Career Progression: Things to People to Money to Strategy
I've heard a few different ways to think about ways your career can progress that are valuable mental models.
These models are helpful, whether you want to climb the ladder or if you want to be intentional at focusing on a certain stage. For example, when I was in my early 20s working as a systems engineer at Lockheed Martin, I worked with a senior engineer who was in his 50s and had intentionally decided he did not want to be a manager. He had turned down several promotion opportunities and negotiated a smaller salary to only work Tuesdays through Thursdays, so every weekend could be a 4-day weekend, where he'd go on fun vacations like whitewater rafting in South America. This was a powerful reminder for me not to assume that moving up the org chart is something everyone should want.
A great mentor and family friend of mine (Thanks Tim!) once explained to me that the progress is Managing Things (e.g. tasks), then Managing People, and finally Managing Money. Early in my career, I was fascainating by engineering and had zero interest in business, so I was surprised/irritated to hear this from him, but it's so true that understanding leadership and managemnt of people and how money works within your organization (such as planning/budgeting, approvals, financial monitoring, rewards/incentives) are powerful ways to move up in your career quickly. Another model I've heard is moving from Doing to Managing (Operations, Structure, Processes, Execution) to Leading (Strategy, Vision, Culture). Here's how I think about this progress conceptually:
When looking forward in your career future, another great resource is Drucker's Effective Executive article, which QAspire Consulting summarized so well in this image:
