If you’ve been at the same company and position without any advancement orpromotion for the past three years—and you want to continue moving your careerforward—it’s time to look elsewhere. Even in a large organization where promotionsare tough to come by, you should be able to make some sort of upward movementwithin this time frame.

If your direct manager doesn’t provide feedback on your performance—or thefeedback is generic and thus difficult to take action on—it’s pretty tough to learn whatit takes to move up within your organization or grow as a professional. The bestmanagers are engaged with your career development and regularly offer advice andguidance—and if yours doesn’t, you owe it to yourself to look elsewhere.

If your learning curve has flattened out or you’re really not feeling challenged, thismay signal a need to move on. You may not be learning something new every day onthe job, but you should be improving upon your core skills and picking up new ones.You often have to take this into your own hands, of course—asking to be involved in anew project, signing up for courses you’re interested in, or attending a relevantconference or seminar in your discipline, for example. But if these possibilities don’texist at your current job, it’s a sign that the company is not serious about investing inyour career development.

If your company is regularly announcing a re-org or shuffling managementaround, this may indicate leadership issues or a shaky strategic direction. (A friendtold me she has had four different bosses in the past year—this can’t be good.)Re-orgs can provide an opportunity to step up and shine; but more often thannot, they signal turbulence. And more importantly, they create a challengingenvironment for your career development needs to get any attention. Yourpriorities, focus, and progress will inevitably be impacted.

The AMCAT is India’s first employability assessment test that help fresh graduates to get their first job quickly and efficiently.