How to craft your career path
The “Ladder” isn’t always clear
When we’re younger, our journey is seemingly simple. Go to school. Get a job. Work. Retire. Even when you’re in school, someone is helping you move to that next step. Finishing 7th grade means you move on to 8th grade. If you’re struggling, you might have the funds to hire a tutor, or visit the teacher during their lunch break.
That changes drastically in the real world. Most organizations don’t have clear career trajectories (even when they say they do.) Some even have an up-or-out model that wouldn’t work so well back in 7th grade. Can you imagine someone saying you really just aren’t great at 7th grade so see ya later? And as much as we want there to be a tutor or teacher willing to help - we don’t always have the mentors or managers that can get us there.
So that means we have to build our own ladder. Or jungle gym. Or path. Whatever it is, it’s important to build that for yourself.
What is a career path and why is it so important?
A “career path” is simply the path your career takes. Some organizations might call these professional growth trajectories. Colleges might use your overarching path as your “major” with all the courses you need to take to succeed.
Our paths can be winding, and sometimes taking the next step isn’t clear. Our companies, managers, family members don’t always know what we should be taking on next.
By starting to chart your personal career path you’re able to better assess where you are, and where you want to go.
If you’re looking at the next position, or your boss’ boss and saying “nope, not for me,” starting to think about your career path beyond the confines of your current role or organization is essential.
Instead of having each mile marker laid out, it’s easier to focus on the areas we want to visit - no matter how long it takes.
How to craft your career path
When you’re trying to figure out what’s next a lot of us get stuck. How do you know what to take on next? How do you learn what it should look like. How do you know you’re going to want to do this for next 30 years?
Well. You don’t.
Things change.
Even when you get the perfect job at the perfect place and you can see yourself retiring from that role - you have no control over whether or not that company is about to get acquired, the amazing management is going to depart, or the market is going to change rapidly and the company will get shut down.
What we do have control over is being able to understand where we are, what we’ve got going for us, and what can help us.
Three ways to get crafting your career path
1. The SWOT analysis.
When we’re thinking about our career we can get caught up in the details. Or more often than not, the LinkedIn titles of our former colleagues. Let’s get away from that with this simple tool to put everything in one place.
Here’s how it works:
First make sure you’ve reflected on where you’re at. Great.
Here are the four questions to ask yourself:
What are your strengths
What are your weaknesses
What are your opportunities
What are your threats
After you have this in front of you, you actually have a career path that is slowly getting defined.
You’re clear on the opportunities ahead of you based on your strengths. And, you’ve taken stock of your own weaknesses to work on and the threats that might blindside you as you move forward.
With this outlined, you know who to reach out for, what you need to work on, and how to maximize your capabilities. It won’t necessarily chart you to your last role before retirement, but it should give more clarity towards the next move. Besides, if you’re still working with the same set of strengths after a couple decades of work… we’d be worried about your learning cuve.
2. The boss’ boss review
Often when we think about the progression of our careers, we’re hyper-focused on ourselves. What do we want next? Is is that this company? The next company? Should I start a company?
If you’re interested in maintaining a more “formal” career path, i.e. trying to move through the professional development and growth opportunities within your own organization… don’t look at your boss.
Look at your boss’ boss. What does their day-to-day look like? What tasks are they taking on?
Imagine yourself in that role. What would be exciting? Nerve wracking? Thrilling?
If you’re eyeing your boss’ boss and saying, well… no way do I want that life.
GOOD.
It doesn’t mean you’re on the wrong track. It means that you know what works for you and what doesn’t work for you.
The next step is to figure out if you can get more of what works for you in your life. Would it require a shift to a different team? A different type of organization? Smaller? Larger? Different industry?
A lot more open questions than closed, but remember, just because you’re not interested in the next couple of levels up doesn’t mean that you’re stuck. In fact, you might simply be the a specialist, or an individual contributor. What “up” looks like to you might be delivering on even more subject matter expertise. That’s great!
And if you’re already too close to the top (with fear in your eyes), it might be time to start thinking about what it’ll take to create a more holistic relationship with your career, ambitions, and longer term goals.
3. Ask an expert
If you’re clear on your strengths, but want to gain more clarity around what to do with them, ask an expert.
Reach out to your network to get access to folks that have the role you think you want.
Ask them for an informational interview.
Come prepared with questions tailored to what their journey looked like - and gain clarity around what you might need to work on to get there, too. You might discover that “perfect” role isn’t all it’s cracked up to be. That’s helpful, too! Although it’s also disheartening.
Too nervous? Go hunting for your idols’ backstories. Find their podcast interviews, scour their LinkedIns, read their biographies. You’ll be able to start seeing the patterns in their paths. Pro tip? Keep an eye out for the opportunities they were given - sometimes your favorite leaders might have gotten there more swiftly than our regular person. It doesn’t mean you won’t make it without access to secret networks… it just means it might take you longer than it did for them.
If you’re interested in more schooling - connect with alumni to hear about their journey, what they liked, what they didn’t… oh… and what their ROI was before you take on more debt.
Now that you know a whole lot more about your SWOT, the levels at your org, and are inspired by other people’s journeys…your next step might be talking to your manager about how you can meet the opportunities you outlined. Or it could be gaining new skills in an area of weakness. Who knows, maybe you need to write your own job description - and then compare it to your company’s goals.
So there you have it. It’s not as simple as a+b=c, but honestly, if crafting your career path was that simple you’d probably be bored. We’re not in seventh grade anymore.
Curious about crafting that path together? Reach out.