Quote from Ali Scarlett on December 8, 2023, 4:44 am

See this snippet from the book, HBR Guide to Smarter Networking:

Authors: A VP at Merrill Lynch described how she and three other women—all high-potential leaders in different divisions of the firm—would meet monthly for lunch to update each other on their projects and accomplishments. The idea was to be ready to talk each other up should an occasion arise.

"So if my boss were to complain about some problem he's struggling to solve I could say, 'You know, you should talk to Lisa in Global Equities because she's had a lot of experience with that,' this VP explained. 'It turned out to be a really effective tactic because we could be quite compelling about each others' accomplishments.'

In short order, all four women acquired sponsors and were promoted.

Finding the right person to highlight your accomplishments and push you to the top is a hard task, but it's necessary if you want to break out of the permanent lieutenant doldrums.

The idea behind this collaborative effort is that each of these women knew they weren't good at self-promotion on their own in this organization. (It was a poor mix of being both uncomfortable doing it and ineffective as well.)

So, by working together this way, self-promotion was much easier...because they didn't have to do it. They knew someone else who had their back (one of their sisters in arms) who would.

A circle of four or more brothers in arms can be rare—typically it's only two to three people from what I've seen—and too many participants can start to work to your detriment.

But, if a small group of brothers/sisters you trust can work together at this level, it can be golden (albeit not always for everyone in the circle, I think the example provided by the book is a rosy ideal that's more rare than the authors might've wanted to admit).

However, there is a caveat...

You have to be discreet about it.

Don't be the group of girlfriends walking back to the office every day from lunch laughing and smiling together, or people will quickly start to realize that you're the best of friends and likely biased when making recommendations of who to speak to/who's great at their work.