[This article is part of the Employee Edge: Sharpen Your Skills & Drive Your Impact series from Total Career Management Services.]
Empowerment is about taking the reins of your own career, tapping into your potential, and actively shaping your professional journey. While supervisors are learning to act more as coaches and facilitators, your role is to step into the driver’s seat. True empowerment means moving away from simply waiting for instructions and instead taking ownership of your day-to-day work, your problem-solving, and your long-term goals.
Being empowered doesn’t mean you have to go at it alone. It means collaborating with your supervisor in a new way—by actively participating in the coaching process. When you openly reflect on your work, share your career aspirations, and embrace constructive feedback, you turn your one-on-one meetings into powerful tools for your own advancement.
Try this: In your next one-on-one, when you run into a roadblock, resist the urge to just hand the problem over to your supervisor. Instead, bring the issue along with one or two potential solutions you’ve brainstormed, and ask, “Here is what I’m thinking—what are your thoughts on this approach?”
Also, try this: Identify one specific skill you want to develop this quarter. Share this goal with your supervisor and work together to outline how you can practice it and how they can best support you.
Avoid this: Don’t wait around for your supervisor to map out your goals or assume they know what you want to achieve. And don’t shy away from constructive feedback; view it as a valuable tool to help you step out of your comfort zone and grow.
You can find these articles and other resources on Total Career Management Services on UCOR Hub. You can contact one of the career counselors by emailing totalcareer@orcc.doe.gov.
