Congratulations! You got the job. All the hard work and effort that you put into the process of applying and interviewing has paid off. Now it’s time to prove the panel made the right decision.
What are your development needs?
Before starting in your new role, it’s worth reflecting on your development needs. Clearly the skills and experiences that you’ve gained to date have convinced the employer that you’re the right person for the job.
However unless your job is identical to the one you’ve already been doing, you will have a number of training and development needs.
Once you start in your role, you’ll be very busy dealing with your day-to-day workload, which can make it difficult to step back and view your role with a more strategic eye. Making time to consider your development needs during the first 12 months in post will be time well spent.
Looking at the Person Specification for the role, it’s worth taking each skill and scoring yourself honestly on a scale of 1-10. How competent are you in each specific skill? If you score below a 10, ask yourself “what would I need to do in order for this skill to become a 10?”
The list of actions that you’ll create will inform your development needs, enabling you to decide how you’ll address them.
Here are some suggestions of the different ways you might approach this.
1. Training courses
An enlightened employer will ensure you have a thorough induction and perhaps a buddy to support you through your first few months. Some things you’ll learn by simply spending time with specific individuals who will teach or show you how to do them.
Your organisation may offer specific courses. These are particularly useful for addressing ‘how to’ needs such as IT skills. If these are not automatically available you may decide to take responsibility for your own development by accessing a range of free or inexpensive short courses. For some examples, see my post on free online learning.
Your organisation may offer leadership and management courses; these can be helpful for building and growing a network of peers in similar roles within your organisation. They can be useful where you’re new to an organisation as you’ll learn a lot about the organisational culture through other participants.
2. Find a mentor
If you can, source a mentor- someone who is one step ahead of you and who can share advice and insider tips and help you gain an understanding of your role.
3. Observing excellence
A colleague once commented that no one person is perfect at everything and not to think of people as role models. Instead, learn by observing individuals who demonstrate excellence in specific skills.
Taking your development needs, look out for individuals who are skilled in those areas you’d like to improve in.
Become a people-watcher. Notice people doing things really well. There will be some who are extremely skilled at chairing meetings. Others will present complex data in ways that ordinary mortals can understand. Some will be highly capable negotiators. A few may be arch diplomats, able to handle the trickiest of people. There are people who, no matter the chaos around them appear to stay calm. Others manage their time admirably.
Why not simply ask the person modelling excellence “How do you do that so skilfully?” Most people will be flattered and happy to share their tips and wisdom.
4. Having a go
Take on board what you’ve observed and have a go. Practising any new skill will feel awkward to begin with, but this is the only way to improve. Think of it as fast-prototyping. The more you practice the more skilful you’ll become. Having an intentional plan to improve will mean you’ll develop your skills more quickly.
5. Review and record
Take time after practising to reflect and review how you did. Note what went well and how you could improve further next time.
Feed details of your progress into your appraisal/reviews with your line manager. She/he may have observed some progress first-hand but some skills may be less obvious so make sure you make the implicit explicit.
6. Pay it forward
Over time you too will be seen as modelling excellence. Do your bit to develop others by supporting or mentoring less experienced staff so they can in turn learn from you.
Hide not your talents. They for use were made. What’s a sundial in the shade?
Benjamin Franklin
