How To CLimb The slippery slope to promotion

How to Climb the Slippery Slope to Promotion

Have you ever wondered why not me? Why do I always lose out? Why don’t they base promotions on merit? Why can’t they see I am the most suitable for promotion? Well I am here to shine a light on why you may be getting overlooked and what you can do about it.

Having worked in HR in a host of well-known companies such as Deloitte, Intel, some mid-size and small companies, I have been on the front line in promotion decision making.  In fact, I estimate I have been on the promotion internal interviewer panels of various companies about 450 times and still am today, as an outside advisory interviewer capacity.

I have been privy to the after-interview discussions on why they are selecting a particular candidate for the promotion, and often delivering the news to the lucky employee as well as the hardest part - telling the unlucky candidates that they have missed out.

I am separating the information that follows into non-rigorous competency interview and rigorous competency interviews

Here are the criteria used to decide promotions in non-rigorous competency interviews

• Is the person loyal? Have they demonstrated loyalty by supporting upper management and not seeking offers from competitors?
• Are they performing well in their role? Have they been getting good consistent appraisals? Can we afford to lose them as a top sales/buyer/technical etc person and take them out of that role to move into a management role? Note this is a big bug bear for those top professionals who get leapfrogged by less well performing colleagues!

• Have they discussed wanting the promotion for some time? Have they demonstrated drive and motivation to succeed in the promotion? This must be flagged a long way out, sometimes even years before the interview.
• Have they been groomed for the role? Have they shadowed the person leaving the role for some time? Have they sought out relevant mentoring and build an internal network to help them succeed in the promotion?
• Are they supportive of the company direction?  Do they use encouraging positive language when critiquing the company and are they a good ambassador?
• Have they achieved buy in from senior management for the role in advance of the interview? Does senior management act as champions for the person?
• Do they look the part? Has this person mimicked the role they aspire to in dress, style and mannerisms for some time?

This list is not exhaustive, but I hope you get the picture.
 
Rigorous Competency Model Interviews
If you are working for a company or organisation that uses a rigorous competency model internal interview process it can be quite different to the above.  I normally see this model used in state or semi-state interviews, which judge the candidate on their competency interview answers alone. 

As a competency interviewer trainer I have trained hundreds of interviewers in how to interview internal and external candidates using a rigorous competency model.

Here is the criteria used to decide promotions in non-rigorous competency interviews

• Did the candidate express their competencies better than any other candidate?  Did they gave in depth competency answers that the panel of interviewers scored the highest?

 
The reality with rigorous competency interviews is that it all depends on the interview - full stop. It doesn’t matter if you have worked the hardest, are the best performer in your area, support the organisation fully and have senior management championing you because if you can’t win the interview you are going to get leapfrogged. But the most important element in a competency interview is giving the best evidence about a time that demonstrates the competency. If you have only mediocre evidence and not 'wow' evidence you are not going to impress the interviewer.

I once 'interviewer' trained a group of public sector hiring managers and they had a hard time grasping that this is what HR wanted them to do – promote people just on the interview answers alone! But that is what they have to do, no matter how good you are at your job, you have to be able to prove it in the interview.
 
What can you do to Help Yourself Achieve a Promotion

Regular Non-Rigorous Competency Interview
For those not in a rigorous competency interview you must have planned the promotion strategy at least a year out from the interview, if you haven’t got most of those points ticked above. If you haven’t got them all ticked you will need a strategy fast, and I can give you the help you need in my Promotion Strategy Programme. 

If you have most of the points ticked you still need to shine at interview and I recommend the Internal Interview Programme.

Rigorous Competency Interview Help
For rigorous competency interviews, unless you are ace at these, I suggest getting my help and booking in the Internal Interview Programme. 

If you don't have plenty of 'wow' evidence, to make your answers impress at interview, you need an action plan to accumulate the right examples and a strategy to make sure you get promoted. I run a Promotion Strategy Programme that will equip you with the action plan and enable you to impress at future rounds of promotion interviews.
 

About me
I am Clare Reed and I have over 22 years professional interview experience in various corporates. I worked as Head of Recruitment at Deloitte, KPMG and Intel as well as some SME’s.  I set up Interview Ready 11 years ago to help coach people in how to interview brilliantly, at both internal and external interviews, and achieve their goals.  I love interviewing so much that I am also an external advisor sitting on many interviewer panels throughout the world and I also train corporate interviewers on the most up to date interviewer techniques so that they can interview candidates professionally.