A reflection on career aspirations & expectations regarding career development and career management practices
Higher education continually keeps getting higher. It is expected that one should have a college degree in order to have a good job. A new professional may chose any number of careers, including management, research, administration, education, medical practice, and many others. However, once you finish your college education and get a career, many businesses and industry leaders still expect you to continue to develop your skills. Among these, the pursuance of a Masters education and attending seminars or short term courses for career progression and development are popular and has become a requisite for some.
A career is described as lifelong sequences of role-related experiences. Against this highly subjective standard, careers are viewed as individual representations of personal experiences within the job sequences. A career is also tied with profession and advancement ( 1991).
People are usually influenced about their career decisions. These start as early as childhood. But an ideal time to present career information is when students are in middle school. At this time of their lives they are looking at their interests and skills and determining what they might like to do “when they grow up.” Organizations, parents, peer group or other factors could present many professions as a viable career choice to middle school students (2006). These kinds of presentations show the students that there are a variety of options available to them.
Career choice and development are profoundly affected by broad, cross-national differences in the structure of education and work and the connections between these institutions. Educational systems can be characterized by the extent to which they (1) are differentiated by the distinct occupational futures of students and (2) offer vocation-specific credentials (2002).
University career professionals frequently lament their inability to get undergraduate students to take seriously the importance of designing a career plan during their initial college experience and then refining that plan throughout their college and subsequent careers. Four roadblocks stand between many students and career success: procrastination; rationalization; unrealistic expectations; and lack of understanding of how their academics, extracurricular activities, and work experience relate to their ability to compete successfully for a job that meets their professional and business needs (2005).
To prepare for the business world’s challenges, every professional does well to formulate a career plan that clearly relates actual performance to his or her desired personal and career success. For the informed and well prepared professional, there are many strategies available to expand the frontiers of personal and career success ( 1993).
The increase in the attention provided the concept of career management at the level of the organization over the last few years has been impressive. Until most recently, writings and guidelines on career programs have been for the most part tailored to individual planning and decision making. The reason for this internally focused, somewhat personal emphasis seems to be associated with an apparent lack of concern for a number of “external” or “environmental context” factors that now are seen as affecting an organization’s career management system (1991).
Sometimes, there are instances when one has to decide about his or her career. These are turning point and career decisions are not simple. There are many different types, and they happen throughout our careers. Career decisions occur within the context of a complex life space influenced by individual characteristics, organizational circumstances, and conditions outside the organization (1991).
There are many strategies and techniques available for expanding the frontiers of one’s personal and/or career success (1993). However, these are usually specific to the kind of career one is in. Say for example, business managers can benefit from one group of strategies while health care professionals can benefit from another group of strategies. What is usually common and works well for any profession and career path is continuing education in the form of graduate studies or training and development programs and courses. Such programs are excellent sources for use in an organization’s or individual’s career development. Strategies and techniques can help expand the frontiers of one’s personal and career success. When these strategies are combined with the recommendations of a good mentor, support group, and/or career counselor, the possibilities for enhancing one’s career success improve.
In the area of management, certain skills are required in order to be successful. Not anyone can be a manager. Managers, by inclination and necessity, are people of action. While they may experience periods of vision and contemplation, the urgencies of the jobs they perform continually keep their attention focused on the practical and on the demand for results 2000).
Six fundamental skills are needed to become a manager: writing, public speaking, interviewing, relating to others, personal computing, and information searching. These are tied together with an emphasis on learning as a lifetime endeavor. However, these skills are also requisites in other career paths. Unfortunately, the tendency to ignore these basic skills is commonplace. They may seem so fundamental that they are taken for granted and no attention is given to them or no special effort is made to improve them (1991).
One of the most critical requirements of successful managers is they possess the skill of being insightful. “Insight” means the ability to see into both persons and situations. In this sense, insight is synonymous with understanding and discernment. Yet, astute persons frequently have blurred understanding or fail to use insights available to them. Some mediocre managers, on the other hand, have sharp or intuitive discernments (2000).
It is an exciting time to be in the management career, if only your heart is really into it. The opportunities open for a management career are limitless. But this is actually true for any other profession. In any profession and career, dedication to that chosen path is the most important determinant for one to be successful.
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