Career Achievement: Align with Career Progress Groups to Advance Your Success

Career Progress: When you connect with groups and people who can help with your career advancement you can significantly improve your success speed and rate. To begin, ask yourself, “For the career achievement I want to attain, who do I want to connect with, and what groups are they likely to be a part of?” If you want to achieve career progress in your current line of work, then you’ll want to find groups made up of people from your present specialty or industry. If you want to start or grow a business, then you’ll want to connect with individuals who can offer support and referrals. And if you’re looking to create more balance in your life, then involvement in civic or nonprofit organizations may be the right path for you.

Related to career advancement, there are several types to consider, along with the key advantages offered by each.

1. Consider a range of career advancement support groups.

Civic organizations - These career progress groups are locally based and focus on improving the community through a variety of volunteer and fundraising activities (think Rotary and Junior League). Become active in one of these career advancing groups, and you’ll have the opportunity to rub elbows with successful, motivated humanitarians from a wide range of industries and specialties within your community.

Key Advantage: Civic organizations can be especially helpful to you if one of your career advancement aims is to connect with a range of local business leaders.

Business Networking & Mastermind Groups – You’re most likely familiar with chamber of commerce organizations and business networking groups, such as BNI, or Business Networking International. These entities are designed to help area businesspeople network with each other regularly, to provide support and referrals, and to achieve their career progress aims.

Another is a mastermind group. In the early 1900’s, Napoleon Hill introduced the concept of mastermind groups – gatherings of a small number of people tasked with providing ideas and support to others for the purpose of goal achievement. Mastermind group formats vary, from one individual being the ongoing focus of the group, to all the group members alternatively sharing the focus.

Key advantage: Mastermind groups can help you really dig in on finding ways to achieve a specific career advancement goal. Your time spent with a mastermind group will be intense, with less socializing and involvement in community-focused activities.

Hobby Clubs & Nonprofit Organizations: Like to hike? Want to protect your local rivers? Have strong beliefs around a certain political affiliation or religion? As a way to connect with others and make progress toward your goals, consider becoming a part of a group whose main focus is around a topic you feel passionately about. Your love for knitting could be instrumental in your career advancement!

Key advantage: Hobby and social groups can be some of the most comfortable to join. Because you share a passion for a topic, an instant connection between you and others already exists. So rather than trying to find things in common to build a relationship, you already have a jump start!

Professional Associations: Just pick up a tube of toothpaste to find an example of a professional association – the American Dental Association, or ADA. Hundreds of thousands of professional groups exist worldwide, and chances are there are several connected to your career advancement focus. Sometimes they’re aligned along your specialty itself, such as, the Northern Colorado Writers Association, or they may be connected to the industry you’re a part of, such as the International Hotel & Restaurant Association.

Key advantage: If you’re looking to climb the ladder within your current career, professional groups will provide you the most concentrated access to colleagues who may be able to help you open new doors.

2. Locate actual groups to investigate

To locate a few of these groups to consider, log onto your favorite search engine and input keywords connected to your career goals. If you try this process and find that it’s not working well for you, call or stop by the reference desk at your local library and ask for their assistance in identifying relevant organizations. For additional ideas, you can also ask colleagues and instructors which groups they belong to.

3. Evaluate great fits and steer clear of mismatches

Once you find some groups to consider, investigate them more closely through the following activities:

Check out their web page and surf for articles.
Contact the organizer or membership chair to ask about the group.
Attend a meeting, just for fun: Most organizations invite prospective members to attend a meeting or two to check out the group. Don’t put pressure on yourself to meet several people right away. Instead, feel free to hang back a little to observe what’s going on. Do aim to talk with one or two people about their involvement in the group, and what they’ve gotten out of it so far. Ideally, it’s best to attend at least two meetings before making a decision to join, because the first meeting may just seem overwhelming. At the second meeting, you’ll have a better idea about what to expect, and you’ll be able to absorb more relevant information to help with your decision making.

4. Get involved and grow…or give it up move on

When you do find a career advancement group or two you want to join, make it a priority to participate actively. At the very least, aim to attend the majority of the meetings, and especially any annual conferences offered, where the best of the best gather to exchange career progress information and support. If at all possible, become active on a project or committee, where you’ll have the opportunity to get to know others while building important skills.

If you find after a while that the group isn’t helping you toward achievement of your career advancement goals, double check that you’ve truly given yourself the opportunity to become involved. As with most things in life, you get out of it what you put in! And if you truly have given the group a fair shot, feel free to set your participation aside for a while to try out other groups.

Excerpted and adapted from “Career Coward’s Guide to Career Advancement” by Katy Piotrowski, M.Ed.