How to Take Full Control of Your Career Development
How to develop your career?
Well, career development does not happen overnight. One needs to put a lot of hard work and dedication to achieve his goals. This is why it is important to plan and choose a career where you are good at so your potential for success is great. Taking full control of your career by choosing the right decisions is important to have a successful career development in life.
If you are in the business world and working in a company, you need to know your skill sets and what you are good at. But sometimes, the skill sets you have and the role you are handling may not always be the same. If you don’t have the right kind of skill sets for the work you are doing, you can seek guidance from the organization.
Nowadays, most of the companies do not offer formal training to their employees. So, the employees have to figure out by themselves what they need to do in order to develop their careers. Generally, companies don’t provide sufficient training because they don’t see the value of investing in people who are not going to stay in the organization.
Moreover, organizations nowadays are unknowingly leaving behind their employees with skill gaps and blind spots, which can have a negative impact on the employees’ career and organizations’ effectiveness.
If you want to develop your career but the company you are working for is not helping you much, you can try to improve yourself in many ways. There are other ways to develop your career differently by keeping in mind the following points.
- Hold yourself accountable for your career and your responsibility.
- If you think you don’t have the right skill sets for your work, you can seek training from the organization to help you out with your skill.
- Figure yourself out with the work you are doing and be flexible in the method that you choose to improve yourself.
- Seek feedback about what you are doing and talk to your supervisors regarding the work you are doing.
- It is extremely important to have career goals no matter what stage you are at in your career.
- To control your career development, you should know how you are evaluated on and on what basis
Career goals
Having career goals, whether they are big or small, are important for the development of your career.
Career goals differ from person to person. Some people may want to hold higher positions as part of their ultimate goals. This may mean becoming the manager of a well-reputed company or a CEO of a particular company. Other people may set a goal to simply become a financially independent person.
Therefore, people can have different career goals to be successful in their lives. They can be short-term or long-term.
Short-term goals and long-term goals
Short-term goals are those goals that you have set to achieve something bigger. If a person’s long-term goal is to become the CEO of an engineering company, then he needs to achieve his short-term goals first.
For starters, he should pass the twelfth exam and enroll in an engineering degree for four years. He may enroll in a management course in order to advance his careers.
Then, he needs to work for at least two years as a manager to acquire the right skills and become the CEO of the company. On top of that, he needs to do a lot of hard work with dedication and commitment in order to realize his goals.
When setting your short-term and long-term goals, take note of the following SMART process.
Specific
Your goals should be specific.
Everybody’s goals are to be successful in life, but they should define what success means to each one of them. For some, success means getting into a position like an executive officer or a CEO of some company. For others, success may mean having to achieve something in life or to live a financially worry-free life.
The definition of success differs from one person to another and according to what they want to do in life. So, find out what you want to do in life in the first place.
Measurable
When you set a career goal, you should think of getting an effective measure to look into the outcome. For example, if you have a study goal, then you should keep a time limit such as finishing your MBA course in three years.
Avoid negativity
Avoid negativity at all cost. Negativity will only result in unpleasant effects and will leave little room for creativity in working towards your goals.
Realistic
When you set your goal, be very careful from setting unrealistic and unattainable targets. Know your limits and work on your blind spots to achieve your targets and goals.
Tie action to each goal
For every goal you set in your career, always accompany it with an action plan. And remember to ask this question: “What are you doing to achieve this goal?”
In doing so, you will be able to focus on your work plan to achieve your target goals.
