Q: How Can I Get Better Visibility Within My Company?
Over the last year, I’ve received many questions on running a Design Studio. This series of articles will answer several of those one by one in a public forum.
→ The complete overview on starting and running a Design Studio
People forget easily. Similar to marketing, or selling additional services to clients, being top of mind, or “visible” matters. While the term “visibility” often goes hand-in-hand with politics, politics inside a company doesn’t always need to have a negative connotation. Being visible can be done in a positive way to help both yourself, your team, and your management.
GaryVee — content, content, contect… put out good content. As a head of studio, I will never mind getting more status. I’ll just delete what I don’t need… but I do mind not having visibility and having to ask.
I was recently asked by a friend at a different agency “How can I improve my visibility across our offices”. If you’re not leading a high profile program or project, I usually fall back on two simple tasks for improving visibility. Both of these, when done appropriately, should be considered as having a positive impact on your organisation, team, and company.
Get attention in the inbox
It’s always good to have clear communication and transparency on what you are doing, and a short Status Report is one of the simplest ways to provide that. It’s also a great way to gain attention and visibility.
In driving a design studio for years, I never mind getting more status communications. If it means I can attend one less meeting, or send one less email on “What’s happened this week”, I’m quite happy. I’ve found many managers are the same.
For status report, I usually summarise four (4) things.
- Executive Summary — no more than three (3) bullet points
- Risks and Mitigations — Show any upcoming concerns and how you’re solving those.
- What you, or the team, did last week
- What you, or the team, will do next week
If you’re alone, you can do personal status, however this might be overkill. As an alternative, perhaps think about how to start up an internal newsletter with interesting content. Substack is proving good content for email newsletters is making a comeback. If possible, spend some time to make it visually compelling. Similar to a newsletter, a podcast can also work, but may not have the same visibility effect. If none of these work, the next option might be a better alternative.
Share skills or provide value across teams and offices
Find something you’re good at and share it. This could be in person, over video conference, or simply one-to-one. In larger companies this could be a lunchtime brownbag, or at small studios, this can simply be peer information sharing. In the light of visibility for positive intent, peer education and sharing skills is never a bad thing. If you can help others become better, it’s a very favourable trait!
The idea works in two ways. First, have a reason to get your name out, and drive visibility for yourself. People get to see what you’re working on and who you are. Second, it can associate you with being an expert on a topic. This can help others seek you out later. That being said, if that is the goal, make sure it’s something you actually have in-depth knowledge on! If you think you’re too junior in your career and don’t have anything yet, start asking people to be mentors and start soaking up information.
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