006 - I'm a new campus hire, how do I differentiate myself?
“I graduated with my undergraduate degree a little over a year ago and have been in one of the campus hire rotational programs at a big company. I enjoy the program and am getting exposure to a lot of different people and projects but can’t help feeling like I am just one more new hire in a sea of people. I know it’s important to get some name recognition and build connections for my career down the road. How do you differentiate when you are part of a rotational program and build credibility early on in your career?”
- Craving credibility
Dear Craving,
Congratulations on landing in a rotational program right out of college - they are a great way to learn a lot (quickly) about what types of work you like and don’t like and where your talents lie.
You are right that it is important to build a positive reputation for yourself in these early stages of your career. The nuance I’ll add is that you don’t need everyone to know who you are and know about your work. It is more effective to build a very positive perception with a few key people vs. trying to meet everyone and they kind of know your name but nothing else about you.
Credibility and trust go hand in hand and differentiating yourself is just as much about building personal trusting personal relationships as it is about delivering great work. If you are a genius but no one can count on you to get the presentation submitted on time, all those smarts won’t get you very far.
So - how do you create a few table-pounding advocates early on? The short answer is by saying what you are going to do, and then doing it well. Sounds easy? The idea is simple, but executing takes thoughtfulness and consistency.
Focus on your direct managers
To start with, build a solid relationship and reputation with your direct manager and your skip level (your manager’s manager). They will have the most exposure to you and your work product and will have the loudest voices as either advocates or detractors.
At the beginning of a new relationship, your manager wants to know: can I count on this person to do the work?
The basics here are pretty basic. When given an assignment or task, proactively tell your manager what you’re going to do and how you’re planning to do it. Give them an opportunity to provide feedback or redirection before you invest a ton of time in it. Then, once you are aligned on the approach, deliver what you said you would do.
They hired you to do the work and want you to be the one doing it. Don’t ask them how to do the project. Instead, create a plan and present it as ‘here’s what I’m thinking about for the approach and deliverables, does that meet the need and align with your expectations’. Your manager gets to see your thought process and add, tweak or redirect if needed. Feedback at this stage isn’t a bad thing - they might have not been clear when they made the ask or things may have shifted due to additional information.
As you are working on the project, make sure to communicate any changes about the approach or timeline clearly and proactively. Then ship off your awesome final product.
Boom. First layer of trust delivered.
The approach described here will show your manager that you can think through problem statements, are open to coaching, and can deliver as expected. All good things. A bad outcome (and one that leads to less trust) is that you go off and work alone, spending hours or days on something that actually isn’t what they needed and then it needs to be redone or is behind schedule.
Become a problem identifier
Once you have consistently established this initial pattern and you are known as a thoughtful deliverer of good work, you can start to be a problem finder. I’m not talking about filling up the complaints box, but instead about helping leaders see things that might otherwise be hidden.
What this looks like: as you’re doing your work, you become the expert on your area. You see more of it on a daily basis than anyone in the company. Start noticing where things could be different or better. Make a list of opportunities you observe and think through how you would solve these problems or improve the process.
When you have downtime, do some analysis to roughly calculate potential benefits (hours saved, cost reduction, speed efficiency, increased customer satisfaction) and the resources required to make it happen (time investment, ongoing maintenance, technology). Pick one or two ideas to focus on. Note - do not fall behind on your project work to do this analysis.
Once you have a short list of high benefit / low cost opportunities, find the right forum to share them with your manager. It could be in a 1:1 meeting or a team demo. You can also give your manager a heads-up that you have a few ideas to share and ask for a suggestion on when and how to do so.
Always give your manager an opportunity to engage first - nothing is worse than your manager hearing from some other leader that you had an idea that hasn’t been acted on. That will erode the trust you have built.
There are many possible outcomes for what your manager will do with your recommendations. You might get a chance to implement some of the ideas, or it might not be a priority at the moment and land on a backlog. For the purposes of building credibility, the outcome matters less than showing your thought process and initiative.
Every leader wants people who can deliver great work and improve the business without being told step-by-step what to do. If you do these two things consistently, you can expect to become a hot commodity in your organization!
Find one or two high-leverage extras
Final note: don’t raise your hand for every extra project. I see many early-career folks fall into the trap of wanting to be, do, and experience so many things that they don’t become a go-to expert in any one thing.
Be selective about the ‘extra curriculars’ you invest in. Pick one or two and go deep.
Examples: join the team that recruits college grads from your alma mater, work on a culture initiative for your team, sign up to produce a big event for your organization. One or two will get you good exposure to leaders outside your direct chain. More will likely distract from your day job and negatively impact your overall performance. Remember - you are aiming for a handful of the most important people to become your advocates, not the entire company.