Someone once told me that a corporate career is like a game of chess. It's not the smartest player who wins, it's the one who makes a series of good moves at the right time. That framing changed how I thought about my own career, and it's the lens I use whenever I sit down with someone I'm mentoring today.
Here's what I've learned working across four countries and companies such as Intel, Apple, Telstra, Inmarsat and foodpanda.
The Early Years: Get Technically Excellent and Find the Right Boss
When you are starting out as an analyst, one of the best things you can do is invest in your technical credentials. Go get that CPA, CA, CFA, or whatever the gold standard qualification is in your field. It signals commitment and competence.
But technical excellence is only half the equation. A great boss at a reputable company will teach you more in two years than five years at a mediocre company ever could. They will challenge you, expose you to situations above your level, and advocate for you before you have even figured out what you want.
I was fortunate to work at companies like Intel and Telstra early in my career. The standards were high, the processes were world-class, and I was surrounded by people who pushed me to raise my game. I came out of those years with a foundation I have drawn on ever since.
From Analyst to Manager: Stop Being the Best Individual and Start Multiplying Others
The moment you become a manager, the rules quietly change, and most people do not notice until they are already struggling.
There is a book by Marshall Goldsmith called "What Got You Here Won't Get You There" and I wish someone had put it in my hands the day I became a manager. The title says everything. The habits, behaviours and skills that earned you the promotion are not the same ones that will earn you the next one. In fact, some of them will actively work against you if you are not careful.
The trap is a familiar one. You keep doing the job you were just promoted out of. You answer every question yourself because you are faster. You are technically brilliant and, without realising it, you have become a bottleneck.
As a manager, your output is your team. If they are not growing, if they cannot run without you, if everything still flows through you, you have not made the jump yet.
Start measuring yourself by what your team produces, not what you produce. Invest in the people around you. Create the conditions for others to do great work. That is what gets noticed at the next level, and it is also a genuinely more satisfying way to work.
What helped me make this transition was realising that I had already been practising it outside of work for years. Leading sports teams, running societies, and volunteering with not-for-profit organisations. This taught me more about motivation, recruitment and bringing people together around a common goal than any management course ever did. If you are investing in leadership outside of work, do not discount it. Those experiences translate directly into the kind of manager people actually want to work for.
A good mentor at this stage is invaluable, especially one who has sat in the same chair before. They will tell you what your manager will not, help you see the blind spots you cannot see yourself, and save you from making the mistakes they already made for you.
From Manager to Director: The Game Changes and Nobody Tells You
At this level, being brilliant at your job is no longer enough. Everyone around you is also good at their job. What starts to matter is your ability to influence people you do not manage, build relationships across the business, and make your impact visible to the people making decisions about your future. You have to start thinking about the organisation's problems, not just your department's problems.
One of the best things you can do at this level is deliberately learn from functions outside your own. Spend time understanding what drives the sales team and their incentives, how operations thinks about cost, and what keeps the marketing team up at night. The Directors who stand out are the ones who can connect the dots across the business, not just optimise their own corner of it.
And do not limit your learning to the company you are in. Watch how McKinsey, Bain and BCG consultants structure an argument and build a slide deck. Study how investment bankers construct a financial model with rigour and clarity. Pay attention to how great salespeople and leaders communicate. They get the entire message across in minutes with confidence and make it land. These are transferable skills and most support function leaders never bother to develop them. The ones who do become significantly more effective at the Director level and beyond.
Mentoring and Coaching Together as a Powerful Combination
I have benefited from both mentoring and coaching at different points in my career, and I have come to believe that the most powerful thing you can offer someone is not one or the other. It is both.
Mentoring gives you the guidance and experience of someone who has been there. When you are trying to navigate a difficult stakeholder, figure out whether to take a risk on a new role, or understand why you keep getting overlooked for the next level, having a mentor who has been in your shies and can share what actually worked is invaluable.
But the best mentors also know when to put down the roadmap. A mentor who holds a coaching certification from the ICF or EMCC can bring something most advisors cannot. They know when to stop sharing answers and start asking questions. This can unlock what is already inside you.
They know when to stop sharing answers and start asking questions instead. At the senior level, the biggest obstacles are rarely technical. They are internal. And the right question at the right moment, whether that is "what do you think is really stopping you?" or "what would you do if you already knew the answer?", can unlock more than any amount of advice ever could.
That combination of experience and powerful questions is what I have seen accelerate senior careers more than anything else. that is exactly what great mentoring looks like.
Having worked across hypergrowth startups, large corporates, and multiple markets in Asia-Pacific, I bring all of that into my mentoring sessions on MentorCruise. Whether you are trying to make your first move into management, break through to Director, or position yourself for the C-Suite, I would love to help you make the right moves at the right time.
