How to create a career development plan

A career development plan is an important document for anyone in the workforce, as well as those about to enter it. Why is it important? Well, just like any plan, a career development plan provides a blueprint for executing and achieving objectives. Essentially, it works out where you are now and where you want to go in your career. From this, it maps out key steps to get you where you want to be.

If you have already started your career, it doesn’t mean you have missed an opportunity to develop a career development plan. It can be developed at any time during your career if you have professional goals you want to achieve. Ideally, it should be a working document which is updated throughout your career as you achieve your goals, goals change, and as life inevitably throws up different challenges in the areas of family, relationships, health, finances and economic conditions.

So how do you create a career development plan? There are five key steps – these are:

1. Pinpoint where you are now

An important first step in creating a career development plan is to identify where you are now. This step includes:

• Reviewing your skills and experience so far – What experience, qualifications and training do you have to offer? What are your top skills? What are your strengths?
• Determining what jobs motivate you – This could include taking assessments to understand more about yourself, such as Myers Briggs personality type tests and working style quizzes
• Identifying what is important to you when working – Consider for example, flexible working hours, travel opportunities, organisational culture, specific working experiences, and employers that offer training and professional development.

Once you have found the answers to these questions, you will have a strong understanding of where you currently are. This will help when developing other parts of the career development plan.

2. Determine where you want to be

The next step is to work out where you would like to be in the future. Not everyone knows what kind of job or career will be most suited to them and/or will make them happy. As a result, identifying where you want to go may require some research into different roles and sectors. The following career websites may help:

• Your Career – this website includes a quiz which can help determine your future career options
• Career Matcher – use this quiz to understand the careers and courses that match your strengths and talents
• UTS Career Quiz – this quiz is for people across the career spectrum to understand jobs and courses well-suited to them.

In addition to career websites, it is recommended that you:

• Brainstorm jobs/careers you are interested in to understand your job/career options and what each of these look like
• Research different working environments to see which ones complement the types of roles you are interested in and your work values
• Investigate roles you would like to undertake and organisations you would like to work for
• Talk to family and friends to get their input on your career ideas and goals – if you know someone who is in a particular job/career that interests you, get in touch and ask them some questions
• Contact professional associations to obtain more information on specific jobs/careers.

It may also help to think about where you would like to see yourself in two years, and then further down the track, such as in five to ten years’ time.

3. Develop your strategy

Once you have worked out where you are now and where you want to be, you need to start working on some goals and how to get there. To do this, consider:

• Any training and development gaps – Do you need to undertake any further study or training to get where you want to be?
• What experience do you need and how do you get this experience?
• What soft skills do you need and how will you develop these?
• What networks would be valuable to build? For example, should you become a member of a professional association and/or join a special interest group on LinkedIn?
• What resources do you have or can you access to support you? This can include personal qualities, social support, such as family and friends and finances
• What job seeking tools do you need to create and/or update? This could include a master CV and LinkedIn profile
• What are the short term and long term steps to get you where you want to be?

4. Make your goals SMART

To ensure your plan remains relevant and valuable to you, make sure your career development plan is written down and that each goal you develop is SMART. This means your goals need to be:

• Specific
• Measurable
• Achievable
• Realistic
• Time-bound.

Using the SMART approach will make it easy for you to know what you have to do, when you have to do it by and what you have achieved!

When developing your career development plan, some people find it useful to divide their plan into short term and long term goals. This approach enables you to realise some goals and obtain the satisfaction that comes with achievement, whilst keeping your focus on the long term objective.

5. Review your plan regularly

Life changes and so should your career development plan!

As a result, review your plan regularly (say every 6 months to 1 year) to make sure your career development goals are still important for you and to adjust your plan accordingly. If you have learnt about a new pathway to get you to your goal, add this in and if a goal no longer fits, remove it and add a new goal.

The key to having a useful and valuable career development plan is to ensure it remains relevant to you, and helps you remain flexible and responsive to changes in your career and the obstacles that life can bring! Good luck with your planning!