Advancing your career is an important step that many individuals take to move forward in their professional and personal lives. It can be difficult to know where to start with it, so consider reading this article to learn of ways to advance your career.
Decide Your Career Path
According to FlexMyFinances.com, the first major step in advancing your career is to figure out the path you want to take. You may be working in one industry right now, that you have zero interest in working in for the rest of your life. The secret is to look at your passions and find something that you can relate to. Everyone approaches work differently, so think of what interests you, whether money or passion.
Work With A Career Coach
If you are stuck with what you want to do with your career, then it may be worth your time to contact a career coach. These career coaches can work with you to find out what you want to do with your life, and how you can get there. They can either work with you to train you new skills, or just work with you to find some passions you weren’t aware you could transform into work.
It’s possible that your employer may provide you with a career coach, or you can look elsewhere to find one on your own. Either way, you should ensure that you work with someone you are comfortable with, so that you can move in the right direction.
Set Career Goals
If you want to find an effective way to advance your career, it may benefit you to set yourself some career goals. These goals can come in a few different forms, with the most common and famous one being a five year plan. These five year plans can help find where you want to be within five years, either with you at your current business or elsewhere.
These plans can help show you the stepping stones you need to take to get there, either small steps or big ones. Think of it as an informal plan on what you need to do. It may be that you need to put extra work in, or that you need to learn new skills to move elsewhere.
Take On Extra Educational Courses
Whether you are currently in employment or simply unemployed looking to enhance your skills, you should take some educational courses. Educational courses come in a variety of verticals and functionalities, offering something for everyone. Many adults get it into their heads that once they’ve left school or graduated from university, that that is the end of their educational path in life.
In fact, as a modern professional, you should be looking to continuously learn. No professional will ever get to the point that they are complete with learning. That is because of changing trends and market influence that means you need to work to keep up.
What educational courses you look into will largely depend on your industry and job role. Some courses will benefit all industries, such as management and leadership courses. These courses can help you develop the skills or enhance your ability to run a business team. This could put you in a prime position for a promotion, as you’ve demonstrated to your employer that you are willing to put in the hard work and apply yourself.
You can engage with courses either online or in person to find a solution that meets your expectations and demands. You will need to conduct your own research, to help you make an informed decision on what course you should pursue. You can discover more from reading course syllabuses, or contacting them yourself directly for answers.
Grow Your Network
If you are able to, you should look to grow your network. If you’re unsure what this exactly means, know that it refers to the amount of business connections you have. This could be connections you’ve made organically from working within business, or it could be from a third-party source, such as with LinkedIn. Either way, there are many benefits from being able to grow your network.
The main benefit being that it opens up a few different doors for yourself. You may be able to rely on these connections to help you get you and your business through some tough times. For example, the business you work at may be having some supply issues, either due to stock availability or the economy in general. If there is someone within your network who operates as a supplier, they may be able to work with you to find a solution.
As an individual, growing your network means growing the amount of people who know your name and what you can do. This will inevitably lead to you being given more direct job opportunities and interviews, as they will have someone in mind for a position before heading to the open job market.
Volunteer More
Employers may look more positively at those who have volunteered in some capacity. This could mean volunteering with the business in general, or it could refer to volunteering in a charity of some kind. Businesses pay attention to what you get up to, and believe they can get a good measure on the sort of person you are by seeing your volunteering record.
However, the truth is that it may not be feasible to expect every worker to have time to volunteer, as they may have other commitments in their life that they need to make. Volunteering is all well and good when you have spare time and the capacity to do so, but it shouldn’t take priority in your life over your own wellbeing.
If you believe volunteering to be something important that you want to actively engage in more, consider speaking to your employers about doing something worthwhile with work. They may be able to fund certain ventures, or at least provide you with the time off you need to engage with more regular volunteering.
Pay Attention
If you are currently in a workplace and want to advance in this place, it will benefit you to pay more attention in your role. It is unlikely you will be selected for any sort of job opportunity if you can’t show any basic interest in your job. Try to pay attention more even in a job role that you believe you have mastered.
If an employer sees you not paying attention in your current role, then it’s unlikely that they will be very impressed. Show more understanding of what is going on within management, as this will show you to be more interested in the business.
Speak Up
If you feel like there is something going on within the business that you could fix or improve upon, then it would be important to mention it to management. If you don’t speak up, and somebody else eventually realises the same thing you did, then they may be able to claim all of the credit.
Speak up to your employers not just about any improvements you can see, but any problems you or someone else is experiencing as well. The more you get involved with a business, the more you can show interest in its success. This could be a deciding factor in promoting you or advancing your career in general.
