"The 6 Helpful tips to stand out in the office (the good way) and move up the ladder" (click to tweet)

I started my professional career only a few months after college and landed a good job in a great company. I didn't have a plan through my college experience (no internship, no recommendation letters, not much experience) so the minute I received my diploma it was time to put in the work I didn't put before. I'm here to share with you some tips that have worked for me for the past two years. These are also the ones I practice each day to be better.

You might be the reader that will think "why is she bringing me tips I already know?" And the fact is many people know the simple tips on maintaining a job but the question is, do you put them into practice on a regular? If the answer is NO this is why I'm here. To remind you.

6 Tips To Stand Out In The Office

1 -Be on time & stay late if necessary.

Life happens and we have mornings where we already had a morning before the day has even begun, but your goal should always be to be on time for work. Just because you made it on time does not mean you can leave 10 minutes before 5pm. Stay your whole shift- this shows your managers you are willing to do the extra if necessary. It also opens doors for overtime.

2 -Do the extra.

Do the extra research to find the answer to your own questions. If you have downtime do the extra search to learn more about your position, the company, your client, etc. Help out a coworker with their workload and learn more in the process. Step up to the play and take on new challenges. All of these extra steps makes you stand out to management. 

3 -Good outcome at a fast pace.

We all have multitasker on our resumes, but are we really good at it? In anything that you do the goal is to always have good outcomes, but when it comes to getting shit done- you need to be fast. You can balance many tasks at once but make sure they are all done correctly.

And by this, I don't mean to do a job half-ass because you want to finish in half the time, but to do the job correctly at a fast pace to be able to meet all of your deadlines. The last thing you want is to not be able to meet the required deadlines. This will only affect your performance in front of your manager and your workload.

Make sure you master the art of multitasking (because it's good to know you are able to juggle different projects at once), but ALWAYS double check your work- sometimes even triple-check.

Have your deadlines right where you can see them and always aim to finish your work before it's actually due, this will give you time to revise all of your work, and extra time in case something comes up. This will show your manager you're responsible and up to the task. 

4 -Accept the feedback & Learn from it.

We are humans, we make mistakes we all know that. The key is to learn from them, but not just say you learned but ACTUALLY learning. Take into practice what was told to you, what was taught to you, and include it into your routine going forward.

At times we are given information and it goes in an ear and out the other one. Don't let that be the reason you lose your job. This will prove to your manager you are a good listener, you know how to take feedback and you know how to learn from what you're being taught. 

5 -Do the work.

I don't mean the simple showing up and doing the daily work. Of course do your daily tasks plus more.  There will be times you will have to do the tedious work, the hard work, the shifts no one wants, and that meaningless time-consuming task an intern should be finishing- get it done. The plan is to work smart, not hard, but to get to that position you have to work hard and be smart about it. This is all strategically- you put in the work, make yourself noticeable you move up the latter.  

6 -Step out of your comfort zone.

This was the more recent piece of advice that was given to me by my manager and of course, I'm sharing it with you. I literally live by all of the points I have mentioned above and some more, but in reality, I'm a very shy person, I'm also very private which makes it even harder to step outside my comfort zone.

To step out of your comfort zone means to do the things you would ask others to do for you (so you can avoid dealing with them), like telling your coworker to present your project for you to your managers in a meeting because of public speaking, avoiding sending 10 follow-up emails to get an answer, putting pressure on others to get you the answers to get the job done and some more. These are the things as a shy and quiet person I struggle with at times and I was told that to succeed (or do it faster) I must learn to step out of my zone and just get it done. 

Stepping outside of your comfortability will show your manager you are willing to do everything that is necessary to get the job done (which is what you have been hired to do). This will also show them that they don't have to step in to save the day because you have it handled.

In reality, all building skills you need as you move up.

I'm not sharing these tips as a "you must do this or you will fail" but rather as a try them and put them into practice and see how much they help your career.