Time, Space & Encouragement

It may feel like it sometimes

but other people are not in your way

No one is in your way

[Image courtesy of katclay on Flickr]

A Career Manifesto

I was chatting with someone recently and they mentioned their personal career manifesto.

It was made up of career-related beliefs and promises that this individual had made to himself. He recorded these key points by writing them down, with the full intention of living the beliefs and keeping the promises!

[To the moon Alice!: see more at Saundra's Photostream here] ✪

The more I thought about it, the more it interested me as a concept. It also appeared to fit quite well with the kind of strategic planning I complete with my clients as part of their career management process. I suppose the thing that surprised me is the word manifesto. The only time you ever hear this word in the UK is when there are elections and the political parties each issue a manifesto to communicate to us (the voters) why they should be elected.

Not because we don't know what the word means but because it is always worth exploring a definition for the insight it might give us. Here is what the dictionary says about a manifesto:

manifesto:  a written statement of the beliefs, aims and policies of an organisation, especially a political party (my thanks to Cambridge Online Dictionaries, as always)

What starts to get exciting about the above definition is that a manifesto is typically associated with an organisation. This inventive individual was actually treating his career and going about his career management in the way a group or a company would organise themselves (set an agenda, have a vision, measure progress, etc.). Apart from anything else, what a fantastic piece of evidential insight for the way the world of careers and work is changing!

[Taxi on Bay Bridge, San Francisco - see more at Saundra's Photostream here] ✪

Back to the manifesto itself: it was full of the kind of qualitative and quantitative targets that would not only allow progress to be made but to be measured as well. This career manifesto was effectively a self-binding contract that the individual was planning to hold himself to throughout his job search and career management activity. [Jason Alba with JibberJobber (a job search management tool) does something similar but this was the first time I had seen anything in this kind of structure.]

So, seeing it made me want to ask: What are your thoughts on having a career manifesto as an idea? Useful, overkill, useless?!?

The more I think about it, the more merit I see, especially if you are the kind of person (like me) who benefits from any kind of deadline or motivational objective.

Send in your thoughts & opinions on career manifestos and let's see what we find :)

All the best for now,

Paul

[✪ For those interested, here's why Saundra & I chose the above images for this post: 'Alice' not only looks closely at the road ahead, the moon is the subject of the shot too. What a great analogy for career management we thought! Concentrate on the road ahead but look to the moon as well!! The 'Taxi' in the second image is a cool analogy for strategic career planning. You never get into a taxi without an objective. You don't always know the route a taxi will take but it you know it will get you there, and sometimes quicker than you expected too! Hope this helps explain our choices, Saundra & Paul :)]

Where the research leads...

The longer I spend in career-related work, the more supporting evidence I find for self-led choices being the best method of delivering sustainable, career-long satisfaction and success.

Work/life fusion has focused on researching, understanding and assisting this form of career decision-making and direction-finding since its very first post but - since you are asking for clarification - what exactly are self-led choices and where can all this research lead?

It is too frustrating and too simple to say that you already have the answers but there is some truth in that statement. It is more accurate to say that you can arrive at meaningful career answers through experiences that you already possess. [It also helps that the latter of these two statements can be qualified and is much more defensible too.]

This blog has referred to our past career experiences as assets. Over time, the belief that our career experiences are genuine assets hasn't changed but maybe it has become easier to express.

[Peace within a storm - see more at Saundra's Photostream here]

In the past, career support services (advice, guidance, outplacement, etc.) were happiest when they were defining our external search. In other words, individual career support was largely based on helping us find something that was missing, something that we hadn't yet found. Once an individual could see what the missing piece was (whether it was a job, a job-title, a certain level of earnings or anything else) their strategy in its simplest form amounted to little more than 'Go get it!'

Growing evidence I have encountered suggests that 'career services' will behave differently in the future and that one of the key differences will be a new emphasis on supporting self-led choice. Self-led career choices are more relevant to our individual career experiences, based more firmly on individually relevant evidence and possess a much closer fit with our individual values, talents and goals.

As it always does, time will provide the ultimate proof but the results of structured research into what each of us wants and can achieve from our individual careers, in my view creates career opportunities too exciting to miss!

Here are a couple more posts on the broader subject of self-led choice:

Ash's story - Career Decision Success!

Career Management from within

Career management & self-esteem

Career management & belief

All the best for now,

Paul

Career expertise

Career success relies on knowing your own strengths but it is also helped a great deal when you appreciate expertise in other people too.

Knowing what you do well - and when to call upon the expertise of those around you - enhances success in a number of ways.

'Best-in-class' leaders know that expertise is at its best when it is valued and applied appropriately. When this happens, experts complete their work to the best of their ability and achieve the best possible results.

As an example of the link between leadership and the value of expertise, how many times has an under-performing team had their fortunes turned around by a change in leadership before a change in team personnel?

[I'm no expert botanist but that is one tiny shell!]

The importance of knowing where our expertise lies - and when to apply it - is a big step forward in terms of career management.

Recognising and applying the expertise of those around you is an equally important step because it requires us to use our judgement objectively, values the contribution of other people and ensures that our own expertise stands out even more because it is applied only when and where it is needed the most!

For more about the importance of expertise in career management, follow these links:

Making network connections

Expert career advice

work/life fusion: talents

Know what you are doing

work/life fusion, perspective and perception

All the best for now!

Paul

Who are the partners in your career?

Career articles sometimes have questions for titles but how many ask us for an individual answer?

I won't pretend to be completely blameless on the annoying rhetorical question front but this is one question that can only be considered independently. Yes, a career is something we all have in common but we are all individuals. There are times when only thinking for ourselves will do.

Here is one question that can only be answered by you: Who are the partners in your career?

[Look closer and you might see something you missed!]

Last year I wrote about the people who have a long-term interest in your career. That article highlighted the difference between the people showing an interest in your career today and the smaller group of people who are with you for the long haul. This article is really about clarifying that small group of interested people and considering partnership from the perspective of our careers.

Partnership goes further than interest because it is more active and involved. Our career partners are the people who help our careers to develop; the people who offer us the benefit of their experience; the people who volunteer an opinion as we deal with difficult questions; the people who challenge our beliefs and intentions to help us succeed.

Successful careers always have partners and they create partnership opportunities for others too. The most important partners in our careers can be people we already know as well as people we are yet to meet. Realising who our partners are, how they have helped us so far and how the benefits of partnership can be extended in the future, is all the incentive we need to answer this question for ourselves.

_________________________________________________

Here are a few partnership & 'independent career thought' related links:

Interest in your career

Looking back, around and ahead

Boulos's story: Job satisfaction

Seek to understand

Time

Splitting decisions

Have a great weekend wherever you are!

All the best,

Paul