The Most Impactful Ways to Advance Your Career

We all want to move forward in life (Maybe that’s an over-generalization, but I hope you do!). And it’d be great if that could happen quickly. I recently learned three impactful ways to advance your career that I will share with you.

Before I do that though, I need to make sure you know what it is you want. There’s no way to succeed unless you know what it is you’re supposed to be succeeding at. Make sure you are specific on your career goals BEFORE learning how to advance your career–if you’re really clueless, use these tips to advance yourself as a human and maybe your goals will come to you.

The Most Impactful Ways to Advance Your Career:

1. Have a set routine

We learned the other day about routine habits of highly successful people. Of course that’s important to advance your career! What you do in the day to day is a representation of the life you want to live.

Someone said something that really resonated with me recently–“I should be able to walk into your space and know EXACTLY what your goals are.” Meaning, what you listen to, what you read, how you take care of yourself, what initiatives you’re taking, all represent what you value in life. Gets a little personal when you think of it that way!

My challenge for you would be to imagine your role model is coming to offer you a job. But the only way you’ll get the job is if your daily routine matches up to their expectations of you! Keep that in your forefront every day to encourage you to keep going, especially when you think it won’t matter. And be sure to include these 5 things in your daily routine!

2. Make investments in yourself

Warren Buffett says “the best investment you can make is in yourself”. And Warren Buffett has made A LOT of investments, so that’s probably a pretty good source!

The ways I’ve been learning to invest in myself (for FREE too!) is through listening to influencers’ podcasts, watching inspirational YouTube videos, and reading or listening to motivational, dream chasing books from the library. These small things have been sources of encouragement as I’m getting started, PLUS they normally have amazing success stories that make me think, “if they can do it, so can I!” It’s a good thing.

Think of where you want to advance your career and shape your investments in that direction. Any courses, books, networking events, etc. that will help you move forward are perfect! And if they cost money, sometimes your employer will pay for them or you can weigh your budget with the pros to see if the expense is justifiable or an impulse buy–Some of those courses and book writers are such great salesman, I almost ALWAYS want to buy! But I will go bankrupt before being successful if I do, so I caution you to think on the product before hitting that instant buy.

3. Create a vision for what you want

I believe that vision comes after you’ve been investing in yourself for a while. Sometimes your goal or idea will start out a little blurry and distant, but the more you work on it, the clearer it gets.

My favorite way to track my vision is through a vision board (Check out how to make one, if you’ve never tried). But lately I’ve been experimenting with other forms of visualization. You can visualize using a dream journal, images on your bathroom mirror, reminders when you wake up, screensavers on your phone, ANYTHING that’s going to get your goals in front of your face. The key is to speak the vision as if it’s already happened to make the vision real, too.

Practice visualization by listing all your goals. Then find images for the goals–go to Pinterest and print them out or upload them. Next make it a point to look at them daily and speak your vision out loud (This embarrassed me at first, but you get used to it).

Now that you have your formula, it’s time to take it full-force! The only way to truly make anything work is to put in the effort and trying to advance your career is a challenge. Make it your purpose every day to be moving forward and to work towards growing your dream.