It’s not what you know, it’s who you know.
I have heard that statement more times than I could count, and I still do not believe it. As the child of two teachers, I learned algebra at age seven, cannot remember not being able to read, and was asked what I learned when on vacation because “vacation” usually involved touring a battlefield or ancient ruins. What I did not get as the child of two teachers is connections at prestigious law firms, accounting firms, investment banks, or any similar companies. Despite starting without these connections, this did not stop me from landing a cushy position at one of the greater Washington, DC area’s management consulting firms.
Oh, but you probably networked on your own once you got to DC. Nope. It is probably a bit embarrassing how much I have not networked in my industry. You will not catch me at work happy hours, networking events, or any functions outside of my workday. You will not even find me at my office often, and when I do go in, I typically go on a Monday morning before anyone arrives to avoid delaying my departure. My LinkedIn is the saddest LinkedIn you could imagine. I have distributed fewer than twenty business cards in my entire adult life, and most were handed to friends to show them my cool new business cards.
Despite being the world’s least enthusiastic networker, I somehow job hopped my way up the corporate ladder at an impressive pace to eventually land my perfect position at the highest level of the consulting ladder before getting into corporate management (no thanks!). So if landing a job is not about who you know, what is it about?
The Slow Death of Middle Management and Know-Nothings
Office culture has revolved around lower-level employees creating completed work products, middle management collecting and identifying the most important products to show leaders, and top leaders receiving a refined version of information needed to make the most important decisions. We took this structure for granted, often complaining about the middle manager that did nothing, but accepting their permanence.
For traditional offices that began the rapid transition to telework in March 2020 to slow the spread of COVID-19, the flow of work shifted. It became clear who specifically built the most valuable work products. Suddenly, with everyone an email away rather than in hierarchical offices, some top leaders reached out to the sources of knowledge upon learning which employees could sift through the data they needed to provide the best insights.
Middle managers that served only as collectors and distributors of information, those that produced no value added on their own, sometimes lost credibility in the workplace structure. Other middle managers noticed their waning credibility and became the main advocates for returning to physical workplaces as soon as possible. The best corporate leaders started to question whether so many middle managers were required, why middle managers were paid more than the workers producing the best products, and how the structure could be improved to maximize efficiency and results.
This switch also highlighted which lower-level employees coasted through their days by chatting with their coworkers, retaining their positions because they brightened a room but produced no work. We all have that one coworker that has seemingly no skills but can make anyone laugh. While these folks are lovely, they proved a bit less helpful when many of us communicated from a laptop on our kitchen tables.
Employers are at various stages of a realization that the employees that actually have knowledge and generate high-quality products are the ones worth paying. To be clear, some are not very far along in this acknowledgement. This can be for a number of reasons. Middle managers enthusiastically support in-office work at the brand-new office complex the company built in 2019 that corporate leadership wants to justify purchasing. John does nothing, but nobody wants to fire John because he is so nice! However, team-by-team and company-by-company it is becoming increasingly clear that the most valuable folks in the workplace are those with the knowledge and skills to improve the workplace.
It’s What You Know…
If you have the knowledge and skill set to answer the questions of your teammates, expedite processes to save time, and/or create the most valuable final products, you are an indispensable employee. As the work world shifts to recognizing work quality above workplace banter, the reliable qualities that make you indispensable become recognized as profit-generating qualities that can also lead to promotions or new job opportunities.
Workplaces suddenly rewarding knowledge and skills does not mean you have to be the smartest person on every topic or the employee with the most complete understanding of niche processes. Instead, you add value when you command knowledge that other employees do not have. I find that ideal approaches in fields that are not particularly high tech or quantitative include becoming the office IT help line or math help line. (I am both at my current job, and these qualities allowed me to secure a 15% raise, receive a promotion, and create my ideal job description.) If these are not your skills, identify another skill set of value for your workplace that others lack. Generally, recognizing what takes folks the longest amount of time or causes the most frustration allows you to uncover where the knowledge gaps are so you can fill the gap.
And Who You Show
The “it’s who you know” folks are still correct on one point: The human aspect is still important if you want to get a new job or a promotion. But this who-you-know component is now more directly associated with the knowledge you have. I like to say, it’s what you know and who you show.
We all have skills that are impressive but do not matter to certain audiences. The way to advance your career is identifying the place where your skills and knowledge directly add value to an organization or team. Sometimes it is clear how to do this, and sometimes it just happens authentically.
When I started working at my current organization (for the employer I started with in 2019 in my job hopping trajectory), our lack of a certain level of data annoyed me. Not having this data often meant that I had to go on a treasure hunt through numerous documents to answer questions with seemingly simple answers. After a few months at the job, I decided to do something about it. Working with another ambitious 20-something with data analysis skills from another team at the organization, we created the set of data we felt was missing. This was back in 2019, and that data set is still the basis for analyzing financial data for a few billion dollars.
Everyone on the financial team suddenly saw me as the data savvy resource, and I also gained this reputation across teams because the 20-something coworker who helped me was on a different team at the organization. My next job hop just happened to be to the team where he worked, and they knew my reputation for problem solving and data analysis. Because I created this data set, quite literally a one-week project but one that required initiative and creativity, people throughout the organization knew my name and wanted me on their team.
My job-hopping success and eventual promotion to my tailored position would not have been possible without working across teams, looking to solve the biggest problems, and helping folks beyond those I was required to help. Becoming the help line propelled my career forward. While “what you know” is becoming more valuable than ever, you still have to show those around you what you can do with your knowledge and skills to make a difference. It’s what you know and who you show.
Disclaimer: Who You Know Expedites the Process
To be clear, I am not claiming that there are no unfair advantages realized by individuals with connections. There absolutely are. With the reduction of middle management positions, folks will still have to know something to find employment. However, folks with connections generally enjoy faster early career advancement as their skills are quickly noticed by leaders who give more attention to their best friend’s kid. Folks with the connections will advance their titles and salaries more quickly and sometimes gain access to career enrichment opportunities more quickly that provide them with even more skills that result in more career advancement.
The process is not fair. The folks with connections will advance faster and receive more opportunities earlier in their careers than the folks without connections. However, I am a bit comforted by the fact that more of these individuals have to actually know something before securing a prestigious position. Additionally, folks without connections can leapfrog their born-with-connections peers by taking advantage of skill-building opportunities when others do not.
Even if you did not grow up with connections, you can also do better than I did and build them yourself. While I was great at tackling the biggest projects and making a name for myself throughout a large organization, you can also actually network a bit, particularly for early career advancement. My one piece of advice here would be not to spend a ton of money at those superficial industry happy hour events that happen each week. Go with targeted networking instead. If someone’s work or career trajectory impresses you, ask if they can have a conversation with you over coffee (or tea or hot chocolate!) about their career and what advice they would have for a young professional. These one-on-one connections are more valuable than 1,000 business cards. Initially, you can learn from this person, and eventually, you can show them what you know.
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