This may seem like a very self-absorbed and indulgent question, however, it has greater depth!
This is a question that I have found very useful with clients over the years as it allows people to think, albeit initially quite superficially! But then, when you REALLY think about it, what you want more of and less of actually can be quite detailed. This particularly applies to heading back into a role after maternity leave or wanting to progress your career after periods of maternity leave.
This question poses the opportunity to think about the aspects of a job that you enjoy, that you are good at, and that you are fulfilled by. This is where the question is not just about, “I want to do more of xxx’, i.e. a particular task or area of work but is about understanding what you want more of from your role and what makes you tick. For example, it’s not about “I want to do more of the meetings with clients” but rather “I want to do more of the meaningful conversations with specific clients about our services showing my breadth understanding in our offer”. This is more refined and begins to hone in on your skillset, what you enjoy and probably what you’re good at.
You can look at the other side of the coin too. By prompting yourself to think more critically about the skills that you have, your strengths and what you are good at this will help you establish the aspects of your role that you may want to do more often but also to potentially progress in. If you start with the question as if there were no barriers being presented, nothing stopping this from happening, what would your answer be? Could you start to think about the specifics of what you are good at in your role or what you know your strengths are and where you get to use these in your role?
Now, before you say she’s making this sounds easy! I’m not saying that it is possible to get what you want entirely and there are potentially always aspects of a role that are less fulfilling and are not necessarily what we want to be doing. This isn’t just get what you want, I’m afraid! Structure and teams don’t always allow there to be scope to move into all of these areas, however it is possible to think about what it is that you really enjoy and what aligns with your skillset and from here whether you are in a position to make small changes.
Starting to document these skills and strengths will allow you to articulate them in future career progression meetings, role realignments and restructures, and can help with Personal Development Review meetings (appraisals) and salary negotiation. Don’t forget all the strengths you’ve developed as a mother, the ability to know what urgent is, to prioritise and name your own too. List the skill or strength and the example when documenting them and begin to plot out how they can feature more in your role.
There is a benefit to others too. By bringing up the topic of your strengths in PDRs/appraisals, this can be helpful to managers too. Many of whom may have never received training in line management and don’t actually know how to get the best out of their staff. For many women I’ve coached they’ve only met their manager a few times or that person is new to managing them and they know that the manager doesn’t know them or their work well. So rather than sitting back, be proactive in this space to show your strengths. It can come as a surprise, but some managers are very open to their people crafting what their role can look like, how workloads can be shifted around to suit people’s skillsets, how people can enjoy their roles and thus want to do more.
Feeling positive about your own work and creating the enthusiasm in your manager can be helpful in raising your profile when coming back from maternity or after a period of motherhood. After all, a happy worker makes for a happier workforce, and this becomes a more productive workforce.
If you’d like to explore more questions that can help your development in the workplace, transition back into work better or help the relationship you have with your manager then book in for a scoping call to discuss how it could benefit you and I’ll explain how my coaching has proved extremely useful for many women returning.
