Reinvent Your Career Today

Are you stuck with mid career crises? Reinvent your career today.

Today new technologies, increased competition and downsizing have eliminated many jobs. Managed care has severely impacted the way medical and mental health services are provided. With fewer people to do the work and increased competition for jobs, we are putting in more hours than ever before. Besides burnout and depression, other job stresses come from doing work you are not suited for, or working in an environment that is not conducive to your temperament, values and the quality of life that you desire. 

If you think you need to find another job or change the direction of your career, it is important to first go through a process of self-assessment, focusing on your options, and lastly, developing a specific action plan to get you where you want to be.

Assessment

What are the values, ideals and ethics that you hold near and dear? You need to display these in your work if you are to feel satisfied and fulfilled. Be clear about the compromises you can make without suffering. What are your special abilities and skills? What do you consider to be your best traits and characteristics? What are your areas of interest in your work and in school? How do you make decisions? Are you a "big picture" person or one who likes to focus on the details? Personality assessments often can help with this process.

Environment

What kind of environment do you want to work in? This includes geographic location and proximity to home, hours that you work as well as clothes that you wear to work and a description of the organizational culture. Do you want flex-time or would you like to work from home? Do you want to be self-employed? What does your office space look like? What kind of people do you want to work with? Do you prefer to work independently or within a team environment?

Focusing

After you have completed a thorough assessment of your values, skills, abilities and the environment that you want to work in, consider the content of the work itself. Do you like to counsel others? Do you like to teach? Do you like to write or conduct research? Is administration and policy-making your passion? Do you want to manage others or work independently? Make a list of the things you like about your work and the things you don't like. Be specific. The Strong Interest Inventory is a good instrument to help focus your interests.

Next you need to match your abilities and skills with the needs of the marketplace. The competition for jobs today is very stiff. Brainstorm the general career areas that fit your interests. Conduct informational interviews to determine what it is really like to work in those areas. What kind of skills and experiences do you need to have to secure a job in those fields? Are you willing to do what it takes to make that happen? What about salary requirements?

Perhaps after conducting the self-assessment and focusing, you decide you really like the work you do and only need to change the environment. If you leave a particular career and decide you don't like your new job, it will be more difficult to return to your former career. It is crucial to go through the self-assessment and focusing process before you make a move.

Action Plan

Once you know what you want to do, develop a specific plan to get there. If you decide to stay put, create a career development plan that includes acquiring the skills and experience you need to further your career. Write your goals and objectives. Update your resume. Network with those in positions to further your cause. A career consultant can help keep you motivated, focused and in pursuit of your goals.

Summary

If you want success in your career, you must have confidence in your ability to solve problems, practice independent thinking and decision-making and be determined to find the answers. Don't give up! Start with a thorough assessment of your values, skills, interests and abilities. Focus your efforts on your areas of interests and abilities, and develop an action plan by specifying goals and objectives. It is only by focusing on your strengths that you can truly obtain fulfillment and success in your career. A professional career consultant can provide objective feedback to help keep you motivated and on-track.

Also read about Coaching, Mentoring & Counselling here.

The Rules for Corporate Career Resilience

Rule #1: The company is not in charge of your career—you are. Your people can no longer wait for you to come to them with a new assignment or opportunity; they must seek out such opportunities themselves. Your relationship with them is no longer one of parent-to-child, but adult-to-adult. They share the responsibility for initiating career discussions. Even being designated as a "high potential" or a valued employee may not guarantee they will keep their place in the succession plan, as these plans have become less relevant as the pace of change has picked up. You will meet your employees more than halfway by giving them the tools and counsel they need to take charge of their careers.

Rule #2: Instead of ladders and paths, there are now webs and mazes. Your employees must learn, if they haven't already, to think of a career less as a ladder and more as a web. Webs have a center but no top and a lot of paths that connect. Unlike ladders, webs often dissolve when their purpose is fulfilled. Smart workers will move along the webs, picking up new skills that meet the organization's needs, looking for problems to solve, and working on team projects. And if a web breaks or dissolves, it can always be rewoven in a similar or different pattern.

Rule #3: Every job is now subject to a "make or buy" decision. Because of the flexibility and cost savings involved in using contract employees, vendors, and temporary employees to do the work previously done by downsized employees, your workers must understand that they may now be competing with these outside resources. This means they have to continually prove their value. Their only security lies in their ability to continually retool themselves to remain valuable to their employer. This is why continuous learning is so important to all workers today. All employees should also consider that their next opportunity may lie in becoming an outside resource themselves.

Rule #4: Hidden needs in the organization's internal job market are more promising sources of advancement than the formal job postings. There has always been, and will always be, a "hidden job market" in every company. Only now the inside job market contains more hidden jobs than ever. New needs appear so fast that there is little time to wait for the slow wheels of the formal hiring process to start rolling. These days, about a third of all jobs filled are newly created ones. And, of course, with the loss of rungs on career ladders, there are fewer formal job slots in the first place.

All employees—you included—must be on the lookout for unmet needs, then make proposals to the person who "owns the problem" to help meet the need. Getting your employees to accept this proposition is a part of helping them learn to take more initiative in every aspect of their jobs. Many times, by looking to meet the organization's needs, they will carve out their next career move.

Rule #5. The most "vendor-minded" employees will find or create the most opportunity. The employees who think of themselves as "intrapreneurs" will see the organization as a market for their skills. They will understand the truest, most empowering definition of a job—"a talent that meets a need." With your help, they will come to see themselves as vendors, and they will perceive more opportunity as a result. Vendor-minded employees realize that the purpose of the organization is to provide goods and services that customer value and that, if the organization’s employees do not do that, eventually they may all be out of a job.

Ref: Leigh Branham

Key Steps in Career Development Initiatives

1. Define the need. To "hit the bull's-eye," you need to talk with employees to find out what's missing. Is it lack of perceived opportunity, not enough training, too little communication, diversity issues? Exit interview analysis, employee surveys, and focus groups can help you become clearer about employees' views on these issues.

2. Identify target groups. Focus on the employees you most want to keep. This helps you to get buy-in from all levels of management, which is important in building enthusiasm and gaining acceptance for the initiative.

3. Tie the initiative to human resources systems and policies. Company policies and practices regarding application procedures for posted jobs, managers' ability to block internal movement, hiring from within, use of computer job/talent banks, training, tuition reimbursement, use of pay systems that reward flexibility rather than hierarchy, and performance management all impact the career development initiative and should be : synch with it.

4. Tailor the initiative to fit the culture. Start with the pieces that the current culture will accept. If you are trying to change your culture to create more employee initiative, giving workers the tools to take charge is an important way to do it. One company, Komatsu, took an initiative to develop a web of relationships across the company. It included an innovative new career path concept— a 'return ticket' policy to encourage the transfer of young employees to subsidiaries and affiliate companies that had previously been viewed as banishment; and the Strategic Employee Exchange Program, which allows employees to work on projects in other parts of the company on a short-term basis.

5. Take a long-term approach with short-term payoffs. To build momentum, develop the program in stages. Begin by conducting a needs evaluation with a manager task force, then design and pilot a program, measure the results, spread the good word, and gradually include more managers and employees. If the gradual approach is solidly designed and well executed, the long-term results in keeping the right people will take care of themselves.

6. Redesign performance management system to make the process easier, if necessary. Some companies require managers to have career discussions with their employees at least twice a year, or to jointly create career development action plans once a year. Others incorporate manager ratings as career coaches on the performance review.

7. Codesign with line management. The career development system, like the performance management system, should be owned by line management, not by human resources, if it is to be successful. Getting line management to help design this system from the outset will go a long way toward making this happen.

8. Separate career management from performance appraisal. Keeping the two apart helps assure employees that the purpose of the program is to help them manage their careers and not to help their superiors manage them. Career discussions between manager and employee should be scheduled between performance appraisal discussions.

9. Ensure top management support. This is the key to success with almost all initiatives. Sometimes successful programs can be created gradually from the bottom up (or from the middle up), but the way to more immediate success starts at the top.

10. Measure results. Collecting manager and employee comments from career management workshops and disseminating them to other managers and employees works quite well. So does documenting the success stories employees who decided to stay within the company or whose performance improved because they attended the workshops and initiated career discussions with their managers

11. Publicize results. Making presentations to managers that include the results and success stories is the key.
Ref: Leigh Branham

Career Anchor and different Career Stages

Schein's career anchors represent aspects of work that are especially valued or needed by people for their personal fulfillment. They include:

1. Managerial competence : the individual desires opportunities to manage.
2. Technical/functional competence : the individual desires to use various technical abilities and special competencies.
3. Security : the individual is basically motivated by a need for job security or stability in the work situation.
4. Creativity : the individual is motivated by a need to create or build something.
5. Autonomy and independence: of primary interest to this person is the opportunity to work independently and without organizational constraints.
Career planning and development activities allow employees to grow in any of these desired directions.

Career Stages
What people want from their careers also varies according to the stage of one's career. What may have been important in an early stage may not be important in a later one. Four distinct career stages have been identified: trial, establishment/advancement, mid-career, and late career. Each stage represents different career needs and interests of the individual

Trial stage. The trial stage begins with an individual's exploration of career-related matters and ends usually at about age 25 with a commitment on the part of the individual to a particular occupation. Until the decision is made to settle down, the individual may try a number of jobs and a number of organizations. Unfortunately for many organizations, this trial and exploration stage results in high level of turnover among new employees. Employees in this stage need opportunities for self-exploration and a variety of job activities or assignments.

Establishment. The establishment/advancement stage tends to occur between ages 25 and 44. In this stage, the individual has made his or her career choice and is concerned with achievement, performance, and advancement. This stage is marked by high employee productivity and career growth, as the individual is motivated to succeed in the organization and in his or her chosen occupation. Opportunities for job challenge and use of special competencies are desired in this stage. The employee strives for creativity and innovation through new job assignments. Employees also need a certain degree of autonomy in this stage so that they can experience feelings of individual achievement and personal success.

Mid Career Crisis Sub Stage. The period occurring between the mid-thirties and mid-forties during which people often make a major reassessment of their progress relative to their original career ambitions and goals.

Maintenance stage. The mid-career stage, which occurs roughly between the ages 45 and 64, has also been referred to as the maintenance stage. This stage is typified by a continuation of established patterns of work behavior. The person is no longer trying to establish a place for himself or herself in the organization, but seeks to maintain his or her position. This stage is viewed as a mid-career plateau in which little new ground is broken. The individual in this stage may need some technical updating in his or her field. The employee should be encouraged to develop new job skills in order to avoid early stagnation and decline.

Late-career stage. In this stage the career lessens in importance and the employee plans for retirement and seeks to develop a sense of identity outside the work environment.

Ref: Garry Dessler