Friday’s Book Giveaway: Beyond Code by Rajesh Setty
Today we are giving away 5 copies of the popular “Beyond Code: Learn to Distinguish Yourself in 9 Simple Steps!”. As the global workforce has expanded and internet connections sped up over the past 10 years there has been a squeeze on professional jobs. Certain positions in the IT industry have become ‘commoditized’. The need to stand out and distinguish yourself is your only hedge against the changing dynamics of the job market.
As we’ve learned in other books such as “A Whole New Mind” by Daniel Pink, we can’t rely on what worked in the past – change is needed. You’ll be become irrelevant if you don’t take personal branding in your own hands. In “Beyond Code” by Rajesh Setty you’ll learn ways to become invaluable to your employer. Although it was written for the IT professional in mind, it’s chock full of advice, examples, and interviews that anyone will find beneficial. As Tom Peters says in the forward, “Read this book as if your life depends on it. It does.”
Check out the Life Beyond Code blog Rajesh maintains. It has some great material that expands beyond the book.
Book Description:
“Through his work with hundreds of technology professionals, Rajesh Setty has had a bird’s eye view of careers that soared and careers that stalled. In the IT arena, Setty noted that while some people succeeded beyond imagination, most people seemed to get stuck about ten or fifteen years into their careers. After careful observation, interviews and insights, Setty realized that the top performers in the IT services industry definitely had a different set of standard practices for distinguishing themselves. To share their secrets, Setty created Beyond Code.
In Beyond Code, Setty explains that today’s tech pros are facing the crisis of commoditization and that in order to thrive, it is imperative that they learn to stand out. Moreover, Beyond Code functions as a blueprint for professionals who want to go from acceptable to exceptional.
Beyond Code explains how technology professionals can supercharge their careers by winning what Setty calls the Inner Game and Outer Game. Complete with exercises, examples, and insights, Beyond Code provides a recipe for technology professionals to raise above the commodity crowd and become remarkable.”
To be entered into today’s book giveaway, “Beyond Code”(5 copies available) answer this question:
What are important qualities/traits an individual should encompass in order to distinguish themselves?
(Answers like hard worker, honest, passionate, ect. don’t fit the bill for this one. I’m looking more above and beyond. Remember, we are talking about standing out from the pack!)
Comment by 9pm CST today and be entered to win! 10 winners will be randomly selected.
Update: Winner’s have been selected! Rajesh was impressed with all the great comments that he selected everyone that commented to win!
After years in IT, these are the traits that nobody put on a resume that I was always looking for:
1) Attitude, Good - You can train skills, but you can’t train attitude. A miserable, highly skilled person is still miserable to be around.
2) Willingness To Seek Work - Some employees, when they are done with a specific task, will try to figure out how to “look busy” rather than take on another task. A larger number will stand around until someone tells them what to do. The diamond employees will come seeking additional work.
3) Ingrained Desire To Help Others - Whether it be customers or co-workers, the best employees try to help other people. Not because they have to (think surly drivers license employee here), but because they can’t help themselves.
If I find an employee, a contractor, or a candidate with these qualities in evidence, I know they’ll be head and shoulders above the rest.
Dan
Comment by Daniel Sweet — February 9, 2007 @ 9:44 am
Based on my experiences:
1 Become a “business” person. Know more than just your limited area. Expand your knowledge. Understand your business procedures and methods. Constantly seek to meet customer demands based on that knowledge.
2 Try It! Progress comes from doing things. Try new ideas and processes. Your competition is advancing — if you are not — you are sliding backwards.
3 Read different stuff! Grab ideas from other fields, areas, etc. It’s okay to read something and then daydream about it. You’d be surprised how many good ideas start off as crazy ideas coming from other fields / areas / professions.
You are not helpless — you can grow and expand your career. To quote the overused Nike ad: Just Do It!
Comment by Gary — February 9, 2007 @ 10:39 am
1. Be agressive. Too often, people just want to fit in and get along with everyone. Being aggressive gets things done. I’m not saying be a jerk to coworkers, but when a project comes up, volunteer to spearhead efforts. Your peers, and your supervisors, will value someone who makes the flow instead of just going with it.
2. Over-do your job. Do your boss’s job. It distinguishes you from the crowd. When a higher position opens up, you have already shown your ability to handle it. Additionally, if your boss advances, you already have a track record of performing his job. I’m not sure how much IT professionals could do this, but in Sales, you can almost always groom yourself as the successor to your supervisor.
Comment by Levi — February 9, 2007 @ 11:06 am
1. Desire/willingness to ask “Why?” Too many people come into a company and just fall in line doing things the way everyone else does them without asking and understanding why things are done that way.
2. Confidence to challenge the answers you receive when you ask “Why?” I’m not saying that as a new employee you should come in and try to change the world, but answers like “This is the way we’ve always done it,” shouldn’t cut it, especially if you have tools or expertise that you know could be applied.
3. The vision and drive to push for change where you see room for improvement. The leadership and interpersonal skills to get supporters and to win over management above you.
And then finally, don’t let your bosses forget the lasting impact YOU were directly responsible for from the above actions, and if you’re moving to another company, make sure you tell them the kind of impact you had, what sort of cost savings or performance improvements YOU created.
Comment by James — February 9, 2007 @ 11:09 am
1. Ability to question the status quo. Like James says, too many people join a company and just do what everyone else does. Distinguishing yourself means the ability to change things.
2. Broad experience. Having experience in different fields helps you understand the company, its business, customers and how you can provide higher value.
3. Good attitude. You can be the most skillful man around but no one will want to work with you without good attitude…
Comment by Eran Kampf — February 9, 2007 @ 11:31 am
Integrity is far and away, one of the #1 factors for me (I wrote about it not too long ago, in fact). While that article is about it in the context of leadership, i think that in some ways the people who i have seen become leaders *already* stood out.
I would go so far as to say that without integrity you will never be able to make yourself stand out unless in a negative way.
The second is the ability to lift up *other* people and make them stand out. it’s one thing to make yourself stand out but another to make sure *other* people stand out, which helps you stand out even more as a good leader (regardless of title).
Third, you need to be able to critically think for yourself and be an agent of change - both in people and process.
Fourth, being devastatingly good looking helps a lot!
Comment by Justice~! — February 9, 2007 @ 12:59 pm
1)Ability to fill in for superior/subordinate at all times. Knowing the job your subordinates do is often something that leaders slowly forget to know how to do as they spend more and more time in a leadership role. Knowing the role of your superior will not only allow you to more easily fill the role if it becomes necessary, but it allows you to better do your job with a complete understanding of what you would desire out of yourself if you were on the leadership end. By always knowing one step above and below your position, you will most definitely distinguish yourself from your peers that likely do not understand the scope of the position they fill.
2)Though it’s been alluded to, and James discussed nicely, the desire to ask why? and therefore understand the process of your job will make you an immediate stand out. All too often employees go with the flow, and take as gospel the ways of those who train them. By having the ability to step back and understand the process, you will not only put yourself in a position to better understand the complexities of your job, but you will be able to adapt to changes in the workplace more quickly and with more understanding than those around you. Those who operate on simple memorization of steps don’t often take the time to understand the complete process, and so one simple step change and they are completely lost. Understanding the process also puts you in a position to seek improvement, and to make educated suggestions from a top-down view of operations, instead of simply looking to make your job easier.
3) Don’t hesitate to do more than your peers. In the workplace, it is all too common for the acceptable amount of work or pace to be decided by the collective workers. This only slows down productivity and puts everyone at the median. By working to your ability, you can either set the pace at which others will need to improve to or you can know the areas that you need to improve, and then meet expectations. By operating under the “collective agreement” total productivity goes down and you lose all chance to distinguish your work and yourself as a skilled and valuable individual.
Comment by Nathan — February 9, 2007 @ 1:46 pm
1. Belief in possibilities. Someone who is always seeing the way it COULD work, someone who rejects the idea of “can’t”, someone who embraces the famous Hannibal quotation, “We will either find a way, or make one.”
2. Creativity. To truly distinguish yourself, you must be different, and creativity is a key ingredient for being “different.” Creative people ask, “What’s a new way to approach this, to teach this, to structure this? How can I design this better than it’s ever been designed before?”
3. Will power. Ultimately, execution is required to become truly remarkable. You need the energy, the self-confidence, the drive to keep going, to keep at it, to get things done. Some call it motivation, but that’s “outside-in;” I call it will power, because that’s “inside-out;” and will power is the foundation of persistence.
Comment by Rob Crawford — February 9, 2007 @ 2:35 pm
One can distinguish themselves from others by “walking the talk” and actually caring about others.
By caring I mean that you want others to suceed. Even if it means getting someone who once worked for you promoted above you.
Comment by Dave — February 9, 2007 @ 2:54 pm
#1: Integrity. Too often recently companies/employees/shareholders have been burned by people with no integrity.
#2: Vision. Someone who can see beyond the current processes into the potential and is willing to work to achieve that dream.
Comment by Bobby — February 9, 2007 @ 2:58 pm
Distinguishing oneself has become especially important in recent times as most job profiles involve some amount of knowledge work.
1. Mastering a personal workflow system like GTD would really help streamline activity and boost efficiency.
2. Learning more about the customers and the business - for example if I am builidng reporting applications then I want to know not just the underlying data models but also how the data is used. This alone has helped me provide more value add.
3. Learn soft skills like presenting ideas in simple terms and defending hypothesis with facts and data.
4. Continuously striving to be a generalizing specialist - you dont have to go to business school for that tech-MBA. One business book a week and self discipline is all we need. Checking stuff out like the ‘personal MBA’ also helps
5. Setting yourself up for success by equipping yourself with the knowledge and tools necessary to do the job better/quickly than most people.
6. Finding creative ways of making your work interesting and fun - makes the journey infinitely more pleasant and the results are worth the effort.
Comment by Manu — February 9, 2007 @ 3:23 pm
Be diverse, don’t just know about your area but know others as well. Learn as much as you can about other areas so you could make a connection with you clients. People skills are a must, without these skills you could only go so far. Show the clients that you care about helping them get what they need for there business. Go above and beyond, as stated before, don’t stand around waiting for someone to you what to do but look for something to do.
Also have a great relationship with co workers and/or employees. With a great relationship with co workers will have them to want to work for you.
Comment by victor — February 9, 2007 @ 3:41 pm
Good question. I’ve always looked upon others who distinguish themselves as having something extra, something that at some level cannot be pinned down, but upon reflection can be quite clear. Those traits include a magnanimous attitude - being generous with others by contributing time and effort and advice, exhibiting beyond-reproach qualities of ethics and humbleness, and executing more than what is asked for but not by doing extra work but by extending the work in a new useful direction.
I’ve found that maybe 10% of people fall into the extraordinary category, and they don’t hit the mark every day. But on average over time they do. Everyone knows who they are - just imagine who your business could least do without.
Comment by Dan — February 9, 2007 @ 4:33 pm
Be the “go to” person for something. In addition to doing what you are responsible for, read all the information you can lay your hands on for one particular topic. Be the “expert”. Soon enough people will come asking you for help, and the managers will notice.
Comment by ispf — February 9, 2007 @ 6:16 pm
Thank you to all.
First, I am touched and second, I am honored by the reader participation on this thread.
Brandon, special thanks to you for making this happen.
Best,
Raj
Comment by Raj Setty — February 9, 2007 @ 9:41 pm
Hi,
Raj was kind enough to send me his book as a gift. I really was touched by his kind gester.
I am from the IT industry and the book really helped me a lot. I gained a lot from the book. It indeed is a excellent read.
Shamelle
Comment by Shamelle — February 14, 2007 @ 10:08 pm