#BeBoldForChange

Firstly wishing all you wonderful women out there a very Happy International Women’s Week!!!

Though we celebrate 8th March as International Women’s Day, this post is applicable for both Men and Women and I hope you will agree with me Along the Way!!!

What I would like to touch upon in this post are a few key points that I picked from the various sessions I attended as part of International’s Women’s Day/Week as well as over the years from folks around me. This year I attended the following programs:

Sessions by Women Leaders in my organization
Session by Archdiocesan Women’s Association

I hope this article will be helpful in your life journey be it Career or Personal.

Stage I: Know Yourself – It is very important to know your capabilities, values and your aspirations. Hence take time to reflect and self analyze where you stand and where you want to be.

My story goes like this, for a long time I believed I am emotionally strong and can take anything that comes my way. However, a project in my career journey showed me how much more I had to grow in Emotional Intelligence and for that I needed space, time and a change of scene. When I made a decision to leave my previous organization for building myself up I was offered a promotion to manager. But my mentor and me knew that I was not emotionally ready for it.

Stage II: Take a Challenge for growth – Often we think we want to Learn and Grow but we do not want to Change. Change is the key to learning and growing.  Try new things I say!!!

Then began the second part of my story, I decided to pass the promotion up and move on to a new organization. Coming in at a senior position at a new firm brought with it, it’s own set of excitement and challenges. Excitement of a new place, varied people and new opportunities but on the other side it brought challenges of having a network at the work place, proving oneself technically as well as showing leadership and having followership. I worked hard and grabbed every opportunity that I knew I could manage and sustain even though I had to learn something new each time. The following year I was promoted to Manager at the new place. So it’s alright to pass up an opportunity if you don’t think its right for you, because all is good all the time and you don’t know what’s around the corner.

Stage III: Each one is unique and their paths are different – Many times in life we see almost everyone raving about a certain technology or movie or tv series and there will be a handful of folks who will decide to pass on and that is okay too.

Part three of my story, most folks in Technology try to do technical projects to increase their core strength, however I realized my strength lies in Client Interactions, Industry knowledge and Communication. So I decided to do initiatives at the firm oriented to these aspects and use my project to grow on the technical aspect. So its alright to be different.

Stage IV: Recognize the strengths of folks around you – Man is a social being and to grow in multiple avenues we need each other’s support.

Part four of my story, know your people. Know their strengths and improvement areas and work with them to build it up. As leaders we need to spend enough time with our junior employees and have a top down approach – not to push rules down their throat but to Lead by Example. This I have personally taken up and spent time with a few folks to provide guidance and to empower them so that they can leverage the experience we already have gone through and be better leaders of the future

Stage V: Connecting with people at various levels – Building a connection is important however maintaining the connection is key.

The last part of my story, is Network. We hear the word Network thrown a lot especially in Businesses and IT organizations. Networking is important, talking to the right connects above and below you, learning current trends and ideating. But does networking strategically make one selfish? It sounds like it and sometimes feels like it but it is acceptable and needed as long as we do not lose the Human Essence of it along the way.

So this post is dedicated to all those who ever thought they want to change,  learn and grow because it all starts with one step. So stand up, be bold and I hope I have inspired you to take the first step.

If yes, please leave a comment as I would love to hear your story and be inspired, for we each have a story but we do not speak up most of the times!!!