Office politics

[Namechanged99999]

I've name changed obviously!
I'm really good at my job but terrible at office politics and always have been.
I just cannot for the life of me see how people do it!
I'm not a lunatic. I have friends, I get on with folk but I can't self-promote.
I continually see people who are fine but objectively not as talented as me progress.
That's not me being arrogant, it's true.
By the same hand there's people who are clearly good but also not progressing and I can't work out the difference.
So, and this is an honest question, how?

I hate this phrase but there are a lot of people who "Fake it til they make it". I see it all the time in my place (corporate finance sector), I can't do that as I'm a believer that the quality of your work and appraisal scores should do the talking.

Someone once told me " make yourself indispensable" , and it works

I think I'm the same but I'm finding it demotivating.

Would it be useful to try and nurture relationships with seniors in charge of promotion To build up a better personal rapport so they get to know you as a person a bit more? Often things like this revolve around 'jobs for The boys' so maybe you need to be a bigger part of 'their' team if that makes sense?

Also keep a record of all the work you are doing, times you have led or used initiative etc so you have concrete examples which will take the pressure off you having to 'sell' yourself more

I think I'm the same but I'm finding it demotivating.

I'm 25 years into a corporate career and my view is that people who get promoted make that happen - they start by telling their manager "i would like to get promoted, what do I need to do to accomplish that?". They are then usually given some advice which they follow.

It also seeds in the managers mind that they have an ambitious team member who wants to be successful and has all sorts of small knock on effects - a new opportunity arises and the manager automatically gives it to the employee who wants to get promoted, the employee does something good and the manager sends an email praising them because it will help them get promoted - that sort of thing.

Most people just want an easy life and will take the path of least resistance. At promotion time, the manager is asked who from their team they consider ready for promotion and the obvious person is the one the manager knows wants it.

There's lots more to it, and some hard work I am sure, but if you don't tell you manager you want it and someone else has then they'll be prioritised even if they don't deserve it (exceptional managers can be the exception, but I've never really seen that happen, it still has to start with the employee saying "I want this").

I moved companies a couple of years ago after watching people all around me leapfrog me... I decided I wasn't going to let it happen again and employed the above strategy. Worked very well for me.

This is all so helpful. Thanks.

Yep all the things mentioned. I've never seen office politics particilarly play a part in promotion.

It's the people that:

Build relationships with Seniors
Make it known they're ambitious
Go above and beyond: stay that extra hour when needed, get involved in projects outside their usual role
Have good appraisals