Where do you see yourself in a year? In five years? What skills would you learn to build your career? Setting career goals is about deciding where you want your career to head and planning the steps required to reach that point.
Do you have a clear idea about who you want to be in the future? Or what do you want to achieve?
Setting and keeping career goals is important to take your work to the next level. You need to have an end destination in mind in order to get there. What’s more, knowing your career goals isn’t just important for you but for your potential employers too.
Need for Career
Goals
1. Goals provide vision
Do you
want to see yourself doing the same job or in the same situation next year or three
years from now?
We
aren’t simply talking about a job change or promotion here. We are also
pointing to skills and capabilities. You can get better at your skills without
moving up the professional ladder. However, it takes more than a few years to
both hone your skills and get a promotion. But, that’s okay.
Have you
ever been in a situation where your manager asked you to read a book, attend a
conference, or take a class?
Though
you might find it a nuisance, your manager is aiming to help you hone your skills.
Even better, it is your chance to work towards your work and professional
goals.
2. Goals provide
clarity
Much too
often, all of us get caught in the rat race of everyday urgent activities and
lose sight of our greater professional goals.
It’s
obvious that you have a daily or weekly to-do list for a specific project.
But
setting professional goals helps you concentrate on the steps you should take
at every stage of your life and the things you need to improve.
3. Goals are measurable
If not
all goals, at least good goals are measurable. Ensure that you can quantify
your professional goals. Regardless of the goals you have, make sure your goals
are achievable and you can show progress.
All the
points we discussed above boil down to these three questions you should ask
yourself before setting professional goals:
●
What
do you want to achieve?
●
What
areas require improvement?
●
How
will you measure progress/achieving the goal?
With these tips in mind, you will be able to
create specific goals for your professional growth.
But, How Do You Achieve
Your Goals?
- Set Specific Goals
Everyone wants to be successful in
this world. But, what success means to you might not be the same as what
success means to someone else. For instance, to one person, success might be
becoming the CEO of a billion-dollar company, while the same word ‘success’
might mean merely getting home from work at 6 p.m. every day to someone else.
So, define what success means to you
and make it your specific goal. Then, work toward achieving it.
- Set Deadlines
As stated earlier, your goals should
be measurable. Set a timeframe for achieving each of your specific goals and
find a way to reach them within the deadline you have set.
Also, rather than taking a big leap
towards your long-term goals, break it into small short-term goals, and take
baby steps to achieve them.
- Be Realistic
Your long-term goals should be
compatible with your talents and skills. For example, wanting to win a Grammy
Award when you can’t sing or play an instrument will prove to be pretty
fruitless.
Nevertheless, you can still set your
goal as winning the Grammy Award if you
decide to become a singer first. We would call it pairing your goal with an
action. To win a Grammy Award, you either have to be a singer or someone
talented at playing an instrument. So make it your short-term goal and sign up
for a singing or music class.
- Be Flexible And
Reward Yourself
Sometimes, things might not work out
as planned. So, if you encounter hurdles that threaten your progress, modify
your goals.
And, every time you complete a
short-term goal or a step, reward yourself with something small that will help
you stay motivated. After all, achieving goals is hard work.
- Have A Goal
Partner
A goal partner or someone who will help
you stick to your plan is an awesome idea to always stay motivated. Your goal
partner can be a friend, a job coach, a co-worker, or even a family member.
Discuss your goals and stick together with them. If possible, motivate your
partner to work towards his/her goals too!
Final Thoughts
Though
this post isn’t a guide to organizing your professional goals, it will still
help you get started. Review your goals again, and make modifications to your
existing plan or come up with an entirely new but effective plan. Because, we
are talking about your career, and it’s really important to have goals in mind
to achieve success.
Still confused about what goals to set?
Here are
some professional goals worth considering:
●
Take a course to sharpen your skills.
●
Learn a new tool (or 5)
●
Improve your public speaking and
presentations
●
Build Your Network
●
Get Better at Time Management
Comments
Post a Comment