What it really takes to get that next promotion

Dear Annie: A friend of mine sent me yourcolumn about getting promoted from the individual "star" level intomanagement, but I already made that jump a few years ago at a differentcompany. In fact, I'm starting to regret having left there because, ever sinceI signed on with my current employer, my career seems to have stalled out. Myperformance reviews have been great, my department has had several bigsuccesses, and I think I'm ready for the next level. My boss, however,disagrees. His main criticism is that I'm "too detail-oriented."

So I have two questions. First, is therereally such a thing as being too detail-oriented, or could that be asmokescreen for something else he doesn't want to tell me? And second, I'vebeen extremely attentive to detail all my life -- which usually has been anadvantage -- so do I have to change my personality to get promoted? (Is thateven possible?) --Stuck in Neutral

Dear Stuck: No doubt you aren't the only onewondering. Getting promoted is tougher than it used to be, for a couple ofreasons. First, "the global recession has been a factor, " notes StuCrandell, a senior vice president at Minneapolis-based leadership developmentand coaching firm PDI Ninth House. "Organizations let so many people gothat lots of positions got consolidated, so there are fewer management jobs tomove into."

Even before that, he adds, companies hadbeen running leaner and cutting out layers of management jobs. "So often,instead of an upward move, we're seeing people move sideways in companies, toget broader experience and visibility, or sometimes even taking a step down inrank in order to prepare to move up later, " Crandell says. "It'sbecome more of a zigzag path, rather than straight up. This is hard for 'Astudents' to accept."

Then there's the notoriously lofty failurerate of people promoted into bigger jobs, which according to some studies runsas high as 40%. "Companies are being extremely cautious about movingpeople from one level to the next higher one, " Crandell observes, and nowonder: "We've heard plenty of horror stories about managers who gotpromoted and then flamed out -- and executives themselves often tell us howmuch harder it is to adjust to a bigger job than they thought it wouldbe."

With all that in mind, a team ofresearchers at PDI Ninth House set out to analyze exactly what leads to asuccessful upward move. Mining information from the firm's database of 37, 000individual executive assessments, the researchers wrote two reports -- oneabout the specific kinds of experience that prepare people to rise through fivelevels of management (from midlevel team leader to CEO), and the otherexamining the personality traits that help or hinder performance at each level.

"Of course, there are some variationsfrom one corporate culture to another, " Crandell acknowledges. "Butsome traits, like high levels of energy and the ability to think strategically,are common to every company as people take on more responsibility. They'reconstants."

In your case, it seems that extremeattention to detail may indeed be holding you back. As the study, which wastitled "Personality and the Leadership Pipeline, " puts it,"Leaving the details to direct reports, leaders focus on more integrativeand holistic issues." In other words, you may need to learn to let go ofthe small stuff and focus more on the big picture.

Says Crandell, "If you're too deep inthe weeds with the day-to-day minutiae as a senior manager, you'll micromanagethe people below you. That's likely to alienate them, and it probably meansyou're not thinking strategically enough."

Luckily, he adds, "You don't have tochange your personality. You just have to alter your behavior at work. Once youleave the office, you can be as controlling and detail-oriented as you want --but while you're there, you can learn to consciously delegate the details toothers, and keep track of their activities without doing everything yourself.