Apart from dressing outrageously and drinking your boss under the table, there are other, more subtle, ways of getting noticed at work. In every office, there are the recognisable faces and the ones who blend into the background. There are certain characteristics that separate some employees from their more anonymous colleagues, who may be working extra hours, but are still failing to get noticed. If you feel you’re being overlooked for promotions and opportunities within your company, it’s worth putting a little thought into how you can ensure your hard work gets the attention you deserve.

It’s a common perception, particularly within the accountancy profession, that potential leaders are identified within the early stages of their career and these high-flyers will be selected for fast-track schemes for management. While such fast-track schemes exist in some firms, they may not be as exclusive as you think.

‘It’s not the case of getting a tap on the shoulder,’ says Tim Richardson, director of leadership and talent at PricewaterhouseCoopers. ‘At our firm, employees who have been qualified for three to four years can nominate themselves for the fast track schemes’.

It is then for the senior team members to decide whether the applicant has what it takes to succeed in such a scheme, which at PwC involves a two-year programme consisting of leadership development, internally and externally based projects, seminars, and coaching and mentoring from senior colleagues. So, theoretically, everyone has the chance to go for the top positions, but whether you are management material or not is for your line manager and senior management to decide.

‘Motivation is the crucial quality we look for in such a candidate,’ says Richardson. ‘It’s all about potential, not performance. We look for optimistic, positive people, who are courageous rather than arrogant. We look for someone who is curious to know more about themselves, someone who asks for feedback and is willing to take on constructive criticism.’

Opportunities for all

Deloitte, on the other hand, takes a rather different approach to PwC. Stevan Rolls, head of human resources at Deloitte, explains: ‘We don’t like to select an elite group of people early on and only give those employees opportunities to fast-track up the ladder. We focus on rapid development for everybody.

‘It’s tough to get recruited into Deloitte, so all our staff are already very talented. We take elements like personal goals and what’s going on outside their working life at home into account. It’s very much about an individual’s personal progression and through regular appraisals we can help them achieve what they want to achieve. Our employees get the chance to progress when the time is right for them.’

So if you think you’ve missed out on opportunities to move rapidly up the career ladder, you may be mistaken. The overriding philosophy at the firms seems to be that management opportunities are open to everyone. You simply need to demonstrate your prospects, because knuckling down and hoping someone will notice your untapped potential simply isn’t enough.

On the fast-track at PricewaterhouseCoopers

PwC offers a range of programmes to support accelerated development for people demonstrating high potential.

In the UK, managers nominated from across the business for the Emerging Leaders Programme, join a two-year accelerated development programme, focused on leadership skills development through mentoring, external seminars, group workshops and external project work.

At a global level, the firm's Genesis Park programme is an intense, 16-week programme in Washington DC or Berlin, providing global high performers with a professional development programme combining elements of thought leadership, team-building, change management and knowledge sharing.

Click here for our step-by-step guide to getting noticed