How To Stay Top Of Mind When Working Remotely
Working remotely has a lot of great perks. However, you will want to make sure that senior leaders are thinking about you, advocating for you, and keeping you top of mind. But how do you do that and why is it important?
It is so important to stay top of mind because you want your senior leaders to think about you for the next promotion that comes along. You also want to show your senior leaders that you are focused and willing to tackle a new project.
Visibility is key to career success, which is why we’ve put together a few strategies to help you stay top of mind when working remotely.
1. Be Proactive
The first thing in how you can stay more visible despite being remote is you’ll want to set the foundation of being proactive in your communications. Staying top of mind requires you to find opportunities to interact with your manager and others in leadership roles. This means communicating with them even though they did not reach out to you. The easiest form is via e-mail.
The reality is, in a remote world, we don’t have the luxury of just walking past someone’s desk anymore. Working remotely means you won’t be able to pass someone in the hallway and simply catch up. These moments are valuable, but they are often serendipitous.
When you are remote, you really can be out of sight, out of mind.
And you don’t want to be out of mind, especially to your boss and other important leaders within your organization.
You may be wondering, will I be intruding if I reach out to other people? The answer is, maybe!
But if you are reaching out and providing value and helping them you won’t be. The key when being proactive is to have a real reason to do it that is valuable. Reaching out to say hi, here is what I did this weekend, or here’s an update that might interest you, most likely will not be met with appreciation. Keep it short and sweet and they’ll see your input and thoughtfulness as a value-add.
2. Value-Driven Offers
Before you begin to reach out to your boss and others, consider what you can offer that is not only value-driven but also not already part of your job responsibilities and expectations.
Value-Driven examples include:
Take something small off of their plate – This can be organizing a meeting for them or setting the groundwork for them so they can reach their objectives.
Offer To Take The Lead – You can offer to take the lead on a project. This can be something that is already happening or you can offer to start something from scratch.
Streamlining – You can offer to streamline a process or refine a current workflow. For example – if you know your boss is wanting to increase their visibility, you can take the initiative to plan out their visibility strategy. You can offer to:
- Write their newsletters
- Looping in other people to create video communications that’ll get distributed to the organization
By doing things not just in your job duties, you’re also carving out unique opportunities for you to be seen.
So what do you do if you feel like you are already overwhelmed with your own responsibilities? If you feel like you can’t take on another project, that’s okay. Consider taking the initiative for something small. Remember, when you offer to do something, no matter how small it is, that is not assigned to you – this will give you a ton of bonus points.
3. Schedule Interactions
Once you have established a value-driven reason to interact with your leader and others, you’ll now want to schedule regular interactions with them.
You can schedule regular interactions weekly, biweekly, or monthly. The key to all of these interactions is that they should be short and sweet. Because these meetings need to be short, be sure you prepare ahead of time.
- Give an update on the project you are spearheading
- Give any insight you have about the project or the task you’ve taken on
You always want to be seen as effective and credible.
While these meetings should be short and sweet and highly value-driven, don’t neglect this opportunity to get to know the other person.
This means developing a personal relationship with them. You can do this by engaging in small talk. Small talk is valuable!
Small talk gives you the ability to get to know the other person on a deeper level. You can catch up on how they’re doing and even let them know details about your life. This is how bonds are formed.
In the end, staying top of mind can be difficult when everyone is remote or working in a hybrid model. This is why taking a proactive approach and finding reasons to interact with management is gold! Have them see you as a valuable asset to the team, so when opportunities arise, they will think of you immediately.
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