Hitting a career plateau can feel frustrating, but it’s often a turning point for growth—what’s one effective strategy you’ve used (or seen work) to move beyond a plateau and uncover new opportunities for advancement? Please share a concrete example of how this approach helped you or someone else continue progressing in their field.

I've hit a few career plateaus throughout my journey, and each time, I found growth by intentionally being a bit disruptive. Disruptive in the sense that I actively sought out challenges beyond the title I held, the role I was hire for, or the opportunities typically offered, especially as the only woman asking for that kind of consideration. Early on, I moved quickly through the HR function, building expertise across disciplines until I had a firm grasp on the entire function and felt I could lead others. That season of my career was exciting, fulfilling, and fun. I was thriving, but I still wanted more. So, I started asking for stretch assignments, exposure to the board, and cross-functional projects that would expand my perspective beyond HR and into the business as a whole. One of my most pivotal moments came at the C-Suite level. I found myself craving new ways to contribute and grow, so I stepped into an acting COO role - without the formal title. That shift opened the door to entirely new kinds of problem-solving, deeper collaboration across departments, and the opportunity to serve the organization in a more holistic, meaningful way. But, eventually I hit my final plateau - the kind that doesn't get solved with a promotion or new project. That's when I decided to truly embrace my persona motto: get comfortable with being uncomfortable and I launched 22 North HR. As a solopreneur, my reach is no longer limited. I choose the work I say yes to, the partnerships I nurture, and the impact I want to make. My purpose is ignited, my passion is renewed, and my story is still being written

Professionals generally want to work hard, feel valued for what they do, understand how their role connects to the organization they work for, and live a good life. They are so driven to continue to add value to the organizations and teams they work for, they often don't take the time to reflect on their contributions and connect it to where they want to go and what they want to do, which often leads to a career plateau. They end up in autopilot going through their days doing the best they can until they realize they've plateaued, or want something more or different. This awareness is a great opportunity to pause, reflect, and uncover new opportunities for advancement. With clients I work with, we start identifying what they enjoy, what they want more of, and what they don't enjoy, or what they don't want more of. We uncover what success looks like for them, and what they want to feel when they step away from their career at retirement along with what they'd have regrets about not doing at this intersection. This is an important component as making change is often scary, and taking steps towards the right thing instead of falling into the something that's going to have them feeling similarly makes a difference. From there, we take stock of their impact, experience, and leadership so they can reflect on what they've achieved (and why it matters), track success stories so speak about their work with clarity, confidence, and alignment. From their, how can they stay visible, valuable, and empowered to ask for something more in their current roles or strategize how to look for it elsewhere through avenues like networking. Without this process, clients are often so disconnected to the incredible impact they've had in their careers at this point, from entry level to very senior, the pause and reflection makes a huge difference and allows one to regroup and determine what advancement looks like for them and how to strategically make it happen. Clients who do this go from overwhelmed with too many options to finding clarity and confidence about what they really want, makes the ask for advancement so much easier, and land in roles they feel aligned with and happier about.

It is a feeling that can begin to creep up over time and eventually one may experience career stagnation. To break free of these doldrums within a career, there has to be a strategy created to uncover new opportunities for advancement. One strategy that I have seen work is to find a more senior colleague that can serve as a mentor/sounding board for career challenges and opportunities. There are typically formal programs within a workplace where employees can obtain mentorship and if it doesn't exist, then find an organization outside of work that can provide a mentor. It is important to consider who can best serve as your mentor, some qualities to consider is their current work experience, skills, and/or companies they have worked for during their career. I have sought out mentorship outside my work environment when I was considering the next steps in my career, and I have also served as a mentor in my work environments. Through one experience, over the course of 9 months, I had the opportunity to coach and support the development of a junior professional in a mentoring program where I facilitated 32 one-on-one development sessions. We discussed both challenges and opportunities to address her desire to progress to the next stage of her career. After completion of the program, my protege continued focusing on her strategy to address her career needs and she went through the process to secure a new role for herself. In my case, I was able to learn from a senior professional and ended the mentorship program with a plan as to how I would seek out new opportunities to advance my career. Another approach to uncover new opportunities and add new skills for advancement is to volunteer. I took this approach, before business school, to gain experiences and transferrable skills as a consultant, project manager, and mentor for various pro bono consulting projects. Finally, assess on a periodic basis how you feel about your work environment. Questions to consider are: 1) Are you utilizing your skills to have the impact you desire? 2) Are you doing work in an environment where you can thrive? 3) Are you compensated for the level of work you produce? To avoid reaching a career plateau, conduct an assessment on a periodic basis (e.g., every 3 or 6 months) to determine career satisfaction. Conducting these periodic assessments will thwart the possibility of a career plateau because there will be a strategic approach to deflect career stagnation.

A few years into running Petners (a nonprofit feeding stray animals of Ukraine), I hit a plateau - not just in growth, but in my own role as a founder and an operator. We were doing the same things week after week: writing posts, sending newsletters, pitching donors and partners. None of it was broken, but none of it was leading anywhere new either. The shift came from tiny, messy experiments. One of those experiments involved using AI to speed up content creation. That became the spark for building Kweet - an AI-powered tool that helps nonprofit create donor-centric content. Suddenly, I wasn't just leading a stuck nonprofit - I was launching a tool that could help other nonprofits grow. New conversations started, new doors opened, and I had a new way to grow - not just my org, but my career. I believe that's the most underrated part of experimentation: it doesn't just improve what you're doing - it can completely reshape who you are in your work. When you start treating stuck moments like playground for tests, your role evolves with the process. Experimentation today is unusually accessible, too. We don't need a growth team or user testing lab - you can get Lovable, n8n and build something within hours, not months.

I reached my career plateau when I became the Head of Technology and Innovation at Etihad Airways. Now you might ask, how did I come to that conclusion? The answer is simple - I tried for various positions at the next level, but I kept getting rejections. The matter is simple. As you climb the ladder, the number of positions get smaller. The ratio of the number of professionals applying for senior positions compared to the number of available positions is lower. This is frustrating for any professional and it was the same for me. So how did I address this? There are two ways you can manage this. First you can sulk about it (which I did for a few weeks) and Second, I decided that if I had to stand out, I had to be one better than the peers around me. That's when I learnt about personal branding. So I started going through Youtube to understand what others were doing to enhance their personal brand. It was clear - I had to show myself as an expert in my field. So I decided to use the most common medium to get my message out there - a website. I created a website under my name, noeldcosta.com, and I started to post articles around my area of expertise. But I wasn't getting any traffic. So I learnt that my website needed Search Engine Optimization (SEO). It took me around a couple of weeks (and a few weeks of trial and error), before which I started getting traffic to my website. With all the new traffic coming to my website and the articles that I carefully wrote, i started to receive queries and questions about my expertise. That started to open the floodgates of queries from recruiters and senior executives. New opportunities started to come my way and my confidence started to grow in leaps and bounds. I finally zeroed down on the opportunity that I wanted and went ahead in my career. So finally what I learnt from this experience was as follows: 1. Rather than sulk about the situation, do something constructive with your time and learn new skills 2. Learning new skills at an older age can be difficult, but with a progressive mindset, there is nothing you can't do. 3. Be prepared to jump outside of your comfort zone. You will be surprised where life takes you. These three learning might be simple, but it takes a lot of effort, patience and dedication. You will achieve success if you have the right mindset.

Follow your avoidance. Most times, you hit a plateau after you become too good- the irony. When I hit my plateau, it was because the system was stable. The deploys were smooth and the team didn't need hand-holding. Nothing felt new, no tension, no stretch. I spent 90% of my time doing things I was great at. It felt like more of maintenance instead of growth. I decided to do something I avoided and dreaded: customer complaints. It is convenient to let the customer care department handle customer complaints. This was my starting point. The user frustrations from the support logs. I started reading comments, replaying sessions and sitting in on support calls. Hearing the pain behind the metrics we present proved how much my work shaped people's experience. It pulled me into product decisions, pricing and messaging and gave me the umph I needed. When you feel stuck, follow your avoidance. Try out something you aren't good at. A space where you don't feel smart. That way, you learn and grow.

Addressing a skills/knowledge gap can be an effective way of uncovering new opportunities for advancement. It is good to have a niche, and extensive expertise in a particular domain - but often, needs of the organization you work at, or the industry you belong to, might change over time. Acquiring new skills might become pivotal for success, and a lack of these skills might actually hinder your career progression. Once you find yourself in the career plateau, ask yourself these questions: 1. Who amongst your peers are experiencing the kind of career progression which would make you happy. 2. What skills do they have which have enabled that? 3. What skills are the most valued in your domain/industry at that point in time? Once you have identified the gaps, formulate a plan to gain these new skills. Identify courses you can take, or networks you can leverage to get you foothold in the new, unfamiliar territory. I personally used this method when I hit the 5 year mark into my career as a software engineer. Even though I had experienced early success, I was still worried about reaching stagnation. I realized that I need to be more product/domain/business minded instead of just focussing on my tech skills. Hence, I pursed an MBA - which opened up a whole host of opportunities for me.

In my experience, when I hit a career plateau, I realized that I was often obsessing over the "what" —what was next, what my next title would be, where I would land in the company, etc. Instead, what I needed to ground in was clarity around the "why" I do the work I do in the first place. This reframe allowed me to reflect on moments in my career where I felt most energized and in alignment-- there are clear patterns and themes in these moments. In this reflection, it became clear to me that I am driven by evolving cultures into those where more people feel seen, where equity is baked into systems, and where leadership reflects lived values -- not just business outcomes. I was able to use this clarity to evaluate opportunities differently, advocate for purpose-aligned projects (even within my current role), and move toward designing roles that didn't previously exist. By regrounding my next move in my why, I was able to make intentional, values-aligned choices that reignited my momentum.

When facing a career plateau I took a Birkman assessment (https://birkman.com/) and found it very valuable. This assessment has high internal validity, meaning that at different points in your life there's a high likelihood that you'll get the same results. This is important as it is a tool that you can refer back to later in on your professional journey. It looks both at the types of careers that will work for you, but it also looks at the characteristics of different job environments that will help you excel. As part of the process, you work with a coach to analyze the results, and to use them to help with essential tasks like updating resumes and LinkedIn profiles to highlight core findings from the assessment that would make you attractive as a candidate. I was able to use this assessment to improve how I spoke about myself as a team member and what I can contribute to a team. I was able to quickly move to a role that allowed me to grow, build skills, and set me up for what came next.

One of the tried and true methods for uncovering new opportunities in your career is to consider going back to school in some capacity. It doesn't always have to be full-time, but going back to school allows you to expand your knowledge, make yourself even more marketable, and, in some programs, you'll get certain industry certifications that are becoming more essential in a crowded sea of professionals. Not to mention going back to school while in your career affords you with a new networking pool to draw from, helping you make new connections that can help you in your career in ways you can't yet begin to predict.

I learned a strategy from a colleague of mine who used it to change his career successfully. I went to my manager at the time and told him my goals and what kind of work I wanted to do. A couple of months later he said there was an opening in another department. I already knew the other manager, so I moved internally to that department without any internal job ever being posted. That's how I pivoted from working in the TV studio to working on entertainment marketing campaigns. It's really important to be proactive in your career and tell people what you want. This strategy works because it helps change other people's perspective of you beyond your current role.

One powerful strategy I use to help clients move beyond a career plateau is reconnecting them with the kind of leader they genuinely want to become. It starts by asking what growth would feel meaningful in this season of their life, and what kind of leadership would spark joy and stretch their sense of self. I worked with Jude, a Deputy Director who wanted to step into a Director role but was stuck in the comfort zone of being a dependable manager. They had spent years focused on being needed and useful, often comparing themselves to a charismatic founder and overlooking their own potential. Through coaching, we used visualisation and reflective exercises to reveal their superpowers: compassion, care, and a stream of quietly radical and brilliant ideas. We developed a new leadership language that felt natural and powerful. The good news is, they got the Director role and are now leading the organisation into a growth phase, achieving more than they thought was possible. Attribution: Ceri Hand, Creative Coach and Founder of cerihand.com, helping artists and creative leaders grow their network, income and influence by stepping into their own version of leadership.

As a long-time remote worker, hitting a career plateau taught me that plateaus aren't failures, but they're invitations to realign your thoughts and actions to a higher purpose. One strategy that helped me move forward was the diabolical shift from being an consumer to a creator. Instead of solely applying for roles, I thought I will use my remote work experience and share knowledge to help fellow remote job seekers (all for FREE), which eventually led to founding Remote Jobs Central, a mission-driven startup focused on democratizing remote jobs for qualified talent all over the world. Creating value for others became the most powerful form of career (and personal) advancement—for me, and now for the growing remote work community I serve through Remote Jobs Central. Though this, I not only expanded my own capabilities and learned a lot but also created educational resources to help other remote job seekers navigate the remote job market confidently by spotting scams, pointing them to super cool jobs from amazing companies (that they most probably never heard of unless through our free remote jobs newsletter)—which empowers many remote job seekers globally in guiding & building resilient, future-ready remote careers.

When I reached a career plateau, I did something incredibly un-CEO-esque: I went out to be a beginner again—intentionally. Business was humming at SpiritHoods, but the creative engine was stalling. Instead of doubling down on what I knew, I took the leap into a design sprint workshop with people who didn't give one whit about my resume. It hurt, it was humble, and it was exactly what I needed. It was a single decision that sparked ideas that led to a new product line and influencer campaign that breathed new life (and dollars) into the brand. Here's the reality: plateaus are simply your brain saying, "I'm bored." Shake it up. Learn something new. Get involved. Ask odd questions. The moment you're no longer the genius in the room, you start rising again.

Several years ago, I wanted to expand professionally, yet I was not quite sure how. I was ready for the next step in my career within human resources, feeling a bit bored and knowing that I could contribute much more than I had an opportunity to. The local HR association announced a few open seats for new board members. One of the roles was perfectly aligned with the career mentoring that I was already doing to support emerging professionals. I applied for the role, and a few months later, I started my first board member position. I did not know what to expect in serving as a board member. I quickly realized I had ample opportunity to learn, ideate, and contribute meaningfully to the community and profession. Volunteering as a board member became a transformative experience for my career development and advancement. Serving on a board offers hands-on opportunities to build new, marketable skills. I was able to develop experience in strategic decision-making, organizational leadership, fundraising, and event management. I also had the opportunity to build new programs and launched a mentorship program for emerging professionals in human resources, something I was unable to do in my primary professional role. Joining the conference committee to help plan and execute the annual conference enabled me to learn the intricacies of event coordination, sourcing sponsors and speakers, and marketing - skills that were not part of my regular day-to-day responsibilities. These experiences provided skill-building and valuable exposure to new perspectives and challenges, helping to break the monotony that I was experiencing during my career plateau. Collaborating with board members and members from diverse backgrounds and industries significantly broadened my professional network. The credibility and visibility gained from leading high-impact initiatives enhanced my professional reputation and opened doors to new opportunities. Ultimately, volunteering as a board member has enabled me to grow in ways that would have been difficult within the confines of my regular role, positioning me as a well-rounded leader and helping me define a renewed and more fulfilling career path. When coaching and mentoring others who are feeling stuck in their careers, I encourage them to seek out new ways to grow and advance. Serving on a board is one way to expand professionally while also being of service and giving back to the community.

When I started my data analytics agency, I saw fast growth of revenue for the first 2 years. However, afterwards the revenue plateaued and even decreased slightly for the next 2 years. For a while I felt like I need to work harder and invest more time into sales but every time I burned out after a couple of months so I was getting nowhere. I then asked myself an honest question "what did I do last year to make my life easier this year?". I realised that I had no answers to this question. I was spending too much time on outbound sales where the effort from my labour didn't accumulate over time. Every day I had to contact more customers and if I stopped, I was again at point 0. I then switched my attention to business development method where results accumulated over time. I started investing more time and money into our SEO. SEO efforts snowball over time and I was turning my website into a strategic asset within my organization. As a result I can now see our website visitors increasing every month and we are now getting 10-20 leads per week. As a result, we are already growing 10% year over year in 2025. I also invested into developing our proprietary software. We started selling this software on annual subscriptions of $1000-1400 per year. As a result, we now have 150k+ of annual recurring revenue which is going to be a driving force for our growth next year so we are forecasting a year over year growth of 20% in 2026.

One effective strategy I've seen for moving beyond a career plateau is to follow your curiosity and use it to create new value. When you pay attention to what energizes you, even if it's outside your current role, you often uncover paths for advancement you didn't know existed. A senior leader I worked with felt stuck but wasn't ready to leave her company. She had a personal interest in generative AI, so she took it upon herself to learn more about ChatGPT. She shared what she was learning with her team, which sparked broader interest and caught the attention of the CEO. Soon after, she was tapped to lead the company's AI strategy across the organization. This is a great example of how investing in yourself and leaning into emerging interests can create visibility, build credibility and open doors to roles you may not have imagined.

I see people treat their careers like a fixed, long-term plan, and that’s precisely why they get stuck. The most effective strategy to break a plateau is to stop planning and start experimenting. Treat your career like an agile project, running small, low-risk 'sprints' to discover your next move. The goal isn't a promotion. The goal is to gather data. A plateau isn't a dead end. It's a data deficit. You lack new information about what you enjoy, what the market needs, and where your skills can create unexpected value. I’ve seen leaders break through by taking on a small project completely outside their job description. It wasn't about learning one new skill. It was about exposing their capabilities to a new network of people, which is what ultimately unlocked their next major opportunity.

The most effective strategy, or rather mindset, I am using to grow professionally is to proactively push myself out of my comfort zone and try to make sense of, organise, and communicate my actions in this new and unfamiliar situation. For example, before I used to work as a Customer Success Manager for a fleet management software, I felt as if I was hitting a plateau in terms of how much I was learning and how much I could progress professionally. As a result, I asked myself how I could help my company improve and analysed all my customers' and my company's pain points. After a couple of weeks, I had a long list and began to prioritise and identify what was feasible (i.e., low-hanging fruit) to solve, and I set up a meeting with my boss. In this meeting, I communicated clearly about what I have done. I was transparent that I want to proactively help the company to improve the experiences for our customers and at the end we agrees that I can be the lead in building out a "Video Academy" so that I do not need to give the same basic training to newly onboarded customers and have a much more in-depth conversation with them beginning in the first meeting. Through this, I learned to lead a cross-functional team, such as the marketing team filming and uploading the videos or fact-checking the course content with fleet management consultants. When we delivered the "Video Academy", we communicated it to the entire company and cut down our training sessions with new customers by 2 hours. Because of this success, I was able to improve further aspects of our company. Then I was offered a new role as a Chief of Staff in my company, which I, however, turned down, as I received a more interesting offer as an IT Consultant using the references of the diverse improvements I have made. Taking action in my situation and thinking about how to help those who can enable me was the learning I drew out of it. Pushing myself out of my comfort zone, clearly communicating it and showing up daily makes a massive difference in the long run.

A couple of years into running Muller Expo, I hit a wall. We had cool, simple clients and operations running smoothly but, everything felt stuck. Projects were starting to blur together. There was no true creative flare. I realized that I was too far into management mode and not close enough to the things that actually excite people. So, I started joining the design team late at night and mocked up booth concepts, sketches of really stupid ideas that made no logistical sense, just to play. One of those "dumb" ideas? A foldable, plug and play demo wall for product testing on the expo floor, which was a random idea and turned into a direct selling point for a tech client who stated, "This is exactly the kind of thinking we want." In that moment, I was reminded that once you do some things at your job for a certain number of years, you reach a plateau and it can't always be changed with a promotion or new job, sometimes it is just reconnecting with part of your work that made you obsessive in the beginning. That moment of creativity eventually became a new service line for Muller Expo.