Competitive at Work without Being Annoying
How to be Competitive at Work without Becoming an Annoying Person?
Have you felt jealous or annoyed by others who excel in the competition at work? Do you think they are too ambitious and selfish? So, this is the time to fix that and become an influencer of a competitive person without being annoying. Look at these steps!
Understand yourself
The first step is you need to know yourself. Then, you can analyze your strength, weakness, opportunity, and threat (SWOT).
You can also combine it with other methods such as 5W+1H. This is the most crucial step before you go further to other steps.
Example Questions:
- What skills do I have?
- Which areas do I excel in?
- What thing I can’t do and don’t like?
- What are barriers that I have to achieving my goals?
- Can you list the experiences and influential people you have right now? Which area that you can develop from them?
Analyze the Trend
Don’t focus on yourself only! You need to find out what’s happening in the current industry; what is the demand? How can you be the “supply”? List all things that can be the opportunity for your career. You also need to know others’ responses regarding these market trends.
Example Questions:
- What skill or job is needed in the next five years?
- Which industry will grow in the future?
- How can other people get into this market trend?
- What are other people’s capabilities or skills to excel in this job?
- Which area needs improvement for this job that others haven’t done
Create your competitive advantages
After you understand yourself and know what is needed in the industry, you need to find your competitive advantages. Don’t forget about the previous steps, but you must combine them in this step. This is the step that can support you in winning the market.
By this step, you can become a “purple cow” among the other people. You also can build your branding through this step because this step can make you more unique. Please keep in mind that you also need to consider the impacts you can give by your competitive advantages.
Example Questions:
- Which skills that I have that unique from other people?
- What thing can I solve in this industry through the capabilities that I have?
- What is the impact of my competitive advantages?
Collaborate with others
Now, you can use your competitive advantages with others to make a powerful impact within the industry. Even though you have competitive advantages, it doesn’t mean you can do everything. You can’t stand only by yourself. You need to build your networking and start to collaborate with others. They can cover your weakness, and you also can cover their weakness. You and your colleagues can be a powerful team to make a more significant impact and rise above the crowds together.
Example Questions:
- What weakness that I have?
- How can other people give me help to cover my weakness?
- What can I contribute to the team?
- How can I help the team make a greater impact through our competitive advantages?
- How can I build the network?
Ask for feedback
Don’t be selfish; you still need feedback from your colleagues. In this step, you will hear what other people feel about you. Please don’t feel you are always right because there are so many things that we don’t realize.
Being competitive is a “should,” but understanding how others think about you is a “must.” If you don’t get feedback and keep trying to repeat the behavior that others don’t like, you will be left by them. You can be a “mean cow” instead of a “purple cow.”
Example Questions:
- What do others say about yourself?
- How can I fix and improve myself?
- What can I learn from others to improve myself?
- Who is my mentor?
Reflect, learn, and repeat!
After all, the steps are done, now is the time to reflect and learn. Continuous learning is needed. Don’t stop yourself at one point; keep repeating these steps because the market demand will keep changing. You must be adaptive and outperform the competition by upgrading your competitive advantages. Don’t be arrogant, and still be humble. Being a purple cow is not that hard, but maintaining yourself becoming the purple cow is hard.
To be competitive at work without being annoying, you must follow those steps and keep learning! Start to build your branding and rise above the crowd. Anything you do, do it with your heart. What are you waiting for? Let’s walk the talk!
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