04/06/2014
Career First
A view on Career Planning by Charlie Crocker CEO & Owner Frontline Resourcing:
Planning is something that I do if I am going on holiday, going out for a night with my friends or even if I am doing the grocery shopping.
In business we do this the whole time: Ask the question how much planning do we honestly do when it comes to life important career decisions? I fear the answer is not much. If I was to jump on a time machine and go back 22 years to when I was supposed to be giving some thought to this somewhat important question the truth is, I gave it very little. The reality is the first career plan I considered was just 8 years ago.
Knowing then what I know now I might have approached things slightly differently. The wonderful thing about hindsight is that you can always ask the question what if?
I don’t want to appear like I am getting too philosophical, however the truth is life and career decisions are closely linked.
Where do I want to live? What sort of life style do I want? Where is my wife working? These are just a few questions that can impact our relationship with career planning and decision making.
If I could make a good comparison for Career planning it would be Strategy Formulation and vision, mission, values. Strong companies and leaders have very clear Vision, Mission and Values and they involve key people in the organization is Strategy formulation. When a Strategy has been agreed and is being implemented it may need to be changed to respond to market and business conditions, external factors none of which any of us have any control over, the key is to ensure that you never loose sight of your Goal, the reason you are in business and the values by which you take decisions on a day to day.
In a career we need to set short medium and long term goals, Career Vision, is something we can measure over time, something that should be aspired to, and something worth working for!!
Career Mission is what do I want to do? What do I not want do? Where do I want to work, where do I not want to work? What are my strengths, weaknesses, likes and dislikes and what are the opportunities and threats in the area I have chosen.
Career Values should be our moral compass for decision making in terms of the sector I want to choose, do I want to go into Medicine, the church, the army or business or choose from a hundreds other types of professions.
When it comes to formulating the Career Strategy, you will almost certainly want to bring others into this, your family, close friends, professors, mentors, career professionals, market specialists. You might want to use a wide range of information tools to research the market, industry, profession you have chosen to better understand the opportunities and threats in that industry. The Career Strategy is the how we achieve our Career Vision and should be something we can measure over time. What competencies or skills do I need to develop for that position, what is the experience I need to get to the next level, how will I differentiate myself against my career peers in a positive way, helping me to be that high potential professional in what ever I path I have chosen.
By continually measuring how we are doing against our short, medium and long term goals, we are able to revise and adapt our strategic career plans to answer any and all the challenges we face along the road.
Can we change our Career path at any point in time, of course, however we need to recognise that we need to start the whole exercise again this will give a greater chance of success and mitigate any negative indicators this might give to our career progression.
I have changed direction many times over the 22 some years I have been working, it is only in the last 8 years that I have really found my career compass , which has helped me considerably towards achieving the life and business goals I have set for myself.
A quote that I have used often when taking difficult decisions and has been a great inspiration to me was by Robert Francis Kennedy
“There are those who look at things the way they are, and ask why... I dream of things that never were, and ask why not?”
You would like further information on career planning please contact me at [email protected]