10 Steps To Clearing Your Career Path

What are your ambitions for the future? If you are like most people, you probably want to advance in the ranks at your current job. While showing your bosses you are capable of more is a good first step for your professional development, it's only half the battle to carving your career path.

In their book “Great Leaders GROW,” Ken Blanchard and Mark Miller wrote about the steps nonprofit professionals need to take in order to progress from competent employee to great leader. One of those steps is to open your world at work. They came up with 10 ways to accomplish this:

• Shadow someone from another department or team. 
• Work at a client’s facility for a day or longer. 
• Listen in on donor calls. 
• Travel with senior leaders from the organization. 
• Serve on a cross-functional team. 
• Begin collecting best practices from top performers.
• Interview recent retirees and seek their counsel on current issues.
• Attend the premier of a new program or the grand opening of a new office.
• Go back in the archives and watch presentations from the past decade.
• Meet with leaders from other departments to understand their issues.