How to Destroy Your Career in A Few Steps

Original Spanish version published in El Comercio newspaper (Peru) on September 02, 2014

Here are some of the things you should never do if you want to take good care of your career and your personal brand.

Tell your boss, your customers, and your coworkers what you really think of them, especially when you’re bothered or offended by something. Remove all filters between what you think and what you say, even if your words sound offensive. Don’t worry about manners or courtesy, and even less about good personal relationships with anyone, since emotional intelligence has already gone out the window. Don’t worry about maintaining your current reliable network, because that’s for people without anything better to do. Believe that no one’s going to give you a job when you need it.

Lie about everything, large, small, important or minor. Forget that everything can be verified in an instant on the Internet and that once you’re known as a liar or unreliable you can never get rid of that reputation. Believe that people are mostly stupid and will never catch on to the lies you’re telling. And if you can also bribe someone in order to get what you want more quickly, do it, because everyone’s doing it, right? And that stuff about keeping your word is outdated, just like taking care of your credibility and your good reputation. Only boring people bother with that nonsense!

Always credit the team’s successes to yourself, and better still, don’t give any recognition to anyone for their contributions or ideas. Don’t try to develop your people, because then they could acquire your skills or, even worse, your job. Defend your territory and keep all relevant information to yourself: that may be your only source of power or influence. Don’t share what you know with anyone, and especially not with your boss, who is your main competitor. And also don’t think about helping him to achieve his goals and objectives or make his life easier. He wouldn’t do anything like that for you, right?

If you already feel relatively successful at your job, stop worrying about developing, learning new things, reading, attending courses, or finding better ways to do things. Keeping current or competitive is for nerds. Distrust any new idea that tries to change the way “we always do things here.” And above all be sure that everyone knows you are better than they are, you know more than they do, and they don’t even come up to your knees. It’s better to be arrogant than to be seen as humble or modest. Power is delicious, and everyone needs to know that you have it.

Forget about any indicators of success in your position or anything related to adding value or doing things well. Believe that they’re paying you to sit in your cubicle and not to bother yourself with doing things that are supposed to generate value or contribute to results. Hold onto your chair and don’t let anyone move you out of your spot. The idea is to survive every boss and every change in the organization without letting anything change your way of doing things.

Bring your personal problems to the office and tell everyone there about what’s happening to you at home, so maybe someone will validate your life. And use Facebook so that your friends know everything that’s going on at your office, what you think about your coworkers and especially your boss. Your 1000 friends will love those rumors! Concepts like ethics, loyalty, and confidentiality are things of the past, and in life’s twists and turns it’s certain that no one will ever notice your faux pas or your immaturity.

Of course you already know that these are things you should do only if you want to destroy your career.

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