Summary.
If you’ve become so valuable to your manager that your career has stalled because they don’t want to let you go, it’s time to become dispensable. But how can you do it gracefully? The author presents four ways to keep your value as an employee from halting your career growth. While you show your value and expertise to your manager and team and make an impact in your current role, set boundaries, take on work you’re excited about, network within your organization, and set the person who comes after you up for success.
“The critical mistake you made is that you became indispensable,” a mentor once said to me. “That’s why you can’t get off his team and move on to your next assignment.”
After more than four years in the same role, I found that my career had stalled even though I had gone above and beyond my job description. My boss frequently volunteered my time to other leaders to build their strategy decks. He asked me to call vendors to get them to purchase annual gala tables for the nonprofit board he served on. He had me write his speeches for external events. He asked me to help manage his LinkedIn profile, and soon other leaders came to me with similar requests. Finally, he asked me to help the CEO and other executives prepare for interviews, because I was so good at crafting media briefs.
The observation from my mentor was a rude awakening. Because I had said yes to every assignment, in hopes that would help me move on to my next opportunity, I had become indispensable, and my manager wouldn’t let me go. Being indispensable had temporarily killed my career.
Complete Article at HBR
