The key to selling oneself in a work setting is that same as selling a product in a business setting. Effective sales involves clearly demonstrate the benefits or gain your product provides to the potential customer. If a prospect clearly sees your product offers the best value proposition (bang for the buck), there is no reason they would not buy from you. In the same vein, you can sell yourself as a valuable employee by demonstrating skills and traits sought by employers that separate you from the crowd.

A basic rule of growth-drive organizations is that in order for employees to find opportunities to move up, people must be developed to take over new roles and responsibilities. Thus, supervisors, who also typically want to grow, are looking for people they can trust and rely on to perform. The more responsibility you as an employee can handle, the more able the supervisor is to delegate routine tasks so that they can in turn focus on higher order needs. This is the nature of the organization.

What then, can you as an employee do, to separate yourself from the crowd? The answer varies a bit, with factors including organizational mission and goals, nature of the work, and more. However, there are usually some common traits and skills desired by all organizations, regardless of goals and position. Here are a few behaviors that will make you stand out from the crowd:

Self-motivation – One of the most time consuming aspects of a leader’s job is to motivate employees to perform. Supervisors love employees that have personal discipline and drive and that do not need constant supervision and encouragement.

Initiative – There are employees that never seem to have anything to do and those that never seem to have enough to do. A supervisor’s best friend is an employee who always looks for ways to help rather than meeting the “minimum standards”.

Positive Attitude – Sounds simple, but people like to work with and around people that provide positive morale for the work environment. Positive and hard-working employees inspire those around them to do more.