When I started my career at PwC, one of the core messages I took away from the orientation month was that “your career is in your hands.” I also understood that consultancies are highly competitive environments where you can do incredible work with intelligent people and, more importantly, where grit, energy and creativity are well rewarded.

By the time I joined EY in the UK, I already had three years of experience. At EY, I had come to understand that if someone could make a strong case, the number of years of experience did not necessarily determine whether they would be promoted. So I decided I would make a case for promotion to manager, with a little over 4 years of experience.

I worked hard and did not fall short on that front. But this was a competitive environment, and others did not fall short either.

Another part of recognising that your career is in your hands is ensuring that the right people are aware of your work — a form of promotion, you might say. And this is where it became interesting. I had to do most of the promotion myself, mostly alone. Others going through the same promotion process not only promoted themselves, but also had people advocating, convincingly, for them, including securing sponsorship.

You can probably guess how the story ends. I did not get the promotion; others did.

It would be simplistic to reduce the outcome to a single factor — namely, the absence of sponsorship — but it was certainly one of the contributors.

In the world of work, you have likely heard countless times that your work cannot speak for itself and that you must promote your skills and contributions. Those who say your work alone cannot speak for itself are right. But there is nuance in how you promote yourself. The simplistic advice to shout the loudest about your work does not suffice.

That nuance is the subject of the research explored in today’s newsletter.

The Self-Promotion Dilemma

In 2006, Professor Jeffrey Pfeffer and colleagues published a paper that sought to resolve the tension described above. If you promote yourself, your competence becomes visible and recognised — but you also risk appearing arrogant or self-serving.

This creates what they called the self-promotion dilemma: how do you signal competence without damaging likeability? Likeability matters because few people want to work with someone they perceive as arrogant.

So it goes like this: competence earns respect. Likeability earns cooperation. But self-praise can undermine likeability.

The key to maximising the benefits of self-promotion, the authors found, is to let others do it for you — for example, when your manager says you are the best thing since sliced bread.

The author’s hypothesis was simple: people are viewed more favourably when someone else communicates their accomplishments than when they do it themselves.

In other words:

  • Self-praise = competent, but less liked
  • Third-party praise = competent and more liked

I hope it is obvious that competence without likeability is like having fuel but no engine — the energy is there, but it cannot move anything. In other words, if you are not liked, people are less inclined to work with you, offer help, or provide opportunities.

The Experiment

Across multiple experiments, participants evaluated individuals who had achieved something impressive. The achievement was identical in every condition. The only difference was this: in one case, the individual described their own accomplishments; in another, someone else described them.

The results were consistent.

When individuals promoted themselves, they were seen as competent. But they were liked less. They were perceived as more self-interested, more strategic and less warm.

When someone else “sang their praises”, perceptions of competence remained high — but likeability increased. More importantly, observers expressed greater willingness to help them.

That last outcome matters more than it first appears.

Promotions are not decided purely on performance metrics. They are influenced by discretionary effort. Who is willing to speak up for you? Who volunteers additional context in calibration meetings? Who offers a defence when questions arise? Who feels positively inclined to go beyond the minimum?

The research suggests something subtle but powerful: third-party endorsement preserves both competence and warmth. Self-promotion boosts one and taxes the other.

This is not an argument against advocating for yourself, you obviously still needs to do that including even strategically asking others to mention you and your work in the right room. Also, in formal evaluation settings — interviews, performance reviews, promotion cases — you must articulate your contributions. Here, silence is invisibility and not a virtue.

But the research reframes the real lever. The goal is not louder self-promotion. The goal is credible, socially transmitted recognition.

There is a social norm against overt self-praise. When we violate it, observers subconsciously discount us. They attribute our communication to self-interest. But when praise comes from others, it feels more diagnostic and less strategic. It carries reputational weight.

And this is why sponsorship changes careers.

Career Sponsorship

The definition of a sponsor is someone who risks their own reputation to advocate for you. That signal is fundamentally different from your own description of your strengths. It changes how others interpret your competence.

There is also a deeper implication here for how we think about career ownership.

“Your career is in your hands” is true — but incomplete. Your career is socially constructed. It is shaped not only by what you do, but by who validates what you do.

The practical lesson is uncomfortable because it requires vulnerability. It requires asking for advocacy. It requires building relationships strong enough that others are willing to attach their name to yours. It requires generosity — because endorsement flows more easily towards those who have built social credit.

If self-promotion is a monologue, sponsorship is a chorus.

The research does not suggest abandoning self-advocacy. It suggests upgrading it. Instead of asking, “How do I communicate my value?”, the better question becomes: “Who is willing to communicate my value when I am not in the room?”

That shift moves us from branding to reputation. And reputation, unlike self-promotion, compounds.