LONDON 2012

How do you go for gold in your career? Are you a Usain Bolt, sprinting towards your goal, or do you take things at a more relaxed pace?

We are in the throes of Olympic fever. Thousands of us are flocking to Olympic venues every day, eager to get a glimpse of an aerodynamic cycle helmet whizzing by, horses’ hooves kicking up sand and sails battling it out in the water.

We’ve been screaming with joy, shouting in frustration and weeping into our super-sized cups of Olympic-sanctioned beverages.

So which athlete do you take after in your career strategy? Are fastest out of the blocks or playing the long game to get to where you want to be?

The sprinter

Are you the career equivalent of Mr Usain Bolt? Have you left others for dust and zipped to the top in record timing?

There are ways and means of pin-pointing you. You love being the centre of attention and thrive on the thrill and chase of hunting down a new account or closing a deal. You’re pretty damn cocksure, like The Bolt-ster - if you were on a starting line you’d be pulling some pretty impressive signature moves. Let’s face it, you are probably in sales.

But while the sprinters on the track find their advantage in power, being a career sprinter can be more of a tactical affair. “If you are shrewd there are certain sectors in which you can achieve a career sprint,” says Yvonne Smyth, director at Hays, a leading recruiting expert. “If you look at in-demand skills in the sector you wish to work and train up in them, you can accelerate faster than your peers.”

If you are brilliant with clients and quickly collect a bursting contacts book, you can get all of the success and glory of the 100m final.

Just be careful not to burn out.

Most likely to find you in: Sales or recruitment

The marathon runner

In certain industries and organisations in which your progression can seem more like a marathon. You work hard to put the ground work in, keep up your stamina, and through sheer resilience get to where you want eventually.

Chances are you are not a massive fan of change. You like to keep a steady pace and are quite happy waiting it out in the same company for quite some time to get to the top. You don’t like the feeling of being out of your depth and always like to have a clear schedule in front of you - ideally for the whole year.

“In some organisations and sectors, with experience comes an assumption of age. There are certain clients that expect you to have a certain number of years behind you before appearing before them. This can often be the case in professional services, in which there are rigid structures and certain gates to progress through.”

The older-style business culture that favoured marathon careers is being eroded in many industries, making this kind of career less of a necessity for many. Whether you need to wait it out your dream promotion the full length of the marathon now depends on the hierarchical nature of the company.

“In the old world (before the .com age) there was an element of needing a big of grey hair to prove you’ve gone the distance with senior people look to recruit in their own image,” explains Smyth. “Things have changed. [Now] if you have the idea and the energy to generate revenue, you will not be left slogging to get round the first corner for long.”

Most likely to find you in: Law, accountancy, medicine

The pole vaulter

You are a creation of the digital era. It used to be a rare occurrence that workers were catapulted from zero to hero overnight, but now it happens quite regularly.

Mark Zuckerberg is the ultimate example of a pole vaulter. Still in college when he started, his career as skipped the maturing process and flipped him straight into the driving seat of one of the world’s best-known companies. Not a silver hair in sight.

You are a big risk taker because you chase those high rewards. If you’re not a plucky tech entrepreneur, replete with black rimmed glasses and one really good idea, you’re probably a trader. The trading floor can make or break someone in seconds, and you have to have nerves of steel. It’s high up there at the top of that jump that you could lose it all in a moment.

Most likely to find you in: Technology, finance

The triple jumper

You have more of a segmented career, punctuated with jumps. It’s all about tactical moves at the right time to build your CV and land on the last jump, exactly where you want to be. It’s about being bold and making the right step at precisely the right time and place.

There’s a high chance you work in PR or marketing, where the average stint in any job is only a couple of years. You make swift and powerful leaps in your career and are decisive in the steps you take, landing with familiar aplomb into the next sandpit.

“We have seen increasingly across the board that in the contract between the employer and the employee, the latter says, ‘I give you X, what do you give me?’ We see much more savvy workers for whom loyalty isn’t rewarded. A generation ago loyalty would have been a sought-out trait,” says Smyth.

“Candidates are happy to hop, skip and jump as long as it demonstrates progression. Employers have to work even harder as these candidates are less risk-averse.”

Most likely to find you in: Marketing or PR

The heptathlete

You are hard to find. Being a complete all-rounder can be hard when advice tell us to specialise in order to get ahead. But some of you just can’t help being a dab hand at just about everything you turn your hands to.

It is often the case that good all-rounders still excel in certain areas, but learn fast and are open to expanding their skill base beyond what is required.

You heptathletes often make great leaders – able to manage, strategize and fight fires. You work particularly well in a start-up where pretty much anything can be thrown at you.

“These type of employees have real breadth,” says Smyth. Though she warns: “Even if you are truly multi-skilled, you have to be an expert in one thing to really stand-out. Real generalists only ally their full range of skills when they reach a leadership role.”

By Gabriella Griffith

Source: www.londonlovesbusiness.com

Kirani James became a history man tonight – although he is still a teenager.

The 19-year-old from Grenada (pictured top) became the second youngest ever winner of the Olympic 400 metres title as he ended a sequence of seven victories in this event by runners from the United States.

That sequence was always going to come to an end, of course, given that, for the first time ever in a non-boycotted Games, the US did not have a single representative in the final which was won in such emphatic fashion in 1996 and 2000 by the American who still holds the world record of 43.18sec, Michael Johnson.

But even the great Johnson got a small chip taken out of him by James, as his winning time of 43.98sec – the first time a non-US teenager had beaten 44 seconds – eclipsed the world champion's UK all-comers record.

"It just shows I'm on the right track," said James, after a race which saw silver go to fellow 19-year-old Luguelin Santos – who, less than an hour earlier, had been uplifted by seeing his 35-year-old  Dominican Republic team-mate Felix Sanchez reclaim the 400m hurdles title he won at the Athens 2004 Games.

Santos, who clocked 44.46, was followed home by Lalonde Gordon of Trinidad and Tobago, who recorded a personal best of 44.52 to complete a clean sweep for the smaller nations.

Grenada's population is a mere 110,000 – and James, who comes from a small fishing village, happily predicted that a good number of them might now be celebrating a victory which came a year after his startling defeat of the 2008 Olympic champion, LaShawn Merritt, to win the world title in Daegu.

"It's a huge step for my country in terms of stepping up to the plate in track and field," said James.

"This victory is putting us on the map.

"There is probably a huge street party going on right now."

There may also be a few celebrations taking place in Sunderland, where Kirani has been training in preparation for the Games in facilities organised by Britain's former world mile record holder and world 1500m champion, Steve Cram.

Merritt, who returned in 2011 from a two-year doping ban, had secured his right to run at these Games by overturning the International Olympic Committee (IOC) ruling against doping offenders competing at the next Games.

However, he pulled up in the heats here with an injured hamstring.

For Sanchez, who had won 43 consecutive 400m hurdles races as he secured two world titles before claiming the 2004 Olympic crown, the effort ended in tears – a bucketful of tears, on top of the podium, after recording a time of 47.63 that matched his winning Olympic effort eight years earlier.

He revealed afterwards that he had had the word "grandmother" written on his spikes in memory of the relative who had died during Beijing 2008 and to whom he had pledged another Olympic medal.

"When I was on the podium I felt the rain falling on me like my grandmother's tears," he said poetically.

Britain's team captain and world champion Dai Greene, who had been nonplussed after only managing to qualify for the final as a fastest loser, put everything into an effort which eventually saw him finish just one place off the podium in 48.24.

Michael Tinsley of the US took silver in a personal best of 47.91, with Puerto Rico's strong favourite, Javier Culson, only managing third place in 48.10.

Sanchez is one of two athletes to have known what it feels like to be unbeatable and who were seeking to reclaim Olympic glories here.

The other was Russia's Yelena Isinbayeva, whose quest to become the first woman in Olympic history to win three straight titles in any event ultimately ended with bronze in the pole vault competition.

Jennifer Suhr of the US took gold on countback ahead of Cuba's Yarisley Silva after both had cleared 4.75 metres.

Britain's Holly Bleasdale, who has already recorded the third best indoor mark of the season with 4.87m, failed to progress beyond 4.45m and finished equal sixth.

"The weather wasn't bad," said Isinbayeva, who revealed she had suffered a muscle tear in May which had severely limited her preparations for London.

"It was terrible." 

Yuliya Zaripova of Russia earned gold in the women's 3,000m steeplechase in a personal best of 9min 06.72sec, with Tunisia's Habiba Ghribi taking silver in a national record of 9:08.37 ahead of Ethiopia's Sofia Assefa who clocked 9:09.84.

In the shot put final, Nadzeya Ostapchuk earned an emphatic victory over Valerie Adams, the New Zealander who had beaten her at the previous year's World Championships, producing four throws of over 21 metres, the best of which was 21.36.

Adams took silver with 20.70 ahead of Russia's Evgeniia Kolodko who recorded a personal best of 20.48.

By Mike Rowbottom at the Olympic Stadium in London

Source: www.insidethegames.biz