Guest Author
By Jayant Pandya
For recent college graduates eager to advance quickly in their chosen fields, there are valuable suggestions to help navigate the challenges ahead. While the concept of a “glass ceiling” exists, it’s often more breakable than it appears.
Drawing on nearly four decades of experience in multinational corporations, from starting as an entry-level engineer to retiring as a senior manager, I’ve learned a few key lessons that can accelerate career growth. It will be obvious to see that to succeed, in addition to the individual efforts, you also need mentors, a professional network, nurturing employer and motivated staff.
Here are the insights from my journey:
Academic Achievement: Performance Over Potential
Graduating from a reputable school with high grades can certainly open doors. I experienced this firsthand with my engineering degree from India and a graduate degree from U.C. Berkeley, which led to four job offers. However, once I began working, I quickly realized that what truly mattered was my contribution, not just my potential. Your performance on the job will become the key to your success. The following paragraphs will further explain this.
Stay Fit: Prioritize Well-Being
Staying fit in every sense of the word is crucial. Early in my career, I found myself overwhelmed while working as an engineering analyst in Foster Wheeler’s “Think Tank.” With a young family to support and no Plan B, I pushed myself to the brink working extra hours, learning how to use complex computer codes to solve engineering problems and taking refresher classes to get a state professional engineering license. Ultimately, I ended up in the hospital with high blood pressure. This experience taught me that maintaining good health had to be my top priority. After recovering, I made changes to my lifestyle and rarely called in sick for the rest of my career.
Focus on Your Strengths: Know Core Competencies and Build Upon These
As an engineer, I climbed the ladder from junior to principal engineer, however, my manager once told me that future promotions would be difficult without a doctorate. He suggested, after observing my strengths, that I consider the management path instead. He sent me to a management assessment center and then to a “charm school” for honing essential skills such as building interpersonal relations, communication and employee empowerment. It is therefore quite important to have good relations with your immediate manager who can observe your strengths and properly guide you in growth. This advice became a turning point in my career, setting the stage for accelerated progress as I transitioned into management.
Managers Are Paid to Take Risks: Spot and Pursue Opportunities
In the late 1970s, I was working for Westinghouse in Pittsburgh when my mentor offered me a risky but temporary assignment in Philadelphia. This had the potential to lead to greater opportunities. The task was to downsize the unionized engineering workforce with a history of violence from over 400 to just 40. By working closely with the union steward, HR manager and routine communication with the affected employees, we accomplished this without a single grievance being filed against company. The laid off employees were given retraining opportunities, assistance in job searches at local businesses along with receiving generous separation benefits. The company was spared lengthy and expensive litigations. It was truly a team effort. This success led to recognition at the corporate level and significantly advanced my career, illustrating that bold, calculated risks often lead to great rewards.
Mentor and Networking: Build Relationships
A mentor can be instrumental in your career. In the mid-1980s, while working in Charlotte, I sought a more challenging role, aiming for a department manager position in Orlando. This was an executive management position reporting to a General Manager. Though I was the most qualified candidate, I was initially passed over due to staff discomfort. A year later, with the support of the plant manager— who was previously Corporate VP of Human Resources and remembered my work in Philadelphia—I secured the position, finally breaking the invisible glass ceiling. Your work attitude and performance can help you find a mentor who becomes your advocate and opens doors to new opportunities.
Measure Performance: Set Clear Goals
When I took over the Technical Information Management Department in Orlando, the performance was far from satisfactory. With a staff of over 300 scattered across five locations, my manager gave me two years to turn things around. He warned me that if I failed to deliver, I should be prepared to leave.
My staff and I started by analyzing existing performance, setting baselines, and establishing improvement goals. By implementing performance measures, employee training and rewards for their contribution, and process improvements, we exceeded our goals. I was able to keep my job and on top of that awarded me company’s “Eagle Award” for excellence. Setting clear measures, assigning accountability and healthy competition among staff are essential for success.
Think Strategically: Perseverance and Focus Pay Off
In the early 1990s, our company was losing its competitive edge due to excessive costs and poor quality. Deploying a Product Data Management (PDM) system would address these issues. It was a major initiative requiring digitizing thousands of documents, upgrading computer infrastructure, process reengineering and training over a thousand affected employees and motivating them to accept changes. The project also required an investment of over ten million dollars. Again, my manager asked me to spearhead this project.
Most people were initially skeptical and thought that I was just selling the company a dream. They called it PDM, “Pandya’s Dream Machine”. We put together a dedicated and competent project team for implementation. It seemed like steering a giant oil tanker and took considerable efforts to get moving. We did succeed by having a prototype system within a year and eventually rolling out the entire system in three years. The skeptics were proven wrong. They converted to enthusiastic promoters instead. Thinking strategically and staying focused on long-term goals can lead to significant improvements.
Change Management: Handle Transitions with Care
Managing change effectively is the key to success. Our PDM project’s success was due to a carefully crafted implementation plan that followed the DEI sequence: Decide on the solution, Educate the affected people on the benefits, and then Implement change. The employees were getting current data on their upgraded PCs which were connected to a fast communication network, thereby greatly improving productivity. The project team constantly communicated with employees on upcoming changes preparing them to accept these. Many well-intentioned but poorly executed projects fail because managers follow DIE sequence by rushing to Implement changes without adequately Educating those affected. Handling transitions with care is crucial to ensuring smooth and successful change management.
Final Words:
I realize that the business environment in 2024 is different from 1964 when I started my career. As a first-generation immigrant I faced several handicaps – language barrier, social barrier, financial limitations and prejudice against and acceptance of minorities in management. Today’s youth, on the other hand, comes from a privileged class, parental support and financial safety. Besides, thanks to the reputation earned by the first-generation immigrants and the Indians occupying CEO positions in many Fortune 500 companies, the road ahead is relatively smoother.
To sum up, think big – very big and success is sure to follow…
Jayant Pandya is 85 and retired in 2002. He and Jyotsna Pandya returned to Charlotte in 2017. He published his memoir, “Engineering My Way to America” in 2014.
Contact: [email protected].
