Mika Hunter is the CEO and founder of Female Defender and coach for 40 Days of Influence and Mastermind for Professional Women.
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In part one of "How To Succeed With Difficult People In Powerful Positions," I discussed how to hone your professional skills. In addition to honing your professional skills to impress people in your organization, there are a few things you can do to gain the support of advocates who may mention your name along with the topic of opportunity. Below are three ways to obtain powerful advocates.
1. Commit to being successful.
In his book, Think and Grow Rich, Napoleon Hill explained that a person may fail until he or she commits to being successful. In my own career, I created a strategy for working alongside other influential people and being successful at doing so.
First, a person must be confident in others using the adjective “successful” in describing his or her career. As a person’s career is labeled with the adjective “successful,” there are things that come along with it: increased competitors, being challenged and having an increased number of people who want to be associated with you because of your success.
A 2022 CNN news report provided an example of a military admiral analyzing the confidence of a person in politics and whether she was comfortable with being herself. As an admiral, he analyzed a person who had a level of influence higher than himself. I, too, have experienced other power players with more (and sometimes less) influence challenge whether I was comfortable in handling my level of accelerated responsibilities. Committing to being successful means you must get comfortable with having increased competitors and being challenged.
2. Build professional relationships inside the company.
When leaders are determining who to promote, the promotion is not always simply awarded to a good sociologist, engineer or professional. Sometimes it's awarded to the best sociologist, engineer or professional who has the additional skill of handling external and internal politics of the organization. The better you are at handling the politics of your company, the better you’ll be at increasing the number of advocates. How well are you doing with handling internal company politics? Below is a short quiz to assist you. I suggest you try answering yes to most of the following questions:
1. Are you working for a publicly traded company? If so, do you help to positively influence the people who have a large stake in the company?
2. Are you competing for a position that is nominated by officials in or outside the company? Do these officials know your name and the importance of your work?
3. Do you know your company's alliances? If so, do these people know your name?
3. Build professional relationships outside the company.
My third recommendation in dealing with difficult people in power positions is to increase the number of professionals you know outside your workplace. Does that surprise you? The Wall Street Journal reported (paywall) that more U.S. companies are looking outside the organization for executive hires. Why is this? What are companies missing? Is your company looking to make strategic alliances? Can you be the person to bridge the gap?
Over the last 20 years, I have done a number of things to build professional relationships to increase my professional advocates. Here are a few things, I recommend you try:
1. Become the president or vice president of a professional organization (only being a member may not be enough).
2. Organize a large fundraising event for a nonprofit organization.
3. Volunteer to teach kids a necessary skill.
4. Start a volunteer organization for your community.
If you can engage as a leader in collaborative projects with people who are not in the organization, you may make a significant impact by achieving the following:
1. Meeting people who work in organizations unlike your own
2. Allowing others to know your work ethic
3. Creating professional allies
4. Meeting leaders in other companies who may be willing to promote (or hire) you if your company will not
After honing your professional skills, committing to being successful, building relationships inside the company, as well as building relationships outside the company will likely have a significant impact on the number of professional advocates mentioning your name along with the promotion, pay, opportunity and success!
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