Step forward

In this day and age everyone wants to be at the top of the food chain; at the top of the pyramid. How does one do this? Well considering that I am only starting to venture out on my career, I won't waste your time in giving you my advice. Rather, I have put together a few tips and experiences from those who are at the summit.

Lets consider Marissa Mayer. 16 years ago she started her career at Google as a Software Engineer. Its a typical starting role dependent on your field. In the next 10 years, she climbed her way up the ladder at Google reaching 'Vice President of Local, Maps & Location Services'. Today she is the CEO and President of Yahoo! having earned approximately $500 million collectively in her career. Amazing right? Well what were the things she did:

• Never think of your ideas and opinions to be a hassle. Okay, yes they can be but if you do not put them forward and push for it, you will never heard. There is a common phrase which is heard quite a lot: 'You only get one chance, second chances don't exist'. It is true, there might be an exception here and there but don't chance it. Your luck tank will empty out instantly.
• Take control. The world is a viscous place, if there is an opportunity available assume there are about another 10 sharks ready to battle you for it. In these situations, it's not about winning the war in the long term. Why? Simply because there will be no war if you lose that particular battle. Aim to come on top in all situations. Consider this example: there is only ONE CEO role for any company, are you going to waffle around waiting for the second day of posting or are you going to swoop in and ''take the opportunity by the balls'? Sometimes you just have to strong-arm the situation.
• Know the limit. When Marissa made it to Vice President she realised she was within the summit, but was this all she wanted? Clearly not. She knew that if she wanted to become CEO she had to leave. She reviewed her circumstances and opportunities for taking. Realising that Google had run out of capacity for her she had no choice. Yahoo! was for the taking and there she landed.

Jeff Miller is another good example. 12 years ago he took up an assignment in a foreign land away from home. A few years after he joined Halliburton, an opening turned up for a country vice president position in Angola. It was a challenging assignment, and there wasn't a long line of people who wanted to take on the work.

Clearly a good chance to come up the ladder a few steps. Considering it was in Angola, not many were interested... the pecking list was short. He met various new challenges where he was exposed to all aspects of the business. From this experience, he was led to new opportunities in Indonesia and later the Gulf of Mexico. Eventually he became Halliburton's COO and in 2014 the President of the company. In 12 years he had leap up the food chain, devouring lions and tigers by becoming the 'dragon'.

What can we learn from this? Take the jobs others don't want. You will be exposed to more areas of business but more importantly challenged and tested by management. Assuming you coming out on top you can only win from there onwards.

I'm sure there are many more examples out there; the key point is to always push through and think about the next 5 steps down the line. Checkmate before your opponents can even see it.

Checkmate