So welcome to the session, career evolution in an era of continuous disruption.Now, I know that so many of you are in a space of, of tech and in development and in building new things in generating new drives for innovation in all that you do, which is really great and important work. I'm I'm a person who's really, really into sustainability and into how tech can make sustainable realities happen in the world. So this is something that I'm super, super passionate about and it's one of the reasons I change careers as many times as I have. And I'm gonna tell you a little bit about that story. But I want to draw also on the session with Hi Victoria. Welcome. So Victoria is in hr ops and in start ups. Perfect. So I want to share with you a little bit and it's a link to if you just watched your riches session, I want to share with you a little bit how that connects to my session as well because the success that you have in your career is really linked to how you leverage your greatest natural talents and you nurture those talents and you scale those talents to repeat your outcomes in the future, even when the rules change, right?

And if you're in the tech space, you're in the business of changing the rules. And in addition to changing the rules, you will find that you are also being disrupted. So your skills are, are constantly on, on the, on the change. There's more things that you need to learn, there's more things that you need to get into and it can all get a bit overwhelming, right? I mean, I know that this is how it is for, for a lot of us. So I'm going to move now into a bit of a little bit of back story about me and so that we can understand why all of this makes a difference. So at the moment, I'm an entrepreneur, I've been an entrepreneur for the last two years and I've been doing five things in my entrepreneur, entrepreneurial business. So I think I'm, I've suddenly become the classic type of entrepreneur. I can never just start one thing. I start several things.

So I'm a career coach. It's one of the things that I do. But I also I'm a consultant. So I'm a process design consultant. Uh I work with my business partner and my life partner, by the way, who is a data scientist and a cio and we help companies with process mining and also with adapting what they do to fit the work, the working culture that they want to create. The other thing that I do is I run a community on Facebook of women in sustainable business. And I help those women start their digital businesses and make it work for them in a way that's sustainable, not just for their incomes, but also for what they want to do for the world. Right? So this is a real community of people who want to change the planet who want to be revolutionary. Now, the reason I've gotten into the space is because I worked in corporate for 20 years and in 20 years, I felt every day like who I was wasn't as important anymore.

So with every changing day, every changing year, every changing career, I suddenly felt like my uniqueness was being dulled by the culture that was the company. So I wanted to make some changes to that and part of it was learning how to speak up. So if I sit back and I think about the people who managed successful careers, they did, they did two or three things really well, they knew what they wanted to do and get out of it. Hi Joe. Welcome. And your session was great, by the way. So if I think about the people who did really well, the things that they, they really understood better than I had perhaps was that they knew who they were, they knew their values, they knew what they stood for. They also knew what they wanted. So if it is that they wanted the money to afford a certain type of lifestyle, they did that if they wanted to make a difference and make an impact, they knew about that and they were clear on these goals, they were clear on where they were going. And that's the thing that I have started to become very aware of myself. And this is the thing that I'd like to help you to become aware of as well. So Shruti says, I'm, I'm a security manager and research and cybersecurity. That's really an important role that we're doing right now.

So if you want to, to manage an effective and really groundbreaking career, even as things are constantly changing, it's important for you to also know what you want to get from it and what you, where are you going with all of this. So I'm gonna skip right now to these three modalities and you'll tell me if you're seeing that clearly. So the three modalities, so I'm gonna flip back to the hoppin screen. The three modalities are three ways or paths you can take to manage your career. So one modality is the specialist. So this is the person who is really, really deep and really, really good at this specific area. Now, nobody can just be good at one area in this world that we live in anymore. That's, that's a given. But a specialist is someone who spends their extra time really digging deeper into this one area of study. The specialist is somebody who will become really advanced in in that area, they will become authors in that area. They will become creators in that area and innovators in that area. Hi Initia that the portfolio of skills is the person who leverages their skills across many different things in the organization. So they're trying to learn how to manage a project. They're trying to integrate the knowledge of what's happening in every function in the organization and channel those things to make them more efficient and work to save cost time, et cetera.

Then there's a person who's into experiences and the person who's into experiences will typically get bored in a specialist or a portfolio role and they will get stressed and overwhelmed in a portfolio role because what they want to do is have experiences that make them feel a certain way that make them do and have impact in a certain different way.

So typically the specialist I'll and I'll tell you about that. Right now, the specialists will get into things like a deep domain. They will be cutting edge in design. They will collaborate with others to improve that design. They'll become authors of their own original work and they will typically choose either a freelancer path or be part of a center of expertise in a big organization. So the organizations that I worked in center of expertise are becoming a much bigger thing, right? And that, that specialist will become known for that thing and for that one thing and if this is what you want, then you need to think about how you develop a path along that and you need to think about your personality as well. And see if this really meshes with who you want to be. The next one is the portfolio of skills. So someone who is into the portfolio of skills, they tend to be very good managers of people. Now, as we think about that, you, you need to be skilled at problem solving, you need to be also highly emotionally intelligent. You need to be good at coordinating and, and adapting and you need to be capable of asking relevant questions based on a sort of interdisciplinary knowledge.

So this person is, is typically a shoe in for uh a manager role or a head of function role, someone who is leading, leading the organization's change processes because all management is change management. As we know the person who's really into experiences will probably be likely to be the CEO S, they were likely to start businesses and they are likely to be the ones really invested in innovation. So they will spend 70% of their time typically on innovating new things and new ideas and bringing that to the fore. So which one do you think you are? So are you, are you feeling like you're a specialist? Are you feeling like you're more of a portfolio manager. Are you feeling like you're, you're one who's really driven to, to create experiences and to create um impact in that way experiences? I love it. I love it. So this is one of the things that I want you to be aware of when you're starting to build your career plan, right? So you need to figure out where it is, you want to go and then how do you manage that reality? How do you manage to bring that into reality? So we're gonna move now into the nine step process that I've created to help you do this plan. So they told me I only had 20 minutes. So I didn't pack a lot into these slides.

But of course, you know, if you want to ask me questions about any of these things, you can feel free to um after the session. So let me just try to get this back on the screen share mode. OK. All right. So, so this one, so the first thing you need to do is map out where you are. So this is uh a situation of looking backward. So understanding what knowledge you've accumulated in the past, that is useful to the part that you want to be on where you stand today and what's happening today and where you want to go. So if you want to own your own organization, you want to start your own thing. If you want to become the leader in the organization that you're in. Um because a lot of you have said experiences. So, so sit and think about where you are today, what you can bring to the table that is balanced and mixed enough that says that you are the right person to take, to take the business to the next level of experiences. And it doesn't have to be jumping right from here into the CEO.

You have to think about what steps you need to take to get there and to know the steps you need to take, you need to understand what you have from the past experiences that you've, you've brought to the table and what experiences you need to get next. So I'll give you an example. Uh I worked in finance for the 1st 10 years of my career. I've, I've done at least five different careers, but I worked in finance for the 1st 10 years. Um, and in that time, I worked in operations, finance, I worked in marketing finance. I worked in core accounting. I worked in management, accounting. I worked in, you know, taxation. I did everything I could possibly do in finance because I knew that I wanted to have a broad base. I, I knew what I wanted. Then I left and I went to internal audit, an internal audit in a big multinational is a bit like this agnostic area of, of discipline. Right? So you have a certain way to approach a process and controls and risk. But you're agnostic in that you can review any process. So I reviewed operations. I review marketing, I reviewed corporate responsibility. I reviewed farming because I worked in tobacco. So this was another way to build on all the experiences that I had to move to the next step. Right?

My next step out of audit was to do logistics because I wanted to know how things move. So I spent three years in logistics and in change management. And then the next step was to go out and do an MBE. So I've been building for the last few years. All of these experiences, I wasn't fully clear and I wasn't fully confident at the beginning about what I wanted to do. So I spent a lot of time building the experience, but you don't have to take as long as I did. That's for sure. You know, it took me about about 20 years before I decided to make this shift, but it doesn't have to take you that long. OK. So once you map out where you are, you know, you then need to set where you need to go. And that's the next phase of your process. Then once you, once you have that picture documented and outlined, it's time for you to start making moves. So taking action, one thing is to set the plan, the other thing is to set the actions in motion. So succession planning is the next phase and succession planning is, is really about understanding how to get the opportunity that you want to get faster. So if you know, or if your, your manager knows who can replace you, it's more likely that she will help you get the next opportunity or he will help you get the next opportunity.

So succession planning needs to be managed and I I kind of call it a bit of a dark art. So in the world, in the world of corporate, you know, um you, you tend to get people who can undermine you if they learn your role too quickly and you can have a number of mixed experiences. So who's had those kind of mixed experiences feeling sometimes like they could be undermined by their colleagues and stuff like this. So if you've had those experiences, managing your succession planning, takes a bit of art and a bit of skill. And what I recommend that you do is you identify potentially three people who can be your replacements who can then become shoe ins to, to the role that you're doing but not completely. So you want to make sure that you develop at least three different people based on their own strengths and help them to be able to get stronger at those things. So that if you leave, you don't leave a complete vacuum, but you leave three people who can cover you until the next person is found, right? So this is one of the things that you could think about, then there's a next role planning.

So the next role planning is looking at, where do you want to go? So what role if you want to be ex position in five years, let's say you want to be the head of your function or you want to be the CEO in five years. What's the next role that will get you the next best skill set to be able to accomplish that eventual goal that you have? So you're gonna need to manage probably three trans transitions before you get to the ultimate goal that you want, think about that next role and don't just think about it, identify it specifically. So if it is a role within your existing organization, identify who's doing that role today and maybe there are three roles, right? Maybe you identify just three roles that you think you want to do next, then you kind of understand and you kind of do a little bit of a, I call it a desktop exercise. Think about that role and think about how you, how that role could make a big impact in the organization that you're in and try to understand a bit about the role as a desktop exercise before you start getting to know the person who's in that role today.

Because managing the relationship with the person who's in that role today makes you a next thought for who could replace that person. So this is a great idea to managing how you ramp up in your career. The next section is about your job, strategy and execution. So this is about how you go out and approach them. This is about the emotional intelligence that you use to make sure that you, you understand what's happening with that person and that job, what's difficult, what's challenging, what's what they're doing well, what they're not doing so well.

Um What things they most need help with what skills can come to the table that would make that rule revolutionary if it's an internal rule, for example, if it's an external role that you've identified and if you want to leave the company that you're in, you want to figure out um more about the company, first of all, to make sure that um you know, which companies match the values that you have because remember I spoke at the beginning about the people who are really successful, understand what they value and then they go after their values.

So you need to understand that the company you're targeting is aligned to your values. And then you need to think about how can you get a relationship or build a relationship with people who are in those roles currently or people who are around those roles. So either the line manager of that role or maybe the pair of that role. So this is about using your network using social media, right? So we can't be shy about social media anymore. We really need to embrace it as part of our career development plan. This is really essential and it doesn't have to be linked in it could be linkedin, linkedin is a great place to do it, but you can also do it on Instagram or Twitter, right? So there are lots of options. So once you get the strategy and execution clay and this is all about networking, it's about understanding things like headhunter and stuff like this. You want to make sure also that your digital branding is spot on and the digital branding comes, comes with knowing who you are and what you stand for. So it's not about colors, right? It's not about beautiful pictures also, although it's part of it, um you really need to think about who you are and what you stand for and how that is represented on social media and how people who will be looking at, you will see that.

So is your branding or the the image of the branding you have in your head aligned to how people see you? OK. And the way to know about your digital or about your brand of itself, not just your digital brand, but your brand is to get um comments from people. So ask people to, to give you recommendations and see what they say, you know, don't tell them what to see but see what they say, this will tell you how people currently perceive you. If you want to do any work to change that perception, then this is the self work that you need to do, but be very clear that you already have a brand and, and it is how people perceive you and then you can manage that brand to be the brand that you want it to be. Right? So, so who feels very confident in their, in their digital brand right now? I'd love to know. That's wonderful too. Thank you. All right. So if you're, if you're feeling a little bit rocky on your digital brand, don't worry about it, right? This is, this is a bit of exercise of research and just talking to people having a little bit of a coffee chat, a virtual coffee chat and just understanding what people really think.

Ok, then it comes to systems and this is probably one of my favorite areas and I literally have one more minute on this talk, but it comes to systems and systems is about your personal playbook. This is the things that actually get you success in your job today. So Jill talked about, you know, remembering things from the past that, that actually help you to be successful. So systems is about capturing those things from the past and working them out as a structure that you can follow, going forward, managing your onboarding. So this is all about understanding the impact that you need to make when you land in that new role in that new organization and understanding exactly what is needed without enforcing what you already think. So this is a time for discovery, a time for listening, a time for using two ears and one mouth as they say, but it's really about uncovering what is the truth of everything that's happening around you and how you can make a difference and how you can make a unique difference.

Then there is reviewing your processes of the new systems. And finally, it's about making a pitch. So once you've gotten a new role, it's important for you to make a pitch because you're going to need investment, you're going to need support for the ideas that you have, you're going to need support for the changes you wanna make. And this is how you are going to be seen as that person who is most likely to develop and span the the next level of their career. So that's what I wanted to share with you today. I would love to know any reflections that you have. Do, feel free to drop me a line on linkedin to connect with me and I will head out on into, into the rest of the sessions. But do let me know what your thoughts are and any questions that you have, I have a free version of the entire system if you would like. So just drop me a message on linkedin and I'm happy to share that. Thanks so much for joining me today guys.