It is important to think like a business person, not a student, when it comes to growth and development. The same expectations that enabled is to succeed in school can hold us back in the business world. 

In school, your role exists to be developed by professors. In addition, you are guaranteed to move on if you preform well. Lastly, you have a clearly defined path to follow.

In business, your role exists to help the organization succeed and prepare for it’s future. If you do well, you are not guaranteed to move forward, but your reputation will be enchanced. In addition, you have no clearly defined path, there are many avenues. 

In today’s organization structures there are less vertical opportunities. This means you should look for horizontal opportunities as well. Why is this important? Well, looking at horizontal opportunities helps to set you up for an even more dynamic career path by increasing the variety in your experiences. Looking horizontally as well can allow you to develop a different career path with more opportunities than your previous. You never know who you will get the opportunity to work with! 

In addition, by looking horizontally you can also focus on building a brand instead of a title. Titles do not help others learn how to best leverage us. If you can brand yourself, you will become more recognizable for your talents not your job description. Your unique talents that only you bring to the table will now be on display to help you ultimately move up in title without “chasing the title” vertically.