This is something everyone should take part in. It is the act of planning your future. What makes you happy and what will you enjoy doing for hours a day? Those are the main questions to be asked. Also, what are you best at? Then proceed to take action whether that is schooling or some specialized training to accomplish this goal.
The most important thing about a career development plan is being smart while planning. You want to be realistic about the plan. You need to think carefully about each decision you make when planning your career.
There’s no better way to figure out what will help people the most than to just straight up ask them. Surveys, interviews, emails, whatever tool works best – as long as people are getting helped! I asked a few of my visitors, test takers, and researchers to share their thoughts to help me better understand how people work. I’m sharing it with you in hopes you’d get something out of it, too. I’m also trying to bring their words to you with as little filtering as possible, so please bear with the awesome level of personal-tough this article has.
Now’s the time to focus on your professional development, your career growth, and the overall future of all things job related.
Today’s Focus: A Career Development Plan
‘R’ = Richard N. Stephenson (me!)
‘I’ = Interviewee (anonymous by request unless otherwise noted)
R: What do you think is the most important thing about this topic?
I: If you can create a career development plan you have some sort of guide to go by. Then you have short term goals instead of trying to reach for something big. If you know your efforts will hit these milestones you will be more motivated to move on to the next goal or step on your journey to the next level.
R: How’s this subject relevant to making or changing the lives of those around us?
I: A career development plan can get someone to put their life in a direction. It can get someone a salaried job and help them live a better life. A career development plan can also help someone get a promotion and make more money.
R: How do you think this could be used for personal development or just being a better person overall?
I: It could assist them in knowing what direction to take with their education. allowing them to focus more on obtaining whatever is necessary to reach a certain goal. As well as help them to learn more about their own strengths and weakness.
R: Describe the perfect person to be the poster-child for this topic.
I: Someone who works in the private sector knows about career development plans. This person can help people understand what comprises a career development plan. Also, recruiters may know this and retired persons since they used them in order to further their careers and hire people.
R: Who’s the flat-out worst at this subject?
I: I would say that people who are teenagers are not good at using or understand a career development plan. After all, most teenagers barely know what they are going to do next week or next month, let alone for their career. It’s rare that teenagers know exactly what they are going to do when entering college or when trying to join the workforce. It usually takes people a good ten years or more to find their career path and then to develop it.
R: Think of your daily routine and then tell us how this topic fits into the overall scheme of things?
I: They could first talk to a counselor. High schools and colleges have counselors specifically for developing careers. They should also start looking online and creating accounts on career websites that show qualifications and resumes. They should also think of their skills and previous experience.
R: Pick a time, pick any time: when should folks out there bring this idea into their lives?
I: When they are starting college would be a good time for them to know what career path they want to go down. This way, they can be sure to study everything they need to know for that certain career. This will increase their odds of getting a position after school, and will help them in the future.
R: Seems like there are good times and bad times to bring this one up. When’s a really BAD time, do you think?
I: I think it would be a bad idea to bring up the topic when the individual is in between jobs or under employed. I do not think the idea of a career development plan would be received warmly when the idea of a career is far off. Usually in such situations, the general difficulties of life have a tendency to put all other plans on a secondary priority.
R: Give us an example of a good place to bring this subject into daily life.
I: Many businesses and professional careers have a core skill set that is necessary for successful entry level performance, and a separate skill set that is necessary for performance at the intermediate to advanced practitioner. Very frequently, this is described as going to the next level. The point in a person’s career where he or she has substantially mastered the entry-level skill set is the ideal time to start focusing on a career development plan. For example, an attorney fresh out of law school needs to master the skills needed for his or her chosen field, which might be research or transactional planning. As he or she masters those skills, a career development plan would be appropriate to develop the other skills needed to advance to partnership, such as client development and the supervision of other attorneys. Without a career plan, the attorney may not fully appreciate how his or her focus must change to progress in the profession.
R: Can you explain a place (or places) where you just wouldn’t even consider using this topic in your life?
I: A career development plan might be a bad idea in cases where a career goal is undefined or not necessary. For instance, in a school setting where a student is taking classes and getting a degree, a career development plan would be unhelpful and irrelevant. While it may not be a bad idea to plan ahead, it may be time consuming and confusing for someone to develop a career plan without the relevant context. Also, those who have not decided what they want their career to be would not want to pursue a career plan until they had narrowed down their options a bit. This applies equally to those who are exiting their working years and are retired, as career development is no longer needed.
R: Who’s someone that could gain quite a bit from looking further into this topic?
I: This topic would be very pertinent to recent college graduates. I would start with folks graduating in the previous 4 years. There are many of them that change their mind about their career choice after graduating, and maybe having worked their first job and did not like it. They need guidance on how to make it in large American corporations in particular. Especially on topics such as network building with older workers.
R: What would you tell the readers to do if they wanted to get help with this topic soon?
I: In order for someone to understand better career development plan in their lives, is to advice on their ambition. Job search also important, how you come up in it. Also letting them know what career goals they have
R: What’s something people should avoid if they’re looking into this subject?
I: People should avoid getting discouraged when using a career development plan. They can’t give up just because it can be a little stressful. They should also be honest with themselves.
R: Tell us of an example of when we can use this topic in our lives?
I: First and foremost decide what career they want to get into. Do some online research on the steps needed to get into that career and then decide what they want to take from. Next would be formulating a plan of action and implementing these steps. So basically research, plan, action.
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Did you find at least one or two golden nuggets of useful information in there? I hope so – I know I love reading these and seeing how I can apply this wisdom to my life. Make it your goal today to take at least 1 thing away from this post and try to live your life more focused from now on.
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