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07.09

Maintaining Career Competitiveness in Uncertain Times

By Peggy Hutcheson

Whether your career is on hold, cruising along at full steam, or just creeping along, now is a good time to step back and think seriously about what it is that you want to get out of the considerable portion of your life that you invest in work. Discovering ways to use your skills in ways that provide you with more than just a job — a career that is both financially rewarding and personally fulfilling — is a valuable investment of time.

Three major areas to take a look at to maintain your career competitiveness are: knowing the market and the competition; knowing your “brand”; and building your legacy.

Knowing the Market

Recent headlines have focused on the unemployment side of the labor market. Unemployment is an important part of the story, but not the entire story. When thinking about your career and potential choices, other considerations — beyond how to keep the job you have or replace the one you have recently lost — are worthy of contemplation.

Step one in this process is to take stock of your skills and experience, and determine their place in the current marketplace. Some skills are being commoditized, and those are the ones that are most easily moved offshore where they will cost less. Some engineering skills (especially in the IT field) have become commodities; other skills are increasing in demand. If your talents can be applied to sectors where there is still strong job growth, you will be more likely to be in the driver’s seat for your career. A few of these growing job markets include: security-related jobs (software, hardware, process); project management (industries across the board are relying on project managers to lead engineering initiatives and product development and application); “green” energy and “green” production; and virtual communication products and processes.

Step two is to consider where and how you want to work. In the employment arena, small business is still “king.” According to the U.S. Small Business Administration, more than 99 percent of all employer firms are classified as small business, and these businesses employ 40 percent of the scientists, engineers and computer workers in this country.

If you are highly flexible about work assignments, you may want to consider consulting as an option. Consulting represents an increasingly important segment of work in the electrotechnology and information technology fields, and has gained widespread acceptance as a way of benefiting both engineers and employers (more than 30,000 searched the IEEE-USA consultant database last year alone).

The third step is to develop fresh ways to approach the job you have — or find the job you want. If the old adage, “if you do what you’ve always done, you will get what you’ve always got,” seems to apply to your career, it's time to try some new approaches.

Businesses look for stellar technical abilities as an indicator that you are up-to-date on the latest technologies. Even if you haven't needed to enhance your skills to perform your job, it is always wise to participate in ongoing learning opportunities. The ability to demonstrate fresh learning to a potential employer can diminish any negative impressions that a single, long-term job assignment or period of unemployment might convey.

Keep in mind that employers also look for non-technical skills. The ever-increasing demands of the marketplace mean that an engineer who understands the business at large, and who is able to think and act like a business leader, is a powerful asset to the company. Similarly, the ability to present ideas, make presentations, and write in compelling ways adds value to the technical skills an engineer brings to the job.

Knowing Your “Brand”

You are the product you offer an employer. The more deeply you understand this product, the better you will be at finding the best match. In addition to some self-analysis (what are my preferred skills? what work values provide me with the greatest sense of satisfaction? what special talents do I bring? etc.), you may want to re-examine how you package and market your brand. As you continue down this path, you can uncover new options for career directions.

Look at everyone you know and the people they know as potential information sources for career options. Today's social networking tools make it possible to find people in specific roles or even specific businesses to connect with to gain information and establish professional relationships. These networks can be invaluable for getting the inside scoop on a position you are considering. In addition, they fit nicely with the way many engineers prefer to work — online, rather than face to face.

Whether you use LinkedIn, Plaxo, Twitter, Facebook, microblog sites, or one of a host of other new locations in the Web 2.0 realm, it is important that you use them well. When using social media, be certain that the information you put forth represents you as the professional you are. Use the sites to demonstrate your intellect and showcase your currency and skills.

New ways of packaging and marketing your brand also includes new ways of asking questions to rethink options and help get your career back on track. Add an innovative mindset to your career concerns. William Miller, consultant and author of IEEE-USA’s E-Book, Innovation Conversations – Book 1: The Innovation Process, suggests four different lines of questioning that correspond with his four Innovation Styles:

• The first approach encourages you to ask questions such as: what are some practical ways to make progress? Experiment with new ways to put things together to move forward. Using this approach can help discouraged or disenchanted engineers put analytical thinking to work.

• The second approach (Miller’s “exploring” style) asks you to think more radically — “what would be unheard of in conventional terms that I might try?” What are some job locations, different roles or non-traditional search techniques that you could try?

• Using the Miller's third approach, you might ask question such as, “What would simplify and improve on what I am doing currently to manage my career?” It's easy to become overwhelmed at work or with all the activities involved with a highly active job search. Using the questions in this “modifying” approach to innovative thinking puts continuous improvement skills to work for you.

• Miller's fourth approach to thinking innovatively about your career is more idealistic. Using this approach, you might ask, “If I could achieve anything I wish, what would I choose?” Many people never try for their dream job because they fear the risks associated with holding out for the best long-term solution.
  

Building Your Legacy

It's never too early or too late in a career to be working on your legacy. How do you want to be remembered by your colleagues, boss or customers? What do you want them to say about you next week, next year or in five years? This is your legacy, and you don't need to leave work to have a legacy. Your legacy is what you leave behind in products, processes and people’s memories after each project, initiative or job.

Build a positive legacy. With roughly one in 11 people in the United States unemployed, businesses have to do whatever it takes to survive. That sometimes means laying off good people. Avoid negative office politics. Too often, people under stress fall into the trap of playing “ain’t it awful” at work. This negative game involves finding more and more things that are wrong with what is going on in the organization. It is de-motivating and consumes valuable energy with no positive outcomes. Don't contribute to the rumor mill, whether it is talking about people or business decisions. Contribute positively to the discussion when people are attempting to formulate ideas; don't get trapped in the game of second-guessing or blaming after the fact.

Build strong relationships with others in the business. When your boss, colleagues and customers rely on you — not just the technical skills you bring — your position is strengthened and your legacy remains intact. Pay attention to developing the interpersonal skills that add value to your work. More than just conversational skills or the ability to get along, they include providing constructive feedback, challenging ideas while respecting individuals, and providing insights that support others’ ideas.

Strengthen your legacy by broadening your focus. Your technical specialty is vital, but work today requires an understanding of multiple specialties. Learning about technical skills that relate to your focus area can broaden your outlook and increase your value.

Broaden your focus also to include others whom you can coach and mentor. A cadre of people who know you as someone who has helped them learn, grow and develop is a powerful and meaningful legacy.

Even in difficult economic times, engineering skills provide the infrastructure for maintaining and building the economy. The engineer who understands business and how it works, and who can articulate how his skills contribute to overall growth, is an asset to any organization.

Peggy Hutcheson is a leader in organization development, human capital management, and leadership with more than 20 years’ experience working with scientists, engineers and technical leaders. She is President of The Odyssey Group, Inc., a consulting firm with offices in Atlanta, Ga., and Washington, D.C., that works with organizations to establish strategic human capital plans, align individual capacity and organizational goals, and determine learning and knowledge management needs for the organization. She also serves on the faculty for the Communications Department at Kennesaw State University in metro-Atlanta.

Peggy is past chair of IEEE-USA’s Employment & Career Services Committee and serves on the IEEE’s Innovation Institute Steering Committee. She presents regularly at engineering conferences on the non-technical skills engineers need for lifelong career success.

Comments on this article may be submitted to todaysengineer@ieee.org.