How to Succeed as an Introvert
As an introvert repeatedly flummoxed and exhausted by office politics in the earliest stages of my career, I very nearly resigned myself to always being overlooked. I didn't have the emotional energy to be schmoozing, wheeling, and dealing; I'd much rather have invested that same time and energy in learning, growing, and producing great work. Consciously, I realized that I was taking the sucker's bet -- that the schmoozers and bullshitters would always rise to the top, and that I'd be stuck in second gear. And so I came to adopt a mentality of learned helplessness: an overreliance on the hope that, someday, somehow, my ship would come in. I'd be recognized. My great work would produce outsized results, and all of my quiet toiling would be vindicated.<p>That day never came. What came, instead, was an eye-opening reversal. I had a very candid conversation with my boss about why I wasn't on track for promotion, despite a long string of big wins, and a consistent track record well above the expectations of my pay grade. And he told me that "Nobody outside of our group knows what you're working on." Note that he <i>didn't</i> tell me that I wasn't bullshitting or schmoozing hard enough. Rather, he told me that I was basically invisible to a large portion of the company. Maybe it's just the way I'm wired, but this was a nonobvious and nontrivial revelation to me. I suspect it may be for a lot of introverts.<p>To overcome this barrier, I adopted the "win a few key allies" strategy, as loosely advocated in the interview. I knew I wasn't going to be a world-class bullshitter. So, rather than try to bullshit clumsily and more frequently, I opted to find people in positions of power who were known to have similarly low tolerances for bullshit. And I volunteered to help these people. I made it my mission to knock it out of the park for them -- and, in so doing, to become known as the "no bullshit" guy who really delivered.<p>To this day, it's not all blue skies and roses. Even as a known commodity at your firm, you're still going to get lapped by the extroverts. But as an introvert, you really <i>do</i> have to step outside of your comfort zone if you want to advance your career. You don't have to out-BS the BSers, but you have to consciously devote time to getting noticed <i>and</i> staying noticed. Never assume that good work will get noticed on its own. If a tree falls in the woods, and no one's around to hear it, <i>it doesn't matter</i> if it makes a sound.