Career Goals

Posted on August 08, 2013 by Kiesha Richcreek, One of Thousands of Business Coaches on Noomii.

Career Goals, Realistically

One of the toughest issues in making a good career choice and career goal setting is identifying what it is that you want. Even when it seems that you know what you want, you may still have doubts on if your career choice is the right one for you.

Reaching clarity in those issues may be the most important thing you can do in your career planning and goal setting. Here are a few career goal setting guidelines that can help.

Most people, even very successful ones, have some periods in their career path when they seem unsure about their career choice and goals. It is totally human to feel that way.

Often, such periods just come and go. For example, they come when you face some overwhelming obstacles on your way. It is all over as soon as you get through these obstacles.

That situation by itself is not a problem of choosing a career, only a test of your perseverance in seeing it through but what if those doubts persist, or if they always live somewhere in the background of your thoughts? If it just does not feel right?

If this is the case, then it is time to look more carefully at your career choice and overall career objectives.

Often we choose or are placed in a career because it just seems like the right step to make or that is what your studies have focused on.

The only problem is that sometimes that passion that we once had as a young adult are now gone, or the realism of the job has taken the interest and joy out of it.

Are you feeling disillusioned because you can’t seem to achieve your career goals? Well, you’re not alone. There are so many other people like you who can’t seem to achieve their goals. Why? Simply because there are no shortcuts to success – only sheer persistence, hard work and patience.

To achieve your career goals, let’s start with these 7 basic and essential steps.

1. Know Your Worth
For starters, know your worth. We are here for a purpose and we all have our unique strengths that can be used for the various roles at work. When you know your worth and know what you are good at, making those unique quality shine is easy.

Constantly reflect on what value you can bring to your work and improve on your skills to make yourself even more valuable.

Learn to be helpful even when by being helpful others may think you are being stupid. Volunteer to do extra. Especially things no one else wants to do. When you volunteer for these assignments, do your best. You will learn to expand your scope of existing skills, and when you do it sincerely often enough someone in power will notice.

Improve Yourself
You know you have strengths you can use. But know of your weaknesses too. Learn about your weaknesses from early on and look for ways to improve yourself. Do not be stubborn and think that your weaknesses are not major flaws that will pull you back.

The faster you start at improving yourself the more chances you have at dissolving these weaknesses. Some weaknesses are easier to change but others will take time. Eventually with commitment and effort, you will be able to become a better person and hence a better worker.

I can never stop emphasizing the importance setting career goals. Goal setting is a powerful process for reminding and motivating ourselves of what we need and can achieve. So, if you want to know how to achieve career success, learn to write your goals down. But that is the easy part.

Once you have written it down and start to act upon your plan, the path will be filled of obstacles. When you meet with obstacles, learn to adjust, improve and keep moving forward, whilst staying on course of your career goals. Know that you need the right understanding and right effort to get what you want.

4. Right Attitude
To achieve your career goals, maintaining a right attitude is essential. Right attitude can mean many things; the most important being commitment, action, pride, passion and belief. Commitment – you keep your promises to others and yourself. Act – you act upon things and not just talk. Do while others talk and idle time away. Pride – do your best each time you work on something knowing it has your name on it. Passion – you do it because you love what you do. Belief – believe in the work that you do and how it can contribute to your company and society. Know that whatever you want to achieve, you can get it.

The difference between people who succeed and those who fail is not talent but perseverance. Success goes to the person who can run that extra mile.

Read the success stories of successful people and you will realize that they have all been patient waiting for the fruits of their labor to bloom and they plough harder when the going gets tough.

Your personal goal setting can be in these areas:

1. Attitude
What are the attitudes and habits that are holding you back from reaching greater heights? How is this attitude affecting you, your career and your relationship with your family? Make specific points to change this attitude that is affecting the way you behave. Your attitude determines how far you can go in life. Take time to confront your negative attitude and make a plan to change it. This area of personal goal setting is one of the most important.

2. Career
In the course of interviewing hundreds of candidates, I am sometimes surprised at the number of candidates that do not have career goals. Where do you want to be in 3 years time? Where do you see yourself in 5 years time? How will you get there? What are the skills you need? What are the potential barriers? As a career builder newbie, you may not have all the answers. In that case, seek someone you can talk to or better yet – mentor you.

3. Education
Continuous education is important for success in life. Not just your career. And education should not be just for the sake of career promotions although people often do that. You may want to learn new things that can enrich your life. Learning is a process, a journey – not a destination. You should never stop learning in order to improve.

4. Family
How much time do you want to spend with your family? What are some of the things that you have neglected to do for them the past year? Something that you have always wanted to do for them – perhaps a holiday? Put these down in writing. It may seem simple but trust me this is one area where it is challenging for personal goal setting. Sometimes we misplace our priorities.

5. Financial
How much money do you want to save by when? What would be the big-ticket items that you would like to buy? A house? A car? How much do you plan to earn by when? Having a financial goal is crucial in enjoying the material side of things. Financial rewards are directly related to our careers. Therefore, they are important in your personal goal setting.

6. Health – Physical/Mental
If you aren’t healthy physically and mentally, you won’t be able to enjoy the fruits of your labor. What are the steps you are willing to take in order to achieve optimum physical and mental health? Do you plan to run X number of days in a week? Meditate an hour each day? What are the measurements you would use for the goals in this area?

7. Personal/Social
Allocate time for yourself too. Set a goal to achieve this for yourself. This is your time for the things you enjoy. Is it getting together with friends? Or it could be meeting new friends. Some people measure their success by the amount of free time they have for themselves to pursue their hobbies.

These are some of the areas you can consider when considering your personal goal setting. If you are ambitious enough – choose each of these areas and start writing some goals for these to be achieved for the year.