Strategies To Break Out Of A Career Plateau

Plateau is a point in your career where you feel like you have reached a phase with no progress or no future prospects. It is a situation where an employee reaches the highest possible level they can within an organization and is not sure what to do next, developing a feeling of being stuck.

Career plateau is one of the common reasons why employees choose to leave a company, and it often happens in one's early 40s or mid-50s. Symptoms of the career plateau include boredom, listlessness, or even burnout. Some may even find day-to-day responsibilities become repetitive and stagnant.

Thankfully overcoming this stage in your career is possible with the right planning and execution. According to career and life coaching experts, here are some simple yet effective strategies to break out of this slump.

Invest In Yourself

As the billionaire Warren Buffet said in an interview, "There is only one investment that supersedes all others, and that is investing in yourself. Nobody can take away what you have in yourself, and we all have potential that we haven't used yet".

If you are going through a career plateau, try to invest in yourself and expand your qualification, skills, and experience. Take time to reflect on your strengths, amplify them and work on reducing the impacts of your weaknesses.

Returning to studying is a great way to explore and expand new interests in your current industry or field. For those who want to avoid being committed to a long-term program, executive education programs are a great way to acquire marketable skills. New qualifications can enhance your executive presence and amplify your impact in a way that maximizes your influence in the organizational hierarchy.

Engage Your Professional Network

Sometimes there may be no opportunities for advancement in your organization, no matter how much you upgrade your qualifications and skill profile. If this is the case, it's a sign for you to move on to another company. However, remember that only 30 percent of jobs are advertised. The rest are filled through referrals and networks. So to land a new and fulfilling role, you must network.

Nowadays, with the help of the internet, it is easier to track and stay connected with professional colleagues. Take an interest in what people share or post on social media and try to engage or join the conversation—keeping your communication active and open increases the chances of one of your contacts introducing you to key players like hiring managers or senior leaders in their company.

Joining conferences or societies where you can meet like-minded people or similar professions is another great way to expand your existing network.

Identify Your Gaps

When you have a clear sense of what you want in your career, do an honest review of where you need to improve in climbing up the hierarchy. Sometimes your probability of being promoted can be overlooked because you lack something or are not doing enough.

If your company offers an annual performance review, then identifying your gaps is easy. But if they don't try to take time to do a self-assessment of your performance in the company. If you find it difficult to do this yourself, seek professional help from a career coach.

Apart from helping you identify your gaps, they will be able to guide you on how to close them in a way that helps you break a career plateau.

Exit Your Comfort Zone

Your career plateau is a perfect representation of your comfort zone. Unfortunately, the comfort zone is also the biggest threat to success as it keeps you trapped in a false sense of security. If you want to move past and break your career plateau, you must step outside of your comfort zone, take risks, and face fears.

This can include taking on a new project that you didn't want to, tackling a difficult conversation, asking for a pay raise or promotion, raising your profile with new qualifications and skills, and even switching to a completely new job role that matches your passion.

Find New Networks/Mentors

If your career objectives have not changed for a long time with the market conditions, and you don't feel the need to switch jobs when you reach a plateau, then you may have no clarity on your career vision. The best way to deal with this is to find a mentor who can give you a new perspective on your career, point out fresh insights, set proper objectives, and potentially lead you on a path that helps you achieve your ambitions.

If you can't find a mentor or someone you think can guide you through a plateau, a career coaching expert may be the next best option to consider. They will help you identify your vision with a more clear view, assess the reasons for a career plateau, and then guide you through a customized plan.