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Tip 115 – Transform Your Career With Peer Support

Tip 115 – Transform Your Career With Peer Support

Peer support should be institutionalized in every company, but you don't need a corporate mandate to get started. Today, I want you to reach out and find one friend at work. Arrange for a good long lunch to talk about where each of you is going and share your one-year goals. Then keep it up! Or suggest turning your monthly staff meetings into peer support groups. In another example of peer support, my cousin-in-law Wendy is a real estate agent who has teamed with another agent – not just to sell more homes, but to inspire each other to constantly do better. Wendy is the type of person who lives by lists, so she pushes her partner to stay organized. Her partner, on the other hand, pushes Wendy to make more cold calls to homeowners trying to sell their own homes. "We complete each other," says Wendy. That's team selling...

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Posted by Keith Ferrazzi on April 11, 2008 | Permalink

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Comments

This is a very important point that you have mentioned. One word of caution from my past bad experience. "Identifying" the right peer is very important. If you identify one wrong peer and then you are done for your career in that company.
Didn't want to sound negative, but wanted to share different perspective.
I learnt my lesson and I still practice LOT of Peer Support, but ensure that I am extremely careful in choosing that peer.
Cheers!
Easy2share - Information hub for Entrepreneurs!!

Posted by: easy2share | Apr 11, 2008 2:51:56 PM

A key point in Keith's comments is "this can only happen in a transparent and intimate environment".

In any other environment, it can damage your career, personal relationships, and other aspects of your personal life. Unfortunately, for some people, the competitiveness overtakes the potential support. Right conditions + right peer = support.

Savor life's best,
Aimee

Posted by: Aimee Wilson | Apr 12, 2008 2:43:52 PM

I completely agree that Peer support should be institutionalized in every company. I and 5 of my colleagues in a fortune 500 company started a peer group together meeting once every month. We decided to form the group because we are all high achievers with one thing in common: We wanted career change.
We have consistently met every month for more than 1 year. We meet outside of work, and 3 of us have left the company and moved on doing other things. However, we still meet every month.
One of us passed away during the year, and it was devastating to the group. The family of the deceased relied on us and got comfort from information about their Daughter that they never would have known if not for the group. We did not replace our deceased colleague.
We set goals every year and every month we do an individual/group assessment. Currently, we are talking about floating a company together and have picked and registered a company.

Posted by: Robert Ngwu | Apr 12, 2008 3:10:05 PM

A bunch of us used to work for a software consulting company. Eventually we left the company but a good 5 of us kept up with peer support dinners in Manhattan. We are all Peoplesoft developers. It was the best thing ever because I was able to land 2 different jobs at big firms from these peers. One of my buddies just became a Director. He called me up right away and offered me a job. I was fresh in his mind because of all of the peer support dinners we had been to on an impersonal level – outside of work and the structure of a chain of command.

Posted by: Rich | Apr 13, 2008 11:06:46 AM

I would like to see some of this information being taught, discussed, etc whatever on our college campuses. (maybe some lectures, events sponsored by student governments or career centers) Seems like a great place to share some of this info. I have read the book and tried to share, teach, explain this info to my kids, but you know they don't always listen to Mom, or think Mom doesn't know what she is talking about. One of my kids is out of school, but I have one who will be a SR next year at USC, would love for him to hear some of this from someone besides me. (he is not a reader, more a math/science brain) Just a thought.

Posted by: pam | Apr 16, 2008 7:39:19 AM

I was a member of a formal peer-support group, Women Presidents Organization, and while monthly meetings were mostly about helping others with their burning fires, the friendships are there still for help that only a business owner can offer.

I also joined my cousin, 4 other entrepreneurs and 3 corporate types in a goal setting group which met quarterly. It's amazing the positive changes in all our careers--especially those in corporate life as they had others they could trust for strategic advice.

Even having moved from my centre of support 4 years ago, I called an emergency meeting 4 months ago when launching something new, and got invaluable perspective, encouragement and advice. More brains and hearts=better results.

Posted by: Marty | Apr 21, 2008 2:33:21 PM

I can attest to the tremendous benefit this is. I've recently started doing this with a colleague of mine who's a real estate agent. Every time we get together for coffee, we're productive in our conversation (we're never selling one another, we don't have to). Instead, we discuss issues that can help boost our productivity; from marketing ideas to market statistics.

It's time well spent and I highly recommend it to others as well.

Posted by: Ricardo Bueno | May 5, 2008 11:07:25 PM

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