Getting to know yourself

In order to build a vision of what you want to be when you grow up you first need to know who you are now. To some this may sound like a very new age idea, looking inward, but it is simply a very practical thing to do before setting forth to create the career that will work best for you. Before you bake a cake you always make sure you have the right ingredients. Building a career is no different. You need the right ingredients. The exercise of “getting to know yourself” is called ‘self assessment.’ There are numerous ways to go about this including personality inventories (like the Myers-Briggs indicator); skills inventories; and reflection exercises. I included a link in the useful web sites section of this site called The Testing Room that has resources to get you started.

When completing your self assessment it is extremely important to be totally honest with yourself and to be objective as possible. This can be quite difficult so you may need to solicit the help of others who know you well. Friends, family, co-workers and colleagues can often identify your strengths and weaknesses more readily than you can. We can often be blind to some of own traits. If you choose to ask others for help be sure not to react immediately to their input. Our first instinct may lead us to be defensive. This is not constructive. Ask questions to be sure you understand what they are telling you and then take time to reflect before making a judgment on the input.

The goal of self assessment is to create an inventory of your employability skills, your personal strengths and weakness, your work preferences, your values and work style. With this information you can do a number of things. If you already know what you want to do as a career you can compare your current skills, knowledge and abilities to that which is required of the certain profession you’ve chosen. From this comparison you can identify where you need to improve and fill in gaps to help you reach that goal.

If you are unsure of what you want to do you can compare your skills and preferences to potential careers to help you figure out where you best fit. For instance if you do not enjoy working independently and focusing on detail you may not want a job as a data entry clerk.

Self awareness is a key for career success, in any career. The exercise of self assessment is an on going exercise that you should never view as complete. Most organizations have yearly performance reviews of their employees. This is an ideal time to revisit your self assessment and see how things have improved and changed for you and to apply this new learning to your career plan. The more you know about where you are the better you can plan for where you want to go.

Good things come to those who plan...

Many people believe that planning their career is too daunting a task and can't seem to decide on what path to take. Others have a very clear idea of where they want to be in 5, 10 or 20 years but are not sure how they will achieve that end. Others just want to be employed and can't imagine going through the exercise of setting medium to long term goals because they are completely focused on what they need immediately.

I don't subscribe whole-heartedly to the "do what you love and the money will follow" philosophy - I am too pragmatic for that. What I do believe is that you should "do what you can and plan for what you love." Little by little you will get there. JRR Tolkien wrote "Little by little one goes far." It seems so simple but it is true.

By looking at what you want to be 'when you grow up', what your vision is for your life (or at least the next little while) both personally and professionally, and looking at how little by little you can get there you will be amazed at what is possible, at what you can do!

So many people have the belief that there will be that moment of clarity; that all of a sudden they will know what they want and how they are going to get there. In my experience, that rarely occurs. As a student fresh out of university I felt so inadequate when I realized I didn't know what I wanted to do. Presumably I didn't know who I wanted to be. In reality I just needed to try many things to discover what I liked and what I didn't. I have learned that even those who seemed so focused in school or so sure of what they wanted have had to go through the trial and error of life to figure out what they are truly good at and what they really enjoy. They've changed direction and found new passions or focused the old passion on a new horizon.

I used to think that by setting a goal or creating a vision for my career I was limiting myself. I thought I would be locking myself into that path and if I did not complete it exactly as envisioned I was a failure. That was a hard thing to unlearn. Goals change but by setting that goal at least you get started on a journey. It is inevitable that you will reach a fork in the road or better yet have to create a new path for yourself. Either way you will learn and adjust along the way.

Another misconception I once embraced was that there is only one path to each destination. If you want to be an accountant you must take certain exact steps in an exact amount of time or you will never succeed. Granted there are specific hurdles that one must jump over to become an accountant but those hurdles can appear on a number of different pathways and along the way you may discover that the skills and tasks you enjoy so much about accounting can be used for this other profession down this other path that is far more interesting and exciting to you! Good thing you ventured that way or you never would have found it!

Setting some goals and coming up with a plan of how you will achieve those goals simply allows you to focus and understand the progress you are making. Revisiting the plan lets you see what you have achieved, how you have changed and helps you refocus. The plan is a tool to move you along, not a trap to lock you into a direction.

Now that I have made a case for making a plan and embarking on the path you choose, I would like to give you the tools to do so. Please check back to this site monthly as I outline strategies to help you along the path to achieving your vision, whatever that may be.

Also, please contact me if you are interested in one-on-one consultations. I would love our paths to meet!

Yours truly,

Kathleen