Susie Wee's Top 10 Career Tips

[#1]

I was invited to give a talk to the Stanford Women in Electrical Engineering group a couple years ago, so I put together a list of Susie Wee's Top 10 Career Tips. I was recently invited to give a talk at a research institute in Singapore and offered to give a technical or non-technical talk, and they chose the latter; so I gave on talk on "The Softer Side of Research" which was based on the Stanford talk. I'm including my tips here.

Susie Wee's Top 10 Career Tips

1. Get really good at something useful. Become synonymous with it.


2. Produce sustainable artifacts at work.


3. Grow your portfolio. Define your career.


4. Be strategic. Be opportunitistic.


5. Be prepared for unsolicited competition. Compete only with yourself.


6. Don't worry about people who don't like you.


7. Learn to understand yourself. Learn to understand others. Improve yourself and your interpersonal skills.


8. Play a team sport. Make your career a team sport.


9. Be yourself. Define who you are. Use your personality at work.


10. Align your work with your passions and strengths. Define your career accordingly.


11. Bonus: Get in shape, eat right, sleep, and exercise.

Additional research tips

12. Collaborate.


13. Evolve your research domain & expertise to stay current.


14. Learn new fields at the same rate that you learned your first field.


15. Stay in a domain long enough to make contributions with impact.


16. Build up your reputation... then shake it off! Repeat.


17. Put your research on the shelf for a while as you wait for the right time. When the time is right, dust it off and put it into action!

What do you think?  Which tip is your most or least favorite?

[#2]

Hi Susie, thank you for your talk. I was one of the (few) non-researchers in the audience. I think your tips apply to non-researchers too, except for the rather incongruous point 2. How to produce "sustainable artifacts at work" has been on my mind for quite a while now, but as I don't write papers (or novels), I haven't found any strong answers.

[#3]

Hi laconic72, I think tip 2 applies to non-researchers, too. Researchers have papers, patents, and prototypes which are very concrete sustainable artifacts. Artists and architects have portfolios where each piece of work is a sustainable artifact. I view a sustainable artifact as a work product you can articulate clearly, i.e., a work product where you can communicate what you did and how you did it. As an example, my admins have not only accomplished tasks within their job responsibilities, but they have also created work products that allow these tasks to be accomplished efficiently. Specifically, one of my admins not only "tracked the lab's finances", but she also "created tools and processes for tracking financial requests, approvals, and payments; these tools and processes are used by 40 lab members, the lab director, and the lab financial liaison to manage the lab's finances". For your job, can you think of a work product you can build that would make one of your job responsibilities easier to accomplish? Thank you for raising this point!

[#4]

Susie, these are good tips and coming from you, they carry weight. I would love to hear some personal examples or a paragraph description of some of these. Maybe they could be topics for future blog posts.

For example, I would like to hear more about what you mean by "be opportunistic" and "define your career".

I really agree with #6,8,9. I heard Philippe Kahn, the found of Borland and other companies, speak once. A woman in the audience stood up to ask a question, with her young son at her side and asked "what tips do you have for my son about succeeding in business?". His response: "get him in team sports". I had the same experience - sports have taught me to hate losing, to sacrifice for the betterment of others, to collaborate, to train and think long-term, to think quickly, etc.

Good post...

[#5]

Thanks for voting, Alex. I did see quite a few heads nodding on tip #6. I'll take you suggestion and expand on some of these tips in future posts. And, perhaps I'll give the talk at a location near you.

[#6]

Thanks for your reply, Susie.

I've been mulling over the idea of work artifacts. If one's work coincides with that kind of creation, that's excellent.

Considering the role of a team captain/coach/manager/CEO, what kind of work artifacts can there be (aside books on strategy, 7 habits or winning friends and influencing people; maybe blogs and autobiographies count)?

More generally, how can one convey one's soft skills (much less represent them in the form of artifacts)?

[#7]

laconic72,

In terms of how you can convey your soft skills, I think the best way to do that is to constantly work on improving them and then try to use them for every interaction you have. Perhaps you can talk to a co-worker about this, and ask them to observe you and give you feedback, especially as you learn and use new soft skills. I would not expect immediate recognition from everyone, because a funny thing about soft skills is that they are often done in the background so it might take a little while for them to be noticed. But, if you continue to demonstrate professionalism and soft skills in every situation (especially the tough ones!), then over time they will be noticed and you will become known for having them.

Good question on how to create artifacts for your soft skills. I don't have a definitive answer, but here are a couple ideas. I created my Top 10 Career Tips list after I was invited to give a talk to the Women in Electrical Engineering group at Stanford. I didn't think of it as a sustainable artifact at the time, but they posted it on their website... and then recently I2R found it and asked me to give a similar talk. So I guess it is slowly becoming an artifact! As one suggestion, perhaps you can try to generate your own Top 10 list on a topic of your choice, and post it on a web page. Over time, perhaps you can give it to a small informal group looking for a speaker, such as a small group of your peers or a special interest group in a local high school. It may be difficult to find an audience depending on what you do. One possibility is to mentor or coach people who are less fortunate than us and have not had the same opportunities. Since you are working at a nice organization, I'm sure there are people who would be interested in knowing how you got to where you are, and how they can do the same. It does take time to get to know people and learn what they are interested in learning about, but it is well worth the reward in the long run.

This may not fully answer your questions, but hopefully it provides a few ideas. Does anyone else out there have suggestions on this?

Thank you for the continued discussion. For every one else- Any more votes on your favorite tips?

[#8]

Do you rememeber the question which I asked you when you visited HPLJ first time? That is about this topic, and thank you for the summary and improved answer here.

[#9]

Hi Du-san, I definitely remember our first conversation when we discussed your evolution from an entrepreneur at a small company to a researcher at HP Labs Japan. While I don't precisely remember "the question" you asked, I do remember our conversation around tips: 3, 13, 14, 15, and 10. So, did I get that right? As for 10, I can say that it is great to have you and your passion, creativity, and energy on the team!

[#10]

These are great tips, Susie! Question: what do you mean by "produce sustainable artifacts at work"?

Good stuff.

[#11]

Hi Erik, I view a sustainable artifact as a valuable work product that can be clearly articulated and holds its meaning over time. It should be a work product where you can communicate what you did and how you did it. And, its value should be recognized and appreciated by others now and over time.

It is easy to keep busy at work, as there is always so much to do. But, it is another thing to focus your work on producing artifacts that have lasting value, i.e., sustainable artifacts. One way to think about it is ask yourself what artifact can you produce that indisputably adds value to your workplace? Can you put this artifact as a bullet on your resume? If your company disappears, what artifacts will you have to show for your work? Artists and architects have "portfolios" that show their work. Everyone else should strive to do the same, no matter what their job function.

It's interesting that this tip is picking up the most questions. Thanks for your question!

[#12]

Hi ! Your tips are well structured especially for me , I just completed my diploma and i needed some inspiration towards my research. Your tips gave me the right direction including a meaningful purpose to take my jprofession into greater extent . Thank you.