You & your career aspirations

“Your success in your career will be in direct proportion to what you do after you've done what you are expected to do.”

What do you hope to be in your career? There is widespread tendency amongst people from all walks of life to confuse their career aspirations with their career objectives. The truth is that aspirations are poles apart from the actual work that you do.

Your aspirations facilitate the enunciation of your objectives. What is that you expect from your job? Your response will be an integral part of defining your aspirations. While there are many people who look for the prestige and concern of a conventional career path, there are others who regard monetary wellbeing of paramount importance.  In between, there are several people who want to work in technical fields so that they come to be regarded as specialists. You will also find some people who want to be independent and do not want unnecessary superintendence. And the more intelligent ones amongst all of them seek to maintain a good work-life balance. Depending upon your fundamental individual requirements, you can outline your career objectives. 

People who want standing and positions of authority and responsibility in a recognized organisation invariably fit into a conventional job very well. The implication is that when they try to define their career objectives, there has to be a marked focus on identifying a job within the company that they are serving in. Their move up will be characterised by increased responsibilities that they will invariably accept with a conforming status boost in their existing organisation. However, people who join big corporations generally rank such an aspiration as the foremost ambition. More often than not, such people visualise the roadmap to management and executive levels as the most credible way ahead. If you able to take appropriate steps early, the roadmap becomes more clear.    

Career aspirations vary from person to person. People who seek financial security above anything else are the ones who are on the lookout for more paying jobs and go in for them. The only prompting factor for such people is money. While pecuniary issues plague everybody’s mind, they are reluctant to acquiesce such an inclination. But if you acknowledge it, you can always make appropriate decisions to make such dreams come true. It may entail establishing contacts with the concerned people and also gaining practical exposure or undergoing special training in the field of work that they are in or hope to be in. The point to note is that when you direct your efforts at anything, the prospects to attain it are more.

It is rather astonishing to note that most people do not aspire for individual approbation. Therefore, there is a pessimistic and disapproving undertone in agreeing that you desire others to come to you for help and guidance; and to recognise either you or your stature as an expert in a specific field of activity.

If you make this an ingredient of your individual career objectives, you will be able to direct and concentrate your efforts; and attain your personal aspirations concurrently. People who seek independence of action and freedom from superintendence, often have an additional requirement. There are many people who do not like to be told how to go about doing whatever they are required to do. Such people will not be able to function well in a team and hence, the most viable option for them is to have their own separate enterprise. If you can come to terms with this truth, it will help you to attain any aspiration that you may harbour.

An important aspect that warrants contemplation in career aspiration is the issue of work-life balance. There are several men and women who harbour several aspirations, but nonetheless feel that they also need to maintain an optimum level of such a balance too. They seek to prioritise between their career and ambition that comprise work; and their health, pleasure, family and leisure that collectively comprise what is known as life. The truth that goads them, knowingly or unknowingly is that the good job that they are is practically attractive but not as attractive warranting devoting their life to it. If you harbour such aspirations, you have to make certain that the objectives that you set for yourself echo this requirement. Your personal aspirations are subject to change; what you seek as a young man or woman can be totally at variance with what you seek, say twenty years later because of changed circumstances of your domestic responsibilities, health imperatives and other obligations.

 You can have any or many career aspirations. Notwithstanding what they are, it is essential that you ponder over in a deliberate manner the reasons why you are engaging yourself in a particular activity. And more importantly, what do you hope to derive from it.