Mistakes that may not allow you to grow in your career

If you feel that your career is not growing as fast as you wish, it shows that you are committing a few mistakes. Experts assertively say that negative patterns in the way you approach your work may spell doom to your career growth. Therefore, it is imperative that you should change your attitude before it becomes very late. Let us look at some of the mistakes you may be committing.

1. Over-committing and under-delivering

Hordes of people commit this mistake and you may be one among them. You may be in the habit of over-committing, thanks to your enthusiasm and when you begin the tasks that have been entrusted to you, you may realize that the tasks are tougher than what you have originally thought. So, you may not be able to deliver the output you have promised. If this happens repeatedly, employers may rank you very low in their quality audits. 

There can be two reasons for under-delivering. You may either be taking more tasks than your capabilities or may not be putting forth the right kind of efforts. You may be committing beyond your capabilities also. When your employer does not get the output or the results they have been promised, they brand you as 'unreliable'. You should therefore refrain from committing such mistakes so you can avoid losing your increments or promotions.

The only way to regain your reputation is to make only those commitments you are capable of fulfilling and once you make your commitments, you must work hard not only carrying out the tasks with aplomb but to complete them much ahead of deadlines. If you do so for a considerable period, you can regain your reputation.

2. Feeling inadequate

The main obstacle that may be impeding your career growth is YOU. If you have self-doubts and always have a feeling that your capabilities are inadequate, this will turn out to be a prophecy that is certain to come true. This means you will hesitate to take up challenges, will not come out with your opinions even when they are needed and will not re-assure your employer that you are willing and ready to handle critical projects. 

The best solution for keeping your worries and self-doubts at bay is by being busy always. But you must ensure to do useful and purposeful work. You should especially engage yourself in tasks that pull you out of the comfort zone you are cozily enjoying. After some time, you may be inspired to speak up or may volunteer to take up difficult tasks as well. If you fail in the tasks, you must delve deep to learn. Willingness to learn from your failures will help you move ahead and grow in your career.

3. Seeking perfection 

If you have a perfectionist attitude, it will certainly harm your career. According to the Pareto's principle, 20% of your efforts will help you achieve 80% of the outcomes you desire to have. But there are certain outcomes for which you may have to spend 80% of your energy. People with a perfectionist attitude will put forth 80% of efforts and will get only 20% of the results they expect to have. 

Of course, you must aim at 100% perfection if you are sending a space-ship into the skies or when you are involved in a laboratory experiment. Spending more time on an office task may reduce your output. You should set short and very tough deadlines and finish every task. In short, you must know where you must chase perfection and where you must look for conserving your efforts.

4. Ignoring lateral moves 

If you wish to reach a mountain top, you cannot assume that you can go up only by a straight road. In fact, you may encounter insurmountable obstacles if you choose such a straight path. However hard you try, you may be failing repeatedly. But lateral thinking, learning new skills and willingness to go around the mountain may show you new and easy ways. Lateral moves will allow you to view things with new perspectives. At the same time, you must approach issues with a positive outlook and move towards the direction of the goals you have set. Focusing on a single path may delay your growth.

5. Chasing money always

You cannot build your career if you always focus on earning money. You should sometimes accept tasks that may not get you very good money. Similarly, switching jobs just for the sake of earning more is also not right. Especially, if you lack skills for those jobs or if you are not enthusiastic about the tasks involved in them, you will be doing grave injustice to yourself and also to the organization that is offering such a job. Instead, your career plan should purely be based on your current skills and those you are willing to learn.

6. Ignoring relationships for the sake of tasks

It is true tasks are important but ignoring relationships and focusing only on tasks will turn your team against you. Especially, when things are tough, people may let you down. You should be a general who leads his men and not behave like a mercenary. In short, relation-building is as important as completing tasks. Therefore, you must focus on interpersonal skills also while you develop your other job-related skills.

7. Resisting change

If you have the habit of viewing new ideas and concepts with scepticism, it shows that you are fond of only repeatable tasks. By adopting such an attitude, you may soon get fossilised because the modern workplace involves rapid changes in job definitions as well as technology. So, shed your negative attitude forthwith and embrace every workable, new idea willingly. Every task has alternate approaches and so, you should try to learn from the changes that are taking place in thedynamic and modern world.