It’s easy to procrastinate when career planning is concerned. The tasks associated with the process may seem unclear to you, you may think that you don’t really need to worry about it until you get closer to graduating, or you may feel you already have a plan in place and no additional work is necessary. But in all of these cases, there are things you can do to prepare yourself for the future, gaining the skills and knowledge necessary to navigate the dynamic world of work and react to unexpected job changes.
Starting early allows you more time to assess your own areas of aptitude and learn about variables that are affecting hiring trends, such as the economy and globalization. Career aptitude addresses your capabilities to perform successfully in different occupations. Or, in other words, it determines your “fitness” for careers and the workplace. The job market is competitive and always rapidly changing. Investing time and energy in career planning activities will increase your awareness of all that is involved and lead to more thoughtful decisions and actions. San Diego State University’s Bill McCarthy reminds us that “what an individual student does early in their college education can help them open or close doors of career opportunity down the line.”
If you haven’t started planning, it’s never too late to get organized. Fortunately, there are many tools and resources available to help you find out more about your aptitude for different jobs and occupations through career planning activities. Finding a good fit can be important to both employee and employer – matching the type of work you want to do, and are skilled at performing, with the type of work a company needs successfully accomplished.
Components of Career Planning
Career planning is a process, with multiple decisions to be made and tasks to be completed. Your plan should be unique to you and reflect your interests, needs and choices. Your plan should also be flexible. As you continue to advance in your academic program, gaining knowledge and skills along the way, you can modify your plan based on your experiences. There are three primary components of career planning to consider:
- Career exploration: finding out more about yourself and the world of work.
- Career decision-making: choosing the career field you will pursue and setting short-term goals.
- Career progression: considering career path options and the potential for advancement; setting long-term goals.
Career Exploration
Career exploration includes a wide range of exercises and resources related to finding out more about yourself and different careers. As you review examples, think about which activities might be the most interesting and helpful to you as you take steps toward planning your career.
Knowledge of Self: Understanding Your Needs and Preferences
There are resources available to help you assess yourself in terms of skills, personality characteristics, interests, and work values. These tools help you document these things, as well as link them to potential areas of study and work.
- Skills and abilities: What do you already know how to do? Check out several of the skill profiling tools available to help you develop a list of skills you have and see how they are related to different jobs. CareerInfonet.org provides an online Skills Profiler that allows you to select and rate yourself on a long list of work-related skills. The system then matches these skills to specific careers.
- Personality characteristics: Your individual traits are also part of the self-exploration process. Are you introverted or extroverted? A good listener? How do you deal with unexpected challenges? Personality profilers, such as the Keirsey Temperament Sorter and the Holland Codes of work personalities, help you to identify your personal traits and research how these characteristics may be important in specific career fields. The World of Work Map is one guide that uses Holland’s Codes as a foundation, expanding the six original personality and work types to address 26 career areas.
- Work values: What are your priorities in building a career? How would you define career success? While some people list “high salary” or “prestige,” others are drawn to defining “helping others” and “independence” as priorities in their jobs and careers. Completing an assessment, like the Values Questionnaire from the University of Minnesota-Morris and the Values Assessment worksheet from Arizona State University, will help you identify and describe your preferences and personal motivators in this area.
- Interests: What do you want to do? How do you like to spend your time? What are your favorite subjects? Developing a concrete list of interests can be helpful as you plan your coursework and make decisions about careers based on your own likes and dislikes. Try the O*Net Interest Profiler to identify the types of tasks you are interested in performing and a list of related careers for you to explore.
As you move forward with your career courses and work experiences, you will develop new skills, find new interests, and maybe even have a shift in your work values. It’s okay to revisit the exploration tools again later on to research new career fields you find out about along the way.
Understanding yourself also means understanding your context. There are additional influences to consider as you explore different career options and prepare to make initial career decisions. What other influences may affect your decision-making?
- Life roles: Career theorist Donald Super encourages all of us to think about our many life roles (e.g. spouse, parent, worker, child) and how they may impact our employment and plans for the future. These roles may dictate what we need to look for in a career and new job opportunities.
- Culture: Your culture (i.e. race, ethnicity, extended family) shapes your values and expectations and may impact your career decisions.
- Gender: Men and women alike encounter gender stereotypes related to career choice. How we perceive ourselves and the options and challenges before us can affect the choices we make about careers.
Knowledge of Work: Understanding the Job Market
How can you improve your knowledge of what kinds of career options are available? Understanding external influences on your career choice, such as the economy, hiring trends, and the changing needs of industry, can influence your plan and inform the choices you make about your own career. As the world of work and job market evolve, so do the resources available to help us keep up with them.
- Outlook: The U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics (BLS) performs a monumental service collecting and analyzing data about jobs and employment. In career advising circles, the BLS is relied upon for its biannual publication of the Occupational Outlook Handbook (OOH). The OOH includes a number of searchable components, including information about the projected need for workers in the future. These projections are organized by career field and are currently available for 2008-2018. Use this resource to explore the careers you are interested in and determine the projections for increasing or decreasing numbers of job openings in these fields.
- Salary: You may have a specific salary in mind as a goal for your first job after graduation. This goal may be shaped by your personal needs, based on calculated living expenses and repayment of student loans. There are many sources for salary information to help you plan and set goals for your career. Compare estimates from Salary.com, PayScale.com, JobWeb.com and the OOH to make sure your expectations are realistic for your field and your local area.
- Qualifications: In addition to your current academic program, will you need any specific credentials to enter the jobs you are interested in pursuing? The industry, and employers in your field, may have additional requirements related to education, training, and experience. These requirements might involve additional work on your part, such as extra coursework or professional certification. The OOH includes this kind of information, but you should also investigate state requirements, talk with potential employers, and look for guidance from professional associations and organizations.
- Workplace changes: The world is becoming a much smaller place as technology brings us closer and allows us to communicate and work with people from all over the world. Keeping up with the changing nature of the workplace can be daunting, but there are a few predictions out there. U.S. News presents recent changes in the world of work that include greater flexibility, increased entrepreneurship, and frequent job changes. Gartner, an information technology research firm, makes predictions for work changes in IT over the next 10 years. Among these changes are increased collaborative work, use of simulations, and virtual work situations. What are the predictions for the future of work in your field?
Awareness of opportunities and economic conditions also informs your choices. Explore these resources and create a short list of sources of information and news about employment that you can refer to on a regular basis for updates about your career fields of interest.
Career Decision-Making
Northwestern University’s Career Services Office asks: “How will I decide to decide?” Consider the following questions before making a final decision:
- Did you assess your skills, interests, characteristics, and values? And did you then identify matching occupations?
- Have you explored the requirements of multiple career fields?
- Are you comfortable with the knowledge you’ve gained about the availability of jobs in several fields and expected salaries?
- What additional information do you need to make a decision and move forward with your career planning?
The South Carolina Career Resource Network created a decision-making worksheet that includes the following steps:
- Identify a decision you are making now.
- Gather information.
- Identify alternatives.
- Weigh the evidence.
- Choose among alternatives.
- Take action.
- Review and evaluate.
The process of career exploration is ongoing. You will revisit these resources and ask these questions again. Seek out any additional resources you need to get assistance with your decisions and prepare to set a few career-related goals.
Developing Career Goals
Short-term career goals might include completing your education and indentifying initial career options after graduation. Goal setting takes practice, and often some level of strategy. Put your goals in writing and revisit them often to assess your progress.
One strategy is to set SMART Goals:
- S: Specific – Is your goal well defined? Describe each goal as specifically as possible and focus on performance. Use the five “W’s” as a guide: who, what, where, when, and why.
- M: Measurable – How will you know when you’ve reached each of your goals? Determine the criteria you will use to measure your progress and achievement.
- A: Achievable – Are your goals possible to achieve as you’ve stated them? Do you (or will you) have the ability to reach them? Setting challenging goals can push you to achieve more than you thought you could, but they should also be possible to reach.
- R: Realistic – Are your goals reasonable ones? Will you be able to stay motivated and complete them as scheduled? Make sure your expectations are realistic and do-able.
- T: Timely – When will you achieve your goals? Each goal on your list may have a different time frame, ranging from short-term (i.e. today or next month) to long-term (i.e. next year or five years from now). Assign a specific date to each goal and put these on your calendar.
Building a Support Network
Deciding on a career can be overwhelming. Inviting others to help you with the process can be beneficial. Keep in mind that the decisions are yours to make, but look for support where you need it. This group can be as formal or informal as you need it to be. Your network can also help to:
- Brainstorm ideas and resources
- Listen to your thoughts and ideas and provide feedback
- Add to your network of people who can help
- Offer advice about their experiences and lessons learned
- Offer encouragement as you work through the process.
Career Progression
You may not be ready to plan out your whole career, but looking at how people progress through different careers can help you to further explore areas you are interested in pursuing. Looking at career progression can also help you identify careers in which past work experience will be particularly relevant and helpful. This kind of exploration may reveal career options you haven’t yet considered.
Career Path Tools
Career mapping is one strategy for identifying career progression and continuing your exploration. There are automated career planning tools available that work to map your route and move you forward with your career planning. GigZig from PayScale.com and Career Explorer from LinkedIn each create lists of job titles that lead through different careers over time. These lists are based on information from millions of working professionals and reflect the dynamic paths that careers often take.
You can also use simple sites like Schools.com’s Career Comparison Tool to explore general career fields (e.g. art and design, healthcare, law and criminal justice). The information provided on this interactive site compares projected income and the number of years of training an education required. Personalize your own planning and create multiple paths. You may be able to reach your goals in more than one way and find new interests on a variety of paths.
Looking Ahead
What are your long-term career goals? This is a popular interview question than can be tough to answer, especially when you are just beginning your career. Consider career path possibilities five years after graduation. Draft a few ideas for the long-term that include jobs and continued professional development.
Work with a Career Advisor
Find your career center, whether it is on-campus, online, or offers a combination of resources both face-to-face and at a distance. What services are offered? Typical career centers offer a range of services to students and alumni. Look for:
- Counseling: Individual and group sessions may be available to provide you with guidance and resources, such as the interpretation of career assessment results.
- Employer Outreach and Connections: Connect with hiring employers and alumni through the career center. These might include career fairs, information sessions, mentoring, and internship programs.
- Resources: Most centers have some kind of a resource library available as well as workshops on career development and job search topics.
Career services professionals will be able to assist you with a variety of resources related to career exploration, decision-making, and progression planning. But you have to let them know that you need assistance. Visit their offices and websites and make an appointment to find out more about the assistance that is available.
Put Your Plan into Action!
Career planning is not necessarily linear, although exploration related activities are a good place to start. As you begin to think about your career plan, consider how you might integrate exploration, decision-making, and progression planning activities into your overall academic experience.
- Course selection: Use your elective requirements to explore new topics and areas of interest. Work with your academic advisor to make sure the courses you select will also fulfill your degree requirements.
- Applied experiences: Seek out opportunities to experience different careers in their workplace environments through internships, practicum and clinical requirements, as well as through volunteer service and part-time employment.
- Extracurricular activities: Increase your exposure to career-related information and involvement in networking conversations through alumni mentoring programs, professional associations in your field (student memberships are often available), and student groups and clubs focused on career activities at your school.
To effectively plan, and then execute that plan, takes time. You’ll ideally want to gradually build your plan throughout your degree program. Waiting until the last academic term can put you in the position of having to make quick decisions without the benefit of thorough research and experiences that inform your choices. Keep in mind that finding the “right” career may mean continued exploration and decision-making. You may even find that there is more than one “good fit” out there.
