Is now the right time for you to start planning your career? Putting in the groundwork now means that by September, you could be starting a new role or have made the changes you want to your current one.
So if you have some vague career goals written down somewhere, now is the time to dust them off and put a plan into place. If you haven’t got career goals, then that’s step one! You can’t plan your journey until you know your destination; my career planning exercises can help you with this.
Once you have your career goals, why develop them into a plan? Well, we can fail to achieve our goals, career-related or otherwise, because they seem so daunting that we don’t know where to start. By breaking goals down into 4-6 specific milestones or smaller goals, we can see a clear path to reaching our ultimate ambition.
What should your career development plan cover?
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Well-defined career goals
Your career goals should be tailored to your strengths, desires, skills, values and lifestyle. We can set a career goal such as “make partner” because it's what we feel we should be aiming for. Test out your goals - imagine what it would look and feel like to achieve them - does it feel exciting? Even slightly daunting? Then that’s the career goal for you!
Separating the goal into milestones and objectives will be so much easier if you define it well. Using the SMART acronym will help you.
Sub-goals or career objectives
Break down the overall career goal into objectives – your strategy for achieving the goal. Visualise yourself in the future, having succeeded in your career, then imagine you are telling a friend how you reached your ambition. “Walk backwards”, thinking about all the little milestones you achieved to get where you are today. These are your career objectives. They can involve acquiring tangible things (skills, qualifications and networks) or intangible things (behaviours and experiences), but they should be outcome-based - i.e. they are a result of you taking some actions.
Career actions and plans
Take a look at your career objectives and then break these down into further steps. For example, having the right skills for a role may involve finding the skills required and then completing a training course. These steps become your action plan and to-do list. They should be tangible inputs - i.e. things you either have or haven’t done. Think about training, actions, and habits. They can be small things you do consistently and regularly or big, brave, one-off actions. Write in your plan the date by when you will do each step.
Measures of success
The next element is about knowing when you have got there. These measures of success will be at the objective level rather than the action level. They may be tangible measures – such as receiving a job offer within six weeks, or intangible measures, such as feeling more confident performing a particular task. If they are intangible, ask how you will know when you've reached it.
Monitoring the plan
One reason why people have a negative view of career development plans is that they spend weeks perfecting them, and then they sit on the laptop gathering virtual dust. Have a space on your career plan where you can note your progress and commit to checking this regularly (monthly is fine). Against each career objective, document the successes you have had, what you have learnt and any further actions you need to take (which can then be moved into your “career actions and plans”)
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That’s it. It's a little bit of effort to start with, but once you have ensured you’ve got the right career goals for you, everything flows from there. You can download a free career development plan template from my website, and if you need further help, do get in touch. I can help clarify your thinking, provide insightful challenge to your plans and give you the accountability you need to launch yourself into action.