Career Action Plan

Whether you are a fresh graduate or someone who has decided to change careers, one thing you should never do without is a career action plan! Previously, I have discussed the importance of goal setting and making a career objective. I am hoping that at this point, you have already made or at least started on making your own.

You should not confuse goal setting with a career action plan. If your goal setting would be likened to a blueprint, then your career action plan is the step-by-step process that will instruct you on HOW to build your career. As you may have realized, you can’t have only one of them. You need both!

In this session, I will discuss details about how to develop your own career action plan. As mentioned before, this will serve as your road-map and at the same time, it will also help you find out how to go about fulfilling your goals and objectives. It is only right that time and effort should be spent well to come up with an effectual plan for your career.

Getting Started

At this point, you have already narrowed down your choice to one career out of the list of careers you have made. This is the one that you want to pursue and one that we will highlight in this action plan.

With your chosen career in mind, make a list of your short-term and long-term goals. These goals are necessary to help you succeed in your career of choice. Short-term goals are those that you can achieve in a period of 2 years or less, whereas long-term goals are those that you can achieve in 2-10 years or even longer. Keep in mind that these goals should be made in order to help you build a solid and successful career.

Below are some examples of short-term and long-term goals for your career action plan. Take note that these goals are for an individual who is pursuing a career as a Network Systems Analyst:

Short-Term Goals

Attend seminars to enhance knowledge on network architecture and configuration
Increase your job responsibilities

Long-Term Goals

Achieve the highest position in your department
Be able to retire at age 45

Conclusion

Now that you have already listed your goals in relation to your career action plan, the next step is to determine the completion dates for each one. Make sure that you set realistic timelines for each of your goals so that you don’t get disappointed in the end. Keep in mind that if you set your completion date too short, you are only bound to get frustrated. However, if you keep it too long, you might lose a lot of opportunities along the way.

Your career action plan should serve as a reminder for you as you progress in your career. It is best to look back to this plan every now and then to check if you are on track.

Are you now ready to make your career action plan? Fantastic! In the next article, I will discuss how to go about making career expectations. This is another significant part of planning out your career. A lot of things could happen, so you better know what to expect and plan ahead!.

If you haven’t read the previous articles in the series, Please review them once as the next sessions will require some of the basics from them.

Chandra Vennapoosa, B.S Arch Graduate, Managing Director – Exforsys Inc, Founder of exforsys.com and geekinterview.com. Chandra’s mission is “to provide quality career coaching and interview advice for aspiring candidates”.

Chandra Vennapoosa – who has written 7 posts on Online Learning.