8 mistakes I made in my first years at Deloitte

1. I thought doing more would get me promoted

I took on side projects. Then more side projects. Extracurriculars for the firm, endless internal initiatives, anything going. My logic was simple: the more I do, the more likely I get promoted.

That logic is wrong, and I want to be blunt about it because it cost me years of evenings. Firm-wide extracurriculars generally feed your bonus, up to a cap. What actually moved my promotion in the junior grades was client work — the time I spent on it and how far I'd progressed on specific skills: owning my own deliverables, my financial skills, my communication.

So I put blood, sweat and tears into things that had no bearing on the outcome I was chasing, and worked until 11pm doing them. Pick one or two extracurriculars — ideally ones that get you onto projects you actually want — and let the rest go.

2. I went for promotion too early, and didn't get it

At Deloitte you typically go analyst to consultant in two years, and consultant to senior consultant in two to three. I tried to do the second jump in one.

I'd worked myself into the ground to prove I was ready. I was doing a senior consultant's role while still a consultant. But I'd just moved from Tech Strategy into Customer Strategy & Applied Design, and that operating unit didn't know me or my work. I had no trusted brand with the people who'd be deciding.

I didn't get it. And here's the thing — I'm glad. If I'd got it, I'd have gone from being one of the best consultants to one of the worst senior consultants, with less experience and less knowledge than everyone around me. Straight to the bottom of the pile. I'd also probably have coasted, and I don't think I'd have gone on to be named one of the Top 100 Women in Tech.

The mistake wasn't ambition. It was thinking that doing the job was the same as convincing the people who decide — and thinking that the promotion was the point. It isn't. What you learn is worth more.

3. I put all my eggs in one basket

There was a director I really clicked with. I joined his projects, I was on his A team, I followed him around for most of my time at Deloitte.

Then he got a better job in Dubai and left the firm.

Three years of investment in one relationship, gone overnight. No senior people to pull me onto interesting projects. Back to zero, starting again. Rotate the senior leaders you work with and build several relationships at once — otherwise your entire project pipeline can walk out of the door inside a fortnight. I've since written a whole playbook on this: The Sponsor Gap.

4. I hid who I actually was

When I joined, I had a rule: nobody at work would know anything about my personal life. Professional life here, real life there. (I have, obviously, comprehensively broken that rule since starting a YouTube channel.)

It detached me from building genuine relationships. I'm fairly sure people thought I was aloof, when the truth was that I was scared and not especially comfortable with who I was.

A partner said something to me that stuck: your professional brand is just an extension of your personal brand. If you can't be yourself at a firm, that's information about the firm — not a personality flaw you need to hide harder.

5. I said yes to everything

At one point I had my client project and six extracurriculars running alongside it. My work quality was dreadful. I'd spread myself so thin there was nothing left.

What made it worse is what I did next: I went quiet. I finished the three I liked, and on the other three I simply let things fizzle out. Late replies, then no replies. It was, I think, an ego thing — I didn't want to admit I was giving up.

Integrity is your personal credit and I was spending it carelessly. Now I follow through on what I commit to, and when I can't, I say no politely and early. I'm considerably less stressed.

6. I networked upwards, and forgot everyone beside me

In my first year I was busy trying to impress senior people. I put almost no effort into the people who joined at the same time as me, and I'm genuinely a bit embarrassed about it.

Those peers turned out to be the ones who helped me most — getting me onto projects in areas I wanted to try, answering the questions I was too proud to ask upwards, telling me how things actually worked. Partners are trying to close deals; they don't have time to hold your hand. Network sideways.

7. I didn't have an opinion

I was building a presentation for the Head of Retail across Europe, and he turned to me — an analyst with under a year of experience — and asked what I thought.

A man with forty years of experience wanted my view, and I was so shocked that I waffled. I said nothing of substance.

Never walk into a discussion without an informed view. If you don't have one, go and read until you do. A consultant's job is to have a viewpoint and the reasons behind it.

8. I ignored the sustainability of it all

This is the one I only really understood four years in. The overtime accumulates. It doesn't feel like anything until it suddenly feels like everything — and then you're on a high-visibility project giving it half of what you're capable of, and you've never felt so burnt out in your life.

Ask yourself honestly whether working until 11pm every night is worth it. Build your career around your life, not your life around your career. If that's landed a bit close to home, read The Burnt-Out Hustler.

What I'd tell myself on day one

Do the client work. Build several relationships, not one. Have an opinion. Say no. Be a person. And stop treating the next promotion as though it's the entire point — the learning is what compounds.

Nobody was there to guide me through this, so I try not to be too hard on myself about it. But if this saves you even one of these, it was worth writing.

If you're not sure which of these is actually your problem right now, take The Promotion Blocker Diagnostic — it takes two minutes and tells you the one thing standing between you and your next level.