…but what exactly are you accomplishing or doing? I guess for people like me, doing the above stuff doesn’t really help all that much. It’s a game that I don’t plan to play until I absolutely have to, and hopefully never will. As long as what we do makes us happy now, as opposed to suffering years of unhappiness to get a few years of bliss in the end…then more power to everyone!

I agree, I’m all for a meritocracy myself, but it’s a rare orgainzation that works that way. I, myself, am not a good player of the game - I’m far to honest and oppionated (as well as often quite vocal) to play well at office politics

I would just have to say play to what your strengths are, know what you are not comfortable doing, and be happy to play at the lower levels if you feel that you’d give up too much of yourself if to “advance” you need to play these games.

I’ve been reading “The 12 Bad Habits That Hold Good People Back” to help me understand these things a bit better in myself. It’s a nice read for these sort of books (which generally I hate with a passion!)

Fantastic post …..especially the last point about politics

But I beg to differ ……..I would not like to play the game any way !! I believe that if u have the passion , skill and knowledge to succeed ……u dont need to play the game.

what do u say ??

Good blog post! I found it very informative. My only issue/concern with it is that lower-level people cannot exactly fly around the country meeting other people. At least in my experience as a low-level grunt it is usually frowned upon . Unless of course you pay for it yourself which can be a stretch sometimes. What did you do when you were first starting out?

When you were starting out did you just network initially with local people and grow out from there? To me that would make sense.