‘Put Your Head Down and Do the Work’ is Trash Advice

Have you heard the advice, put your head down and do the work? It implies that something magical will happen when you pick your head back up. Yeah? That’s bunk. I’ve heard it so many times over the years. It comes up during people’s performance reviews. It comes up when people are coached toward a promotion. More recently I’ve heard it on the internet, and this one has just a little different tone. Now, I’m guessing this isn’t a new trend online. More my little corner of the internet doesn’t say it so I don’t see it. But, I got sucked down an Instagram wormhole recently. I happened upon guys (maybe more accurately described as bros) who were trying to market career and leadership to women. It was as if they found career advice from Ladies Home Journal circa 1958. Put a 2023 aesthetic over the top, and high fived each other for reviving tried and true advice. Well fellas, some advice is better left in the past.

Why put your head down and do the work is such bad advice

We’ve talked about this before, but it bears repeating. Doing the work with your head down has a lot of negative impacts. This includes missing out on feedback, lack of awareness of your hard work, limited communication opportunities with decision makers, and more. We talked about this in a previous post, Is this Advice Helping You Get Ahead, or Holding You Back? If you want more on how this kind of advice can be damaging to your career click the link to read more.

What made the bro version so much more damaging is that it implied that women aren’t where we want to be because we’re distracted. New’s flash, we are. We wear multiple hats at work, raise children, care for spouses, support aging parents, family, and friends. On top of that, we do want to grow and advance in a variety of areas of life. That doesn’t mean we aren’t doing the work. We are, but we need some help. So, we go looking for help on the internet and run into Chad who gives us terrible advice and makes us feel like it’s all our fault. Then when his advice doesn’t work, because it won’t, we’ve let our family down, didn’t achieve the goal, and feel like it’s because we didn’t put our head down and do the work well enough. The whole thing is a very gross self-fulfilling prophesy.

Advice failing in practice

A little over a year ago I was working with a super smart young woman, Crystal. Crystal wanted to advance and move from an individual contributor role to a manager role. She had been working in her field for years and had only been with her current employer for about a year and a half. Her immediate supervisor was retiring and had high hopes that Crystal would take on his role after he departed. He knew the type of work he’d given her during her time in the role and it always came out looking perfect. Her facts and figures were on point. Her analysis was insightful and challenged the status quo. He’d even given her stretch opportunities with leading projects and teams. The supervisor knew Crystal was right for the job.

He told her that her work excelled and to just keep her head down and do the work, and she’d get her promotion. Well, his retirement came and went, and Crystal stayed in the same role. She didn’t know what was going wrong, so she took on more and more responsibilities. Finally, she came to me to discuss and work through it. I asked with him now gone, what her relationship was like with the other leaders in the department. Crystal gave me a blank stare, she was doing the work, she hadn’t developed relationships. At this point, she couldn’t imagine taking her eye off the ball long enough to make those connections. I asked, who shares the projects she works on and the progress she’s made with the teams? She had always put that work in shared folders. Her boss was sharing it. With him gone, she assumed people went out to the folders.

Don’t worry, we got Crystal back on track

I’m hoping you can see the holes in Crystal’s plan, and her supervisor’s advice. While he clearly meant well, he set her up to fail in his absence and was likely inadvertently taking credit for her work while he was there. Crystal used a version of my Development Plan guide to work on the areas we identified and communicate her skills and worth. She was so valuable that after only about 6 months she was able to secure a leadership position. Yes, she had done the work, but it wasn’t until she picked her head up that it came to fruition.

What to while you do the work

Get a mentor

If you don’t have one already (seriously with all of my harping, how do you not?) when you’re working toward a goal is the most important time to have one, or a few mentors. You need to be selective, yes. Not everyone who’s ever encountered a goal or even has knowledge on the topic you’re working on is a good mentor. For example, just because Suzie is in a position of power at work doesn’t mean she’s the one to talk to. Maybe she doesn’t have the same style as you, values, boundaries, or skill set, and that may mean she’s not the right mentor. Now, a little diversity of thought is important but someone who’s experience is entirely different from yours likely isn’t the right candidate or at least shouldn’t be the only mentor you have.

In Crystal’s circumstance, a mentor would have been helpful in continuing the relationship and connection after the supervisor retired. She may have also gained other insights that better aligned with what the decision makers on the team needed to know and be aware of to promote her.

Start talking

You knew I was going here, right? Why on earth would you ‘do the work’ and keep silent about it? Telling your mentor, your boss, your partner, your friends, is important to your success. They can help you see the pitfalls, get clear on your focus by asking questions, come up with suggestions you hadn’t thought of. Even if you’re nervous that someone might not agree or think it is a good idea, you still need to share with at least a few people. Which brings me to my next point, I am by no means saying you shouldn’t be strategic about this. At least not in the early stages. Share your goal in a setting that you can control and with people you trust to have your best interest at heart.

I’m not suggesting Crystal should have gone all around the office saying that her boss said she was the best fit for his job. Also, I don’t think bragging about all the good work she was doing was right either. She shared with her boss, sure, but there needed to be others who could aided her in her efforts. Crystal may have ran into opposition from co-workers who wanted to be considered or people who thought she was too green. Strategically choosing people to share with is important and often, like with Crystal’s supervisor, you can find someone who can champion you and point you in the right direction.

Do the work of sharing with your network

So now you’ve figured out the goal. You started doing the work to make it a reality and solidified it with mentors and those closest to you. You still have work to do. This is still not entirely head down work though. Now is the time to share your goal, your efforts, and your progress with your network.

Now is the time to bring Suzie into the fold. You would be shocked how often people want to help. Even if Suzie doesn’t do things the way you would, she might be able to put you in contact with someone that can help support. Or maybe Johnny happened to have had a conversation with someone who can help solve your problem just the other day. Can you do the work without the Suzie’s and Johnny’s of the world? Usually, yes. It will just take longer and likely have more holes in it. Stress test your work and get the right heads in the room to make sure the work is done right.

No question about it, Crystal taking her work and sharing it with the leadership group would have been an awesome opportunity. This could have been before or after her boss retired and she could have shown off all the great work she did.

One last word of advice, be brave

Part of the reason people say, put your head down and do the work, is because it’s safe. Opening up, even in a strategic order to intentional people, is scary and hard. At any time, those people could tear you down. Don’t let them. Find your success and momentum in working toward the goal so you can stand on that while you build your courage. If you’re brave enough to do the work with your fear, you’ll find your courage, and with time, build your confidence.