Project: You

Most career experts put a premium on learning. That's what drove Karen Shorr, a senior project coordinator for Universal Creative, to work on Totally Nickelodeon, a new show at Universal Studios Hollywood that debuted this past Easter. "I wanted to be on that project because I'd never done a show before," says Shorr, 33, who previously had worked on restaurants and rides. "I wanted to learn what it was like to bring a show to the park. That's how I pick projects. I ask, Is there something I will learn from it?"

Of course, if you're always learning, you're seldom leading -- that is, demonstrating the expertise you already have. Isn't someone like Shorr better off sticking with restaurants and rides so she can deliver on what she's already learned? "It's a balancing act," says Harvard's Kotter. "If a project has unbelievable visibility, you'd better make sure that you're contributing, not just learning. But if the stakes aren't that high, then join it for the learning opportunity. Your odds of getting into trouble are lower."

Some people won't make that tradeoff. HP's Cyr has a simple rule about choosing low-stakes projects -- he doesn't. For example, one of his current projects involves designing measurement systems to track HP's safety performance. The project isn't glamorous, but it has a high profile. Cyr decided to work on safety after a senior HP executive gave a speech about its importance to the company.

"I choose projects I get excited about," Cyr says. "It's an emotional response. And part of what excites me is knowing that a project matters. When top management recognizes what you're working on, you get validation and support."

How Do I Hear About Hot Projects?

It's obvious: you can't join great project teams if you don't know about them. But how do you find out about the right projects at the right time -- before they're fully staffed by other people in the company? The answer is no less obvious: listen to and network with the right people. Which doesn't mean only those high on the corporate ladder. In workplaces filled with decentralized projects, company peers and industry colleagues are often better sources of project intelligence than your boss.

Unless, of course, your boss is Bill Gates. Back in 1992, after he left the Visual Basic team, Adam Rauch joined a Microsoft project that focused on consumer electronics. Then Gates gave a speech on the rise of the Internet and Microsoft's commitment to it. That was all that Rauch needed to hear. He started comparing notes with his pals from the old days, learned about the company's growing interest in data-networking, and settled on his next project: leading the team charged with launching NetMeeting, a software package designed to support video-, audio-, and data-conferencing over the Internet. Rauch began work on NetMeeting in December 1994. Recently, Microsoft shipped the second version of the product.

"I've tried to develop a network of people throughout the company -- people I know, associate with, stay friends with," he says. "The nice thing about Visual Basic is that as Microsoft has gotten bigger, the people I've worked with have been dispersed throughout the company. I can ask them, 'What have you heard about? What's new? What's cool?' I saw NetMeeting as that kind of opportunity. It was a brand new thing, a blank slate."

Hewlett-Packard's Lauren Martin takes her approach to personal networking one step further than Rauch does -- beyond the borders of the company. Martin, 35, joined HP in 1984 as an accounting clerk. Today she runs a career self-reliance program for the company. How does Martin learn about the projects she wants to work on?

"Once or twice a month, I have lunch with an industry peer," she says. "I make it a point to strike up relationships with people who do the kind of business I do or am interested in. In the past, people focused on their direct relationship with their manager. In a project environment, people need strong, healthy relationships with their peers." That's just as true of peers inside the company as of those outside, Martin emphasizes: "I always assume that the people working with me on a project may someday manage me. Or that I may manage them. So I treat people with that in mind. I always cultivate a social relationship -- `Let's have lunch and talk.'"

Of course, even the most aggressive networking can only help you find out about projects that other people have created. Sometimes the best projects are those you create yourself. "Most of us like to believe that the boss and our colleagues are thinking of us," says William Morin, chairman of WJM Associates, a New York-based executive development firm, and author of Silent Sabotage (Amacom,1995). "But that's usually quite far from the truth. You need to figure out where the company is going and what it's going to need. The world recognizes people who come up with answers on their own and puts those answers into practice."