Free Career Goals Development Essay Sample
Short-Term and Long-Term Career Goals
Every day people are becoming more and more interested in their career development and personal growth. A good example to understanding of human desire to gain career promotion is the Maslow’s pyramid which covers five levels. The first one begins with the basic needs of individual and the last one discloses his or her self-actualization needs. Hence, the category of workers, which finds career as a vital aspect of their life, is at the top of the Maslow’s pyramid. Hence, career goal is a means of improving one’s working position, a tool for career advancement, and a way to get job satisfaction.
Career goals may be distinguished between short-term and long-term goals. There are several important stages in setting the both long-term and short-term career goals: highlighting the priorities of each goal, their total recognizing, and goals’ analysis for probable commitment and conflict. Moreover, there is no isolation for short-term and long-term career goals in terms that they may be tightly connected with many other factors and situations, or even be strongly influenced by them.
Short-term goals
Short-term goals are characterized by a short period of achievement, for example, a few weeks, months or years. Time period is set by an individual personally; it may depend on complicacy of a goal or of availability of tools for achieving it. The examples of short-term goals maybe found in improving business skills, gaining as much experience as possible, furthering education or increasing in wages. Short-term aims are necessary for person’s long-term ambitions. Nevertheless, short-term goals often demand more responsibility in a current workplace, permanent educational improvement to become more qualified for a desirable position, and person’s strong willpower to accomplish positive results. Moreover, short-term targets always relate to long-term objectives, and they both should be well-organized. The examples of short-term career goals may include applying to many different companies for the same position, taking peculiar classes necessary for a preferable position, learn how to conduct new projects and develop different strategies. Generally, operational plan of short-term goals includes the small steps of everyday efforts. Creating short-term goals is a way to manage one’s time.
There is also a special type of shorter-term goal called an enabling goal, which aims at helping person to achieve a long-term goal, because it is considered as a stepping stone that supports man to make him facilitate progress. After achieving one enabling goal, a smart person had better set new enabling goals in order to reach the level of long-term goals.
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Long-term goals
Before setting long-term goals people should work in reverse, which means to decide where they want to go and work backward in order to figure out all necessary steps that might get them to this career position. When the destination is clear then a person had better focus on his or her distant future. Nevertheless, it presupposes conceptual and operational goals. First ones are broad and include person’s needs and desires. At the same time operational part deals with real actions taken by person to those needs and wants.
There are several things concerning long-term career ambitions that are very important. They are responsibilities at work that are interesting to a person and bring professional and personal growth. Doubtless, when a person is satisfied with his or her job, it is easier and more pleasurable for this person to always go through new challenges, take opportunities and disclose strengths and inner potential. Consequently, personal distinction between preferable and non- preferable things and responsibilities at work remains essential. Additionally, each one must have a big consideration about the characteristics of company, or generally workplace or position they find important to him or her. Everybody has the right to choose whether to work from home and be closer to children, to own his or her own business, always be busy, and stay far from beloved people, or take a kind of active and creative profession that demands a lot of travelling, for example. Once person has an idea of what sort of work and its conditions he or she likes, is good at or wants, these may be a starting point for the long-term career operational plans. Hence, conceptual targets include peculiarities of preferable job. In case when one of person’s conceptual goals is to work in a creative occupation, then an operational aim may be to become a special graphic designer for some PR agency or an advertising company. There are many people who have already been working as professionals, but they do not feel satisfied with such situation. Hence, they should advance their positions in the way of thinking about what peculiar positions they would like to have. The example of the long-term career goals may be a recent college graduate that wants to become the art director of one international company. This operational objective is serious and, surely, will take many years, as well as many steps and efforts to get it. Therefore, to have a vision of a long-term objective is a good quality, but it also demands different short-term plans.
In conclusion, person should have a steady confidence about career goals and further motivation at work. Therefore, it is necessary to remember the next things: their goals should be based on values and interests, each priority on career ladder should be specific, challenging, but real. Additionally, the both short-term and long-term goals had better have their start date and deadline, as well as be rewarded after completion.