Aaron Goldsmid is not your average tech executive. The son of Broadway performers, he was the first in his family to have received higher education. Now product director at Deel, he has had an impressive career with the giants of Silicon Valley.
After twenty years of career in tech, he delivers Business Insider an unvarnished account of the mistakes that can slow down a promising career. Here are his 3 main tips.
Always be two steps ahead, not just one
“It’s a marathon, not a sprint.” This sentence perfectly sums up Aaron Goldsmid’s philosophy. Too often, young professionals focus solely on their next position, seeking to resolve the frustrations of their current position or land a prestigious title. A mistake that he himself made by leaving Microsoft for NBCUniversal, then for a startup which offered him a high-sounding title, but which he had to leave less than a year later.
The key? Project yourself two positions further and ask yourself this essential question: “How will my next role allow me to reach the one after that?” This approach notably led him to join Kiva, a microfinance NGO, not for prestige, but to acquire essential skills in business development and communication with institutional actors. These experiences proved valuable when he later took a general manager role at Twilio.
Invest in human relationships before anything else
His time at Twitter taught him a lesson that is the opposite of what we usually hear: quantifiable goals are not everything. Responsible for growth at the time, he often had to intervene in other teams’ projects to optimize performance. “We were so focused on achieving goals that we sometimes forget the importance of interpersonal relationships”he confides.
This approach often backfired on his team, creating tensions that then needed to be repaired. Looking back, Aaron Goldsmid emphasizes the importance of taking the time to explain your approach and build alliances before acting. “In a company, not everyone pursues the mission in the same way, he explains. By investing in relationships, you can better communicate your alignments with others, and even if they disagree with you, they will respect your process.”
Avoid copying leaders
Coming from a family far removed from the corporate world, Aaron Goldsmid had no role model for navigating the corporate environment. A situation which led him to copy the behaviors of the leaders he admired, including their bad habits (hello Elon Musk admirers). “Young professionals have difficulty distinguishing what truly makes a leader successful from their flaws that the company tolerates”he explains.
In particular, he remembers imitating the tendency of some leaders to make sweeping statements about the future, without realizing that their credibility was based on years of proven experience. Now a leader himself, he pays particular attention to his behavior during meetings, aware that younger people could be tempted to reproduce his faults.
The 3 tips to remember:
- Plan your career with two positions in mind rather than just one
- Prioritize building strong relationships rather than achieving goals at all costs
- Avoid blindly copying the behaviors of leaders without understanding what really makes them successful
