Planning Ahead for Your Career Success

Landing the role felt like crossing a finish line—yet the real race begins the moment the offer letter is signed. Career momentum grows when value becomes visible, positioning shifts from order-taker to strategic partner, and work moves steadily up the ladder from tasks to influence.

In this segment, we have Bryttani Graddick to ground the discussion with her expertise and lived experience, focusing on helping you maximize success after you're hired. Today's content is curated from the insights she shared on as a guest on the podcast.  

The path centers on recognizing it’s time to become irreplaceable, diagnosing root causes instead of chasing surface fixes, elevating from “doing” to “leading,” and compounding progress through her 4E's flywheel process of Education, Experience, Engagement, and Excellence.

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Why This Matters

We know this well by now: the labor market has shifted under everyone’s feet.

Titles no longer guarantee stability, tenure no longer guarantees advancement, and transactional work is increasingly automated. What moves careers forward now is strategic positioning - which is where you make the case, through your action and outcomes, that the organization performs better because of the way you execute your role.

Cultivate a mindset of “growing the job” as an ongoing discipline, meaning that instead of waiting for permission, an assignment, or perfect conditions, you need to build a reputation for anticipating needs, framing decisions in business terms, and stitching together human context that no tool can replicate.  

That reputation becomes insurance against restructuring, and it's a magnet for opportunity inside and outside the company.

Signs It’s Time to Become “Irreplaceable”

Feeling stuck is the early warning signal.

Not stuck due to effort or talent, but stuck because there’s no framework around the work—no clear path to the next level, no leader specifically naming the skills you need to build, and no cadence for development conversations.

A few other signs to watch out for include:

• Feedback loops, whether from your leader or internally yours, revolve around volume (“much to do”) rather than value (“here’s what changed because of this work”)
• Work is hard but indistinguishable, meaning you spent hours on that project but the result didn't make an impact for other people, other teams, or for the organization.
• Your leader is knowledgeable but strapped for time...or kind and supportive but unsure how to grow the role.

Take inventory and see whether this is you, especially now that we have come to the conclusion that ultimately, ownership for progress is in your hands (especially if there is little or no talent development support).

Why a New Job Isn’t Always the Answer

A new job can feel like fresh air. But if the same frustrations keep showing up across companies, it’s not just about the logo on the wall. Before you jump, it’s worth asking: what’s really going on?

Stress might point to culture—but it could also be about authority, boundaries, or how you’re positioned. Sometimes a smaller company, a different leadership style, or a clearer mandate helps. But without reframing your role and your value, those same frustrations follow you.

The goal here is getting clarity on the root of the problem, and knowing how to separate workload from role design, personality from process, and urgency from importance. When you see it this way, “fit” is really about two things: the environment you step into, and the actions you take to position your work.

Put this into practice: Map your frustrations. Are they about scope, authority, stakeholders, or feedback loops? Clarity here keeps you from fixing symptoms instead of root causes.

Career Audit Questions That Cut Through the Noise

Surface stories are loud. Root causes are quiet. A quick audit can change the whole conversation:

• What problem keeps repeating across roles or teams?

• What’s a fact, versus what am I assuming?

• What conversations with leadership am I avoiding? If I had them tomorrow, what would I say?

• If I was positioned as the expert here, what would that look like in the next 90 days?

Answering these with honesty turns emotion into insight. Often, you’ll see the pattern: unclaimed authority, unspoken aspirations, or uncommunicated value.

Do this alone or with a coach, and you’ll shift from “how it feels” to “what’s causing it”—and then into actions that reset expectations.

Getting the Job Isn’t Enough—Keeping It Requires a Strategy

Across industries, routine tasks are being automated. HR is no exception. The opportunity isn’t in resisting automation—it’s in rising above it.

The edge is in what tools can’t do:

• Recognizing messy patterns in human behavior

• Using judgment when the data isn’t clear

• Influencing groups toward better outcomes

Take action: Audit your week. Push low-complexity tasks down, turn them into processes, and free your time for high-judgment work where your value multiplies.

Use Technology to become the Irreplaceable Human

Three spaces where you’ll always add unique value:

• Ambiguous people problems where context matters more than policy.

• Culture-calibrated change rolled out at the right pace.

• Long-view talent planning that anticipates what’s needed years ahead.

Mastering these spaces makes you essential and they are nuanced and complex tasks AI just can't compete with. 

Making the Shift From Doing the Job → Leading the Work

“Doing” solves today’s task. “Leading” solves tomorrow’s problem.

Leading means working five steps ahead: not just delivering a report, but explaining what it means and what should change. Not just filling today’s role, but shaping tomorrow’s bench.

This requires a new posture. Start narrating decisions in terms of tradeoffs, risks, and ripple effects. Ask: what will this look like in six months?

Leaders notice who thinks in horizons, not just tasks.

The Effectiveness Pyramid

Picture a simple pyramid:

Tasks → Manage and prioritize.
Processes → Systematize repetitive work.
Data → Talk about patterns, not about individual instances.
Strategic Influence → Connect the dots across the business.

The higher you go, the more your voice changes. At task level, success sounds like completion. At process level, predictability. At data level, evidence. At influence level, alignment and impact.

Put this into action: Each week, turn one task into a process. Each month, turn one process into a data-backed insight. Each quarter, present one insight as a cross-functional recommendation. Notice how more impactful action may feel less busy or urgent, and will take longer to accomplish - But it will have a bigger impact in the long run. 

The Four E’s Flywheel

Bryttani shares a high level overview of her four E's flywheel to help us put a framework together for our work. It involves:

• Education: Expanding tools and mental models.

• Experience: Reps that turn knowledge into judgment.

• Engagement: Relationships that give your work influence.

• Excellence: Reliability and consistency that earn trust.

Each one feeds the next. Lean too hard on one (like over-credentialing without practice), and momentum stalls. Keep them balanced, and the compounding effect is powerful.

To Sum It All Up

Maximizing success after you land the job comes down to three moves:

1. Diagnose whether the tension is environment or positioning.

2. Elevate your work from tasks → processes → data → influence.

3. Keep Bryttani's Four E’s flywheel turning.

Bryttani shared a system for HR career success but her principles apply across industries and functions. I hope you enjoyed learning from her expertise. If you are in HR, click here to learn more about Bryttani's program and how she can help you create the Four Es flywheel in your HR position, or click here to schedule a 1:1 diagnostic conversation where she can help you figure out why your stuck and how to move forward.  

And remember:

Become the person leaders can’t replace: someone who reads the room, shapes the path, and leaves the organization stronger than they found it. Your leader, your org, and your future will thank you.