Getting ahead on your personal finances often means earning more money and learning smarter ways to manage that money. One of the best ways to start earning more money is to get a promotion at work. By increasing your take-home pay every paycheck, you can start making your money work for you.

So, how can you go about earning more by landing a big job promotion? We’ve got you covered — follow these steps to take things to the next level.

Here are 8 steps to get a promotion:

  1. Think about 6 key areas
  2. Find a promotion opportunity
  3. Give yourself a performance review
  4. Reach out to your network for advice
  5. Set up a meeting with your manager
  6. Make a formal proposal
  7. Listen to their response
  8. What to do if your boss says “no” to a promotion

Are you ready to get started on earning a promotion? Read on! 👇

How to get promoted in 8 easy steps

1. Think about 6 key areas

If you’re thinking that you’re ready to start seeking a promotion, have a dialogue with yourself first — before you even get your manager involved. 

In order to make sure you’re ready for the extra responsibility and career growth, conduct a little self-check-in and think about:

  • What you’ve done in your current role to go above and beyond
  • How you support your team members in adding value
  • The kind of new role you’re looking to move into and its responsibilities
  • How you’ve demonstrated your hard work and ability to handle those new responsibilities
  • Your current skill set and any new skills you’ll need to do well in the new job
  • The possibility of a leadership role and the leadership skills you bring to the table

This list can help you determine your career goals and frame your conversation with your boss when the time comes. 

2. Find a promotion opportunity

Next, it’s time to look for the right promotion opportunity. This could be as simple as checking in with your employer’s job listings page or asking leadership what they’re currently hiring for. 

Remember, timing is everything. Think about when it may be a good time to ask for a promotion, or on the contrary — when it may be a bad time. 

If your company has a job listed that you feel qualified for, consider it a green light. Also, if you’re noticing a gap in business needs that you think you can fill with your particular skill set, you might want to bring it to your supervisor’s attention — it could result in a promotion.

However, it may be a bad time to ask for a promotion if your company went through a recent round of layoffs, or if you’ve only just started with the organization — a company will have a hard time promoting a new employee 60 days in! A good promotion opportunity should take into account what’s happening at the company and consider your own tenure in your current position.

3. Give yourself a performance review

Before having the big conversation with your boss, give yourself an assessment regarding the work you’ve been doing — consider it a personal performance review.

First, take a look at your current job description. Identify and write out the main responsibilities of your role, in accordance with your job description, and score yourself 1 through 5 on each one. Remember, keep things honest, identify high-performing areas, and give yourself some comments in each category.

Then, write out any additional responsibilities that you perform — tasks that are not in your job description. Score yourself on these too, and explain how they add value to the company.

For example, if you work as a sales representative, you might demonstrate excellent sales in your area (5/5 for your job description) and you might also have created a new way to categorize customer visits (5/5 for additional responsibilities). 

Choose tasks that show your hard work day to day as well as your ability to be a team player and overall contributor.

4. Reach out to your network for advice

We all need friends, right? When you’re looking for a promotion, it’s a great idea to tap into your network for advice. If you know someone who works in a similar role, reach out to let them know you’re planning on asking for a promotion, and see if they can offer any guidance from their personal journey. 

By knowing what skills they possess, how their process went, and what they did to succeed, you can put yourself in a more advantageous position. If they bring up any skills that you currently don’t have in your toolbox, look into those areas of professional development to sharpen your skill set. 

While LinkedIn can be an unbelievably valuable asset for connecting with your network and keeping in touch with your professional contacts and acquaintances, refrain from contacting people you don’t actually know. These are personal conversations, and you don’t want to spam strangers!

5. Set up a meeting with your manager

Once you’ve found a promotion opportunity, conducted your performance review, and gotten advice from trusted colleagues, you’re ready to set up a meeting with your manager to discuss the prospect of getting promoted. Let your manager know that you want to have a serious discussion about career development and that you feel ready for a promotion. 

If you work together in person, you might want to grab them if you have a few minutes after a meeting — just to plant the seed — but avoid asking them first thing in the morning or five minutes before they’re about to head out. The bottom line? You want to be respectful and courteous of their time and busy schedule. Be quick, direct, and to the point. 

If you work remotely, ask your boss if they have time for a quick Zoom meeting and bring it up face-to-face. Again, this discussion isn’t to ambush them into a promotion dialogue — it’s just to let them know it’s on your radar. 

In both cases, the goal is to schedule a meeting with your manager and get on with the promotion ask!

6. Make a formal proposal

When you finally sit down with your manager to ask for a promotion, you’ll want to submit a formal proposal — using your performance review as a template. Show them the great work you’ve been doing!

Here’s where it really pays off to know your audience. 

Is the decision-maker data-driven and analytical? Come to the meeting with slides, data points, metrics — anything you can think of to show your performance in terms that they understand and appreciate.

Is your supervisor more casual, valuing honest conversation above all? Be ready to have an open dialogue with your boss, and include what you’ve been doing to improve the performance of the company as well as where you see yourself in a few years down the line.

The goal is to demonstrate your seriousness, show off your track record and work ethic, and show your manager that you’re ready for the higher level the new role requires.

7. Listen to their response

When you have the conversation with your boss, be sure to listen to what they say — it’s really important to keep an open mind and sense of calm while listening to their response. Remember, this is a professional conversation, and your boss has taken time out of their day to sit down and hear your request. 

If your boss sees your career path (and career success) as less of a “linear path,” approach their response with level-headedness, and most importantly, don’t devolve the conversation into a challenging line of questions. The goal is to keep the serious conversation as relaxed as possible, and make sure you do your boss the courtesy of hearing their reply.

At the end of the day, it’s about respect for both parties.

8. What to do if your boss says “no” to a promotion

If they accept your proposal, great! Get ready for the new responsibilities and pay raise that come with the new promotion. 

However, if your boss rejects your promotion proposal, don’t force them into a “yes/no” conversation. Instead, start by making it very clear that you accept where they are today. Make sure you keep the working relationship in great shape.

Then, ask them for feedback. In particular, you’ll want to understand where they see any gaps between your current skills and the needs of this role so you’ll know where to focus your efforts. You can also ask about career development — find out where they see you in six months or a year from now. Square away a professional development path and means of upgrading your skill set. 

If your boss is open to it, consider asking them directly if they have any career advice for you. Do your best to leave the door open. Let them know you’ve heard them and that you’ll work on the items they suggested — then, plan to check back in after another quarter or two to find new opportunities and, hopefully, your next promotion with their blessing!