In my last post, I gave a little diatribe on taking the next step in your aec marketing career. One of the pieces of advice I gave was use your own time to become awesome at something.
I can’t stress this enough. But since I like to read articles with actionable advice, let me give you some more detail on what you can or should become awesome at. I’ve broken it into two categories.
Obvious
- Learn everything there is to know about the technical aspects of what your firm does.
- Get to know all your firm’s projects and people backwards and forwards.
- Read and understand everything in the Marketing Handbook for the Design and Construction Professional.
- Learn how to network. Read Rainmaking and apply it. Go to every networking function you can. Get deeply involved with SMPS or some other industry organization. Pay your own way if need be. Yes, I said that.
Not So Obvious
- Increase your typing speed to 40+ words per minute. This is going to take practice, but your productivity will skyrocket.
- Learn and use every keyboard shortcut in the programs you use. This will not only increase your productivity, but create the perception that you are an expert in this software.
- Learn to write. You know how you learn to write? You write, and write, and write. Learn the rules of writing. Read Elements of Style. Read Copyblogger.com.
- Learn to edit. This is a whole different skill, one I really wish I was much better at. It’s so valuable to be a great editor. It’s a skill that you acquire with practice.
- Learn to script and program. If you can apply scripting or programming to what you do, that’s going to take you to a whole new level. Most of the programs and operating systems we use are scriptable. Anything that doesn’t exist can be programmed. If I was in my 20s, I would learn this for sure.
- Learn productivity and life hacking. Read David Allen’s Getting Things Done and apply the concepts religiously. Read lifehacker.com.
Let’s put this in perspective, if you came to me and you could demonstrate that you mastered these 10 skills, I would hire you in a millisecond. Anyone who wouldn’t is a fool.
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