place at the right time to grasp an opportunity for a promotion or a transfer or being selected for a key project. Certainly the more people you know, the more projects you get involved with and the greater the variety of experience you accumulate the more luck you will encounter.