Habits of highly successful employees
Tuesday, March 16, 2021
Successful employees treat everyone with respect, regardless of personal feelings. / Net photo.

The following article was suggested by one of our readers—if there's an idea you would like us to cover, please submit it here.


Receiving that confirmation that you were among the best candidates for the job and called to start working right away is fascinating, but the tricky part about it is figuring out how the company operates, catching up with the pace, growing successfully, personally and mostly impressing your boss.

An employee’s success at a job can’t be determined by his or her resume and experience. However, regardless of how long you have been in your field, the overarching principles are the same.

Some of the habits of highly successful employees include;

Be devoted

According to Fraterne Manishimwe, an entrepreneur in Musanze, it’s the little things that matter and are noticeable by bosses and colleagues for instance, keeping time. If your company opens at 7:30 am, you should be at work by 7:00 am because there is no excuse for being late as it’s a sign of being unserious.

But also, he adds that meeting your deadlines is as crucial as time keeping as no one yearns to work with a lazy person who keeps missing deadlines. 

"Deadlines help workers to collaborate toward achieving a shared goal, and to keep complex, multistage projects on track. So therefore, in order for your teammates to rely on you in all situations, the two aspects are important,” he says. 

Foster a problem-solving mindset

He adds that successful employees are eager to solve problems, instead of considering something as a problem, they view it as a challenge to be tackled. 

Problem-solving is the process of identifying a problem, developing possible solution paths, and taking the appropriate course of action. This is a skill set for any professional for example, entrepreneurs, managers, or someone in the leadership team in an organisation, he says. 

Manishimwe carries on that employees need to embrace the problem, focus on the solution, come up with all possible solutions, analyze the root cause, and see their problems as opportunities to grow. Having a problem-solving mindset sees a problem as a motivation to find solutions, thereby focusing on growth and achieving positive results.  

Creative and Innovative

He further says, creativity allows employees to outspread their minds, do new and exciting things, and engage themselves in a way that takes them one step closer to reaching their full potential.

Career experts say that creative people have a great deal of energy, both physical and mental. They can spend hours working on a single thing that holds their attention, yet seem to remain enthusiastic all the while.

Manishimwe stresses that without innovation, there isn’t anything new, and without anything new, there will be no progression. If an organisation isn’t making any progress, then it can’t stay relevant in the competitive market.

He adds that innovation solves impossible problems, increases workplace productivity, displays unique qualities and beats tough competitors.

They are respectful

According to the Achievers, an employee recognition and engagement platform, between co-workers, supervisors, customers and clients, there are many different personalities in a professional organization, so it’s unlikely that you will like everyone you encounter. Despite this, the most successful employees treat everyone with respect, regardless of personal feelings. They treat their peers and employees they manage with the same level of respect, which makes everyone feel valued and appreciated.

"This mutual respect in the workplace creates a positive work environment. When people work with one another with peace and harmony, they don’t have the time to focus on other shallow and petty ideas.”

They understand the importance of clear communication

TopResume, a resume writing service, explains that highly successful employees realise the importance of clear communication in email, voicemail, person-to-person, and so on. They also understand that people have different communications styles. If you can understand someone else’s communication style, then you can lead by example and better communicate with them on their terms to collaborate for optimal success.