ST Recruit, In The Driver's Seat, 13th October 2003

Article from ST Recruit, 13th October 2003

IN THE DRIVER’S SEAT

Your career is your responsibility, and it’s up to you to steer it in the direction you want.

Career management is not only for top-level executives, it applies to everybody.

The human resource department used to manage employees’ careers, especially those at a senior level and those deemed to have enough potential to be put on the fast track.

But now, many companies have to grapple with more pressing tasks such as managing costs, fighting hard to stay afloat and finding ways to remain profitable. So, everybody has to be responsible for their careers.

Even as you read this, one or more of your friends, relatives or even a co-worker could have just lost his job. It can happen to anybody at anytime.

You may have spent a decade or two with the same company, but it does not mean that you will be “taken care of”.

Increasingly, companies focus on the bottom-line and everyone is expected to add value. One-job careers are no longer the norm, multiple-job careers are.

You now have to maintain your “employability” rather than focus on staying employed.

The time to take charge of your career is as early as your first job. Should you one day be “shown the door”, this strategy will ensure that you do not panic.

You can move smoothly to a new challenge with another organisation.

Here’s a guide to get you started:

• Learn more about yourself as an individual. Find out your likes, dislikes and preferences. You must know who and what you are before you can discover what your career goals are.
• Review your career progress. Plan to take time off to do periodic career soul-searching. Put pen to paper: Where you have been, where you are now and where would you like to go.
• Identify the motivation and reasons why you left your last job and/or took up your current one. What were the influences that shaped your decision?
• Perform an analysis of what you like most — and least — about your current job as well as previous ones, and say why.
• Identify and write down your past successes, situations that you excel in and enjoy and recognise the skills and personality attributes that enable you to succeed.
• Review your “personal life”. You need to do this because work or your career is just one aspect of your total being.

You also have your family, social and other aspects of your life to concentrate on. This will help you to find out what areas you need to work more at to achieve a better work and life balance.

• Use psychometric tools, or consult a qualified psychologist, to enable you to better understand yourself — both as an individual and a professional.
• Have your supervisors, peers and subordinates give you their individual feedback on what they think of you at work, your style and areas for improvement.

Career options

Having done all this, you should discuss career options with your mentor or career counsellor, who should have a good understanding of the prevailing market conditions, what’s hot and what’s not, now and in the foreseeable future.

Finally, map out a strategy to arrive at your chosen career path and destination. If you need to fill “gaps” in your career development, plan how to meet them.

Article contributed by Paul Heng, founding president, Asian Association of Career Management Professionals (AACMP). To learn how to better manage your career, visit the AACMP’s annual conference to be held Oct 30. Details and registration at www.aacmp.org.sg