Personal Career Development - Essay Example

Personal Career Development Plan Name Institution Date Personal Career Development Plan Career Development is a continuous process through which people come to understand themselves as they relate to the work environment and the role they play in it. There are many reasons that can influence the selection of specific career from convenient concern to the personality such as salary, advancement career advancement and so on. Other people may choose a career based on the aspiration to solve problems, help people or to work in a family business. Career Development Theories Career development requires theoretical frameworks with application and validity to explain career development phenomenon and issues. This paper discusses two theories of career development: Super’s Life-Span, life space theory and Holland’s Theory of Person-Environment Interactions. Super’s Theory One of the major contributions of Super theory to career development has been the importance of an individual's self-concept development. Super noted that self-concept changes and develops through experiences throughout peoples live in their careers. People continually improve their self-concept over time and its application in their work life help to create adaptation in their career choice (Abernathy, 2003). According to Niles & Harris-Bowlsbey (2008), a career is developed by societal expectations as well as psychosocial development, and hence there is a relationship between age and career development. I consider myself to be an ambitious person and necessary to help people in the best way possible. Therefore, being a lifelong learner enhances individual skills that are crucial in enhancing an individual's profession. Super's theory stresses on life-long learning, growth, and change. It is based on the assumption that people learn and adapt throughout their life, and thus career development plan should be able to accommodate all stages of learning throughout a person's lifespan. Also, our role in life and self-concept are developed by individual and situational factors. Thus, our career choices are based by self-concept that has been build over time. We seek career satisfaction through our work, of which our self-concept is developed. Being an ambitious person I face numerous challenges and achievements. This experience has helped to develop ways I can handle such situations in the future. Super's theory is based on the assumption that people are static and thus we experience constant changes (Chen, 2003). This theory attempts to explain different factors that influence an individual in their work life in different stages of their life. Holland's Theory Holland’s theory is based on the assumption that people find jobs based on an environment where they can be with people of similar interests or likes. People are likely to be attracted to the work environment where they can employ their skills or attitude when working in their job roles, an interaction between environment and personality. Holland's theory provides a connection between personal characteristics and job title and classified personal characteristics into the following, Realistic, Investigative, Artistic, Social, Enterprising, and Conventional. He also argues that when there is a link between a personal characteristic and the job, there is a greater job satisfaction (Abernathy, 2003). For instance, as a sales representative one learns new skills that can be incorporated into existing knowledge. However, in their field, they are surrounded with people of similar interests where they can learn new things as well as motivate them. According to Holland's personality characteristics, different working environment are dominated by given type of personality characteristics. A social personality is linked with activities that involve informing and enlightening (Niles & Harris-Bowlsbey, 2008). Also, realistic characteristics require people who are practical. Investigative characteristic is also important in work environment that require the employees to solve issues. Artistic personality characteristic as it allows individual to work in tasks that requires them to be creative. Conventional personality characteristic prefer working in environment where structure abounds. As a salesperson, enterprising personality is crucial as these skills can be used for self-gain to better market products or services. Understanding this theory can help an individual to make an informed career choice. People of similar interests working together form a working environment where even their rewards match and hence working in such environment an individual is more likely to be satisfied. Career Interventions Career interventions refer to activities that can be considered to help an individual enhance his or her career development by helping them make and implement various career decisions. As a salesperson, I think the most important interventions that will benefit me most at different stages of my career are mentoring and developmental training. Mentoring is one of the most important career interventions that will help me advance my career in marketing at the establishment, advancement and maintenance stages (Career Planning Process, 2014). Mentoring is the close link with someone who is more experienced in the organization. In establishment stage, a mentor will take a personal interest in my career and guide me to ensure that my skills and hard work translate into advancement opportunities. In maintenance stage, a mentor offers an opportunity to share my experience with those with less experience. Development training intervention will also be crucial as it will help me to gain skills and knowledge to train and coach others. For instance, career workshops designed to help me gain a particular skill or complete a specific task. It also involves training that can help me to improve my skills and move to a higher position. This training will help me in achieving my career goals. Job rotation and challenging assignment intervention are also useful in advancement and maintenance stages. It will provide me with experience that is essential to advance my career or a challenge that will revitalize when my career appears to be stagnant at the maintenance stage. In advancement stage, I can shift to a new job area once I demonstrate that I have competence in a particular specialty. Job rotation provides an individual with a broader range of skills as well as opportunities to show their competence, and thus the management can identify employees who are capable of handling a particular position. Challenging assignment offers challenges for learning which can help me in the maintenance stage. In fact, studies have shown that people are responsive when the job seems motivating and challenging. People will not be satisfied when they feel that a job no longer enrich them. In maintenance stage, job rotation and challenging roles can be used to prevent loss of job motivation as they keep them responsive. Phased Retirement is crucial at the withdrawal stage when employee is leaving the organization and establishes a productive leisure life. These interventions include forms of part-time work, leisure activities. Hence, they can make a transition from organizational to leisure life. Career Development Strategies in local contexts Human resources play an important role in developing and planning employee's careers. In fact, the human resource should provide employees with career enhancement opportunities in addition to proving career opportunities. Training and development are part of human resource strategies; however, it should be aimed at developing their lifetime opportunities rather than during their life at the organization. Effective career planning and development need an inclusive plan that can be achieved through human resource planning aimed at developing and maintaining a workforce to meet the business need. As a result of recognition of importance of career development, Emirates Airlines has implemented high standard training programs which are accessible to all employees. Also, the programs can be accessed either online, classroom based or practical assessment that can meet different needs of staffs. This provides the employee with an opportunity to improve their skills and improve their confidence to work even in other organizations. Google has also been on the forefront in reefing their approach to coach and give performance feedback to employees to help them in creating and achieving their goals. It recognizes that employees need continual feedback concerning goal achievement and coaching to ensure they improve performance. Coaching and feedback are crucial at the initial stages of career development as it assists employee on how to perform their work, inform them whether they are performing up to expectations, or whether they have gained the required skills (Career Planning Process, 2014). Google now focus on helping the employees develop their individual skills. In fact, the performance management emphasis on feedback and places a greater value on development. They separate the aspect of career development in the performance appraisal from the salary review to ensure that individual career needs also receive enough attention compared to the salary issues. Another company such as Hamilton-Standard creates assessment centers to find people with right skills. The assessment center conducts various activities such as evaluating skills and ability to make decisions for job applicants. During the preliminary assessment, there is an information session for the applicants when they learn about firms expectations. As a result, these assessments helped Hamilton-Standard to identify the strengths and weaknesses of the applicants who would help them reject or accept the applicants. The assessment team consists of human resource specialist who observes the behaviors and performance of each applicant. In the end, they come up with an overall assessment containing a rating of each item that is believed to be relevant to that particular position and success of the organization. Career Planning Practices in the local and global contexts Career planning is the development of a plan that provides and monitors opportunities that can enable employees to grow to allow their personal goals to be aligned with personal goals (Gutteridge, Leibowitz & Shore, 1993). Organizations are willing to invest in career planning to ensure that the workforce is committed to its success. There are several effective career planning practices that offer best opportunities for career development and planning locally and globally. First, one of the most effective career planning practices is to ensure that individual career development plans are strategically and clearly aligned with the organization's goals, objective, and mission. Research has shown that it is considered crucial to link career goals with the business directions, strategies, and needs. In fact, employee development must be aligned with the business performance so that both the organization and individual wins. Some companies such as Hewlett-Packard, career development are aligned with the business plan and objectives. Workforce development and performance objectives are determined by a business unit aimed at aligning them with the result that contributes to the firm's objective. Second, the organization should have a culture that values, supports and rewards learning. An effective career development plan only thrives in culture practices that support and reward learning and participation. Literature indicates that much organization emphasizes on employees to value learning and the company creating a learning environment (Gutteridge, Leibowitz & Shore, 1993). Apparently, many organizations have changed their culture to ensure it supports and rewards career development. The top management, therefore, is critical in cultural change. In U.A.E, MasterCard Middle East is recognized for rewards high performers and achievers in the workforce. In fact, the company has a ''Heart'' award program where the best employees are nominated to receive award that is perceived to have demonstrated corporate values. This increases employee’s loyalty, and hence reduces re-hiring. Another effective career planning practice is to ensure that employees are given tools, information, and resources they need to develop their career. Organizations must recognize that is they pace burden of career development and planning on an individual, and they must be given the necessary tools, information and resources in place to proceed. Offering support is an effective career planning practice; firms must provide extensive support to their employees in this regard. Provision of information and resources to facilitate employee career planning include self-assessment tools, clear competence and performance requirements which the employees can use to compare with their progress. The key to the usefulness of this resources lies in their timeliness, accessibility, and relevance. Firms should provide various resources to meet the different needs of employees are different stages of their careers. Self-Analysis My results for the Holland Code Quiz are as follows: Realistic: 1 *lowest Investigative: 2 Artistic: 1 *lowest Social: 8 Enterprising: 13 *highest Conventional: 7 The results show that I score high in enterprising personality characteristic. This matches my interest in marketing. I also scored high in social and conventional. However, I scored low in artistic, realistic and investigative and thus I need to improve on these skills. Working in the marketing field, an individual has the responsibility of promoting products and services or developing marketing strategies. I find this role fascinating because it offers an opportunity to meet and communicate with people as well as seeing the impacts of your work in both short-term and long-term. Personal KSAs During my course work, I have gained marketing knowledge on various principles such as promotions, the public relation among others. This has improved my enterprising skills and I can be able to sell products. I have also engaged in promotion campaigns where I gained knowledge on methods of selling products and services such as sales techniques, product demonstration, and marketing strategies. In my business course, I have gained knowledge on media production and communication methods that can inform as well as entertain such as visual media. I am very aggressive, self-confident and sociable. I can easily persuade people to listen to me, which is an important skill in sales. These social skills help me to easily persuade people to listen to me and buy products. I can effectively communicate in public and deliver presentations to individual and groups and present my products or services. I also listen actively to what others are saying so that we can understand one another. Having worked in a team, I have great concern for rules. I am conventional and I believe that I set rules in order to reach my targets. I have participated in some group works in the classroom, where we worked effectively in a group to solve problems. I have the ability to set goal to reach sales target for my company. KSAs to improve and short-term development activities to undertake According to Holland’s theory, career pattern is determined by individual skills, I will pursue higher education in marketing to improve my knowledge on marketing strategies. I want to improve my investigative skills so that I can solve work problems through experiences working with a different culture to understand how it plays the crucial role in making buying decisions. Experience in marketing will help me solve such issues. I also want to improve my artistic skills so that I can express products and services to customers indirectly which is good marketing strategy. Lastly, I want to improve realistic skills so that I can market services with useful information, like real life example rather than sales pitch. Identification of personal goals and career paths My dream is to be a marketing executive in a multinational company, and thus I know I have to gain skills as well as experiences that would enable to perform its roles. I know I have to gain these skills and knowledge through education advancement and experiences from lower ranks working at different positions and move up to senior marketing executive position. The experience and training will help me improve my communication skill, interpersonal skills, and ability to conduct research, creativity and so on. Short term careers development goals To start my marketing career at entry level job as a market researcher once I finish my course. This will improve my skills in consumer analysis of needs and behaviors, the effectiveness of advertising and competitive activities. It will also help me to develop a network of contact. To be analyzing new marketing issues on a monthly basis. This will help me to be up to date with the latest trends in marketing, and thus we can change the marketing strategies depending on the new trends. It will also increase my depth in knowledge on various marketing aspects. To attend professional development course every year. A cultural awareness course will help me to understand how culture impact buying behaviors and patterns, and leadership development will improve skills on how to manage a team and these skills will be crucial as I move to the next level in the marketing field. Long-term goals To write articles on various marketing aspect in marketing journals by 2020. I will be undertaking research on various areas of marketing and writing articles on such issues. This will help in providing information and data to other pursuing marketing courses. To become a member of marketing research by 2020. This means I will require more academic qualification in research, and I am considering advancing in the marketing field. This will improve my chances of attaining my goal by gaining a post –graduate degree in marketing, as well as the experiences, gained working in marketing research, which is crucial to my career goals. References Abernathy, C.A. (2003). Career Development Theory. Retrieved on 11 November, 2016 from http://taracat.tripod.com/careertheory1.html Career Planning Process (2014). Oregon State University. Retrieved on 11 November, 2016 from http://www.osucascades.edu/studentresources/careers/puzzle Chen, C. (2003). Integrating perspectives in career development theory and practice. The Career Development Quarterly, 51, 203-216. Gutteridge, T,G., Leibowitz, Z.B & Shore, J.E. (1993). Organizational Career Development: Benchmarks for Building a World-Class Workforce. San Francisco: Jossey-Bass. Niles, G & Harris-Bowlsbey, J. (2008). Career development interventions in the 21st century. Prentice Hall, London : Pearson Education . Read More