The technique of career planning

Any time spent in career planning is not wasted for the simple reason that such planning puts you in a forward-moving mode in a direction that you like your compass to indicate. When you engage in career planning, you acquire immense transparency and intelligibility pertaining to your career aims. Career planning per se should be undertaken prior to setting out on your maiden job hunt.

More often than not, men and women tend to get bogged down during the initial stages itself. This is largely because of the variety of career options available and the tags of advantages attached to them tend to lure everybody. The career options available are rather bewildering and prompt feelings of uncertainty and insecurity. You thus get to view a career option as unsuitable for you, though in actuality it is not so.

Career planning can help you in ways more than one. You can approach the process in two ways. The first method entails discerning what you have a penchant for and then go for it without bothering for it may offer you subsequent years. In the second method, you discern what actually inspires you and then you acquire the requisite skills and proficiencies for it. While if you follow the first method, the entire career journey that you undertake will be a gratifying ride; and if you follow the second approach, you will work your way up gradually towards your incentive, something that could be enumerated as an outcome of your very pursuit. But, either way, you get and come to be whatever you aspire for.

Irrespective of the path that you elect to trudge upon, it is essential that you are aware of all your plusses and minuses, your strongpoints and weak-points. You need to carry out an honest introspection to evaluate yourself. You should recall all your achievements, all pats on your backs and all praises and commendations. In addition, you should also recollect efforts and events that really ignited fervour and enthusiasm in you. If you make a record of your attainments and accomplishments, you will be surprised to see that a pattern or precedent will surface. You will discern that perhaps you excel at organising events or engaging in physical doings; or at creative work or tending to poor and needy. Each of your penchants highlights some innate attribute of yours or manifests a career choice by itself. Where any of your inherent attribute is highlighted, they could well turn out to be valuable assets in your future career preferences.

The next step is to identify things that motivate and encourage you – things that you wish for. All things that one wishes for are actually imaginings and visions in some form or the other; and perhaps always meant to be attained. Having identified whatever you aspire for, you should find where exactly you stand between your current status and your eventual objective. This portrait will become richer, more vibrant and flawless; and as it does so, you will experience a feeling of self-assuredness, consciousness and single-mindedness. These qualities, once identified will tell you what your plus-points, rather marketable plus-points are.

It is also possible for you to take note of careers that offer you a standard of living or even specific returns. Evidently, these have to be founded on the degree of ambition enjoyed by you as also your very outlook. To illustrate the point, a marketing career will be ideal for you if you love travelling and meeting people. It is essential that all your responses to introspection conducted by you should be candid, truthful and devoid of any conjectures or presuppositions. There are several people who get carried away by glitzy fallacies and are compelled to change their decisions subsequently. The crux is that you should take up a career that is your cup of tea. Remember that progress, recompenses, incentives, appreciations and contentment are a result of only one singular disposition – you must be in love with your job.   

Once you decide on the bearing that you need to set on your career compass, you need to build up your capabilities and proficiencies. Different careers call for different competencies and which cannot be acquired by a single training course. You will be able to excel in the pursuit that you elect to follow only if you aim to be nothing short of No. 1. It will be necessary that you imprint your personal marque on it. In addition, apprenticeship training, volunteer work and informational interviews, etc. are some other ways to get to know what your future will be like and what you need to do to gear up for it.

There is no career that does not call for good communication skills. You should be adept at both spoken and written communications. There are other skills that you should also focus on, notable being developing a social attitude, adhering to workplace ethics, working under stress and being an eternal learner.

If you have an objective, the need to be absolutely clear about it needs no emphasis. It is only then that you should begin inching forward towards it. And as you move ahead, the process of acquisition of skills and knowledge will be concurrent. But the most important thing is to take the first step forward.

Challenges of a multigenerational workplace

All along, workplaces have always had representations of the young, middle-aged and the elderly. There was no escape of having these three generations working all together and harmoniously - the youngsters, new-entrants as they are can well be described as greenhorns, the middle-aged who hold appointments necessitating superintendence and the elderly who have worked for nearly four decades and holding senior positions. Each of this generation is armed with its own peculiarities and which could prompt some contradictions, if not discord in the environment.

Workplaces of today are just the same what they were in the past, like any household or family, where grandparents, parents and children always existed. The difference however is one – there happen to be noticeable differences in the principles, standards, method of talking and work dispositions of each generation. And very soon, with superannuation getting delayed for various reasons, you could well have four generations required to function together. In the light of the foregoing, top management of companies ought to well-prepared to face the difficulties in integrating newer employees and at the same time ensuring that the respect attached to the rank and familiarity of older workers is not diluted. There is no denying the fact that as new generations enter a workplace, a period of adaptation is necessitated at both fringes. The new-entrants should revere and understand; and the older lot who are well-entrenched with their skills acknowledged should try to adjust and shed all rigidity. Organisations could possibly challenge their workers to triumph over generational dissimilarities, take inconveniences in stride and handle all difficult situations together and efficiently.

The issue however, is not all that easy too. How can corporate leadership render a multigenerational work environment more prolific, more efficacious and more congenial? There are three major challenges that are faced by the modern workplace, viz, communication flair, downbeat typecasts and cultural aspirations. Dealing with them calls for diligence as under:

· Communication flairs & preferences: The young prefer to make use of SMSs, What’s App and tweets, etc while the senior lot is more inclined to speaking on the telephone and emails to a large extent. The younger lot uses abbreviated and colloquial forms which take time for deciphering by the elderly lot. And that disrupts the communication lines. Formality is no more there and the absence of which is viewed as impudence and contempt by the elderly lot.  How do you address this vexed issue, particularly when there is no indication of any side relenting? Top management and employees should make intensive endeavours to communicate in ways appreciated by others. Perhaps joint training in teambuilding could facilitate removal of some impediments that have surfaced because of an upsurge in digital communications.

· Downbeat typecasts: The elderly generation sees the youngsters as a lethargic, favoured and excessively impatient lot. On the contrary, the younger generation sees in their elders a reluctance to learn, inability to grasp things and rigidity to shed the old mentality and outlook. To subjugate existing typecasts is indeed a difficult proposition. It actually calls for a conscious effort to differentiate own endowments and disallow prejudiced ideas in executing the same on your behalf. Employees at all levels will have to harmonise and coordinate their visualisation of success with work tenets that necessitate following to attain it. This implies a readiness to perform more than what is otherwise expected of you. How can the top management intervene to resolve this problem? It can always intrude and mediate whenever they foresee a difficult situation emerging on account of prevailing misapprehensions and generational conclusions. It should be stressed that the experience of the elderly lot matters, but that cannot be allowed to remain inviolable and to impede generation of new thinking and concepts. Youngsters should be encouraged to persist with their zeal and efforts tom experiment with newer things; some control over them would be necessitated as they may not fully comprehend associated hazards of their pursuits.

· Cultural aspirations: With the workplaces having been inflicted by changing technologies, there has been another concurrent fallout. A consequential shift in cultural aspirations has also been given birth. This development is undoubtedly a jolting experience for the elderly lot because they have been used to the ‘work more, well done’ philosophy. The younger generation feels that the time spent at the workplace is secondary; what matters more is the final outcome. Coming to work in time or leaving late is of no consequence. You can work from home and increase your overall productivity. The younger lot has perhaps been brought up in an environment where both their parents were working people and hence great emphasis is placed by them on balancing the obligations of work and domestics both. This difference in thinking is going to be hard to bridge.  Higher management of companies should display flexibility in permitting employees to work in their own styles and appreciate the contributions made by them to bring about improvement and productivity.

Every generation has its own positive aspects. It brings with them its own skillsets and cultural models. At the workplace, an amalgamation should take place wherein different generations, different individualities and different geniuses work for the attainment of a common objective. It is only then that an organisation will be able to make certain that they are bringing new outlooks to otherwise customary glitches.     

Meaning & significance of career planning

Career planning is a sort of conduit that connects your present with your future. If there is no linkage between the two, you will not be able to negotiate the vast expanse that lies between them and resultantly, you will become directionless and insecure. It can be of great benefit, irrespective of the fact whether you are in a job and like or hate the same; or likely to take up one. Every person should take some time off from the daily tight schedule of work and ponder on matters related to the development of one’s career.  

You must visualise your career plan from two perspectives – something that is relevant for the immediate future, say the ensuing one to five years and something for the distant future, say five years hence and beyond. Some fundamental guidelines for both are enumerated in the succeeding paragraphs.

Planning for the immediate future

Though the duration of the focus could be anything up to five years, it is all dependent upon an individual. The vital feature of any planning for the immediate future is creating objectives that are possible to be attained in the short term. It is necessary that you also liberate yourself of all mental barricades that could be highly personal like lethargy and demotivation; a tendency to defer actions and decisions; any compulsion to join a family business; and a pressure to follow a specific pursuit or shun a particular career path.

It should be appreciated that planning and deciding on a career is a very significant life activity and hence you should not tire yourself unnecessarily so that at appropriate times, you can make crucial decisions and exercise correct options. You must also appreciate that the entire process and procedure of career planning is constantly undergoing a change and hence calls for a deliberate and measured effort to:

· Evaluate your current and future lifestyle: You will need to determine if you are happy with your routine and everyday life or not; and whether you need to alter it or not. If you are clear about what you seek vis-à-vis your lifestyle, you should identify issues that are its fundamental characteristics. The vital question therefore is, “Does your present career path facilitate leading the lifestyle that you seek. 

· Scrutinise your fervours: You must contemplate on moments when you feel fervent the most the times and situations in which you feel most spirited, most busy and appointed. It is then that you should scrutinise if a common profile of the situations can be developed or not. You must also catalogue your passions and whether they surface while working or not.

· Examine your strongpoints and weak-points: For a moment, you should wear the hat of your management and then view yourself from his standpoint. You will be able to identify your strongpoints and weak-points. It is necessary that you reflect in terms of your qualifications, expertise, knowledge practical exposure and own individualities. 

·  Evaluate what success means to you:  Everybody has a personal definition of success and what it implies. Is it money, authority, control and satisfaction?

·  Assess you personality: There are basically two forms of a personality – introvert and extrovert. Which category do you fall in? Are you a thinking person or do you prefer being on the ground working? Are you averse to change or do you feel at ease in a state of flux? Do you prefer static jobs or action jobs?

·  Analyse the job of your dreams: You should think quietly and come up with an idea of what a job that you have inspired for is all about. It is necessary that you do this exercise sans any downbeat influences and look within for ideas within to identify alternative options, should you discern current arrangements not favourable. 

·  Probe your present state of affairs: Unless you are clear about where you are at the moment, you cannot undertake any planning. Therefore you should probe your conditions and identify where precisely you are; all your future plans have to be with reference to it.  

Having done the above, you should next proceed to envision yourself and the shape of your career over the ensuing couple of years. When the process of envisioning is complete and the mental image is up to your satisfaction, you should get on to crafting a plan to accomplish your objectives. This would entail the following:

· Deciding on the next move and narrowing down your focus on one or two career choices.

· Researching various aspects of a career to understand its nuances well.

· Identifying qualifications that you would require to step on to the next higher level or execute a career change and take necessary action for acquiring them in an appropriate timeframe.

Planning for the distant future

Career planning that extends beyond five years from now will entail a wider and more comprehensive groundwork and guiding principles. Due to environmental demands and technological advancements, everything about practically every career is being subjected to change, so much so that even expertise and skills sought after today may become redundant a couple of years hence.

In the light of the above, career planning for the distant future ought to focus more on the recognition and improvement of core skills that companies will regard. Concurrently, personal and career objectives should also be upgraded. Actions should thus be initiated for the acquisition and development of core workplace competencies; the focus should invariably be, amongst others on communication skills, crisis management and lessons on teamwork. You should also make efforts to identify new career and job tendencies so that you are better geared to face the challenges of change. This will be possible when you remain active while planning for the immediate future.

Planning for the long term implies understanding your career outlooks and concerns; being clear about what a career change involves and knowing more about different careers; knowing in detail additional qualifications that you need to acquire and how; the manner in which you should be doing self-promotion. If you are able to find a career to which you are adapted by temperament and outlook; and then work hard, there is no way that you will not succeed in it. And the best part of this is that once you find the right career, hard work will cease to be so. Your career will be a pleasure ride. 

Help yourself to professional advancement

You run a greater risk of becoming excessively self-assured and smug about professional advancement when you happen to be in a job. In most cases, people who are already employed do not make extraordinary efforts to heighten their skills, particularly when they appreciate that such skills may not be of much use while serving in the company. You fail to understand that when you take any step that could possibly help you to grow professionally, you are bound to succeed in some field or the other – perhaps today or even tomorrow. However, if you do not add up to your skills and qualifications, there is every likelihood of your colleagues and even juniors overtaking you in your career journey – something that could turn out to be highly disadvantageous when you aspire to move into some higher slot. 

It is inescapable to pay due attention to your professional development if you seek to remain relevant in your field. Just in case you fail to add any additional qualification or skill to your list for a couple of years, you are likely to be rendered redundant. With competition getting tough and the employment climate being what it is, you have to harbour an open-minded and avant-garde outlook; and focus on what would be required in your next higher designation. Considering various factors, it is essential that you acquire more and more transferable skills so that you get to stay relevant in different roles in different industries in the times to follow.

Being in command of your own professional advancement has become an imperative today; this has been brought about by the recent economic slowdown wherein companies have expressed their reluctance to facilitate employees grow beyond their fundamental functions. Today, you find employees not willing to stay on with companies – something that was not heard of in the yesteryears – and as a result of which, the value attached to training an employee who could be lost is not appreciated. In other words, if the aim is to preclude attrition, facilities for professional advancement need to be provided.  But since that is not being executed on ground, you yourself have to be at the wheels of your career.

Some methods that can help you in the advancement of your career are:

· Acquire new skills: Getting into a job does not imply that it the end of your learning effort. You can always enrol for evening, weekend, correspondence or even online classes to acquire additional qualifications. You should continue to move ahead and acquire knowledge in any domain, howsoever relevant or unconnected with your current work it may be. Learning a new skill can be done if you can identify those that are desirable and then start putting them into action. You can also consider going in for honorary assignments because they doing so will throw open opportunities to become adept at skills that otherwise you would not have been able to become proficient at.

· Engage in informational interviews: They will provide you with hands-down experience on issues that you have so far not been good at. You will learn the nuances of work that you intend taking up subsequently, besides boosting your PR and widening your contact base. You will thus be able to learn from the accomplishments and mistakes of others. Even if you observe how people discharge their duties, a lot can be learnt too.

· Latch on to a ‘Guru’ for guidance: You should identify a mentor – somebody who you trust and who has time for you. A person could be highly experienced but he may not have time to spare for you; such a person will never turn out to be a good mentor. But a person who is genuinely interested to help you will also facilitate the decision-making process by you. He will be a source of great encouragement by sharing his or her experiences and offering practical advice. You need to find a professional in your field whose career you would like to emulate. Your focus should be on finding a person who exhibits qualities that you would like to hone in yourself.

· Participate in professional seminars & workshops: These events are one of the most powerful career tools available and yet, far too many people tend to ignore them. You should identify seminars and workshops that are meaningful for you. Attendance or participation in them will help you to learn new skills and expand your network – all key factors for professional advancement. You should find out what is available for professionals who share your role or work in your same industry; you will thus get innumerable opportunities to meet and mingle with some of the top professionals in your field.

You should never forget that the price of success is hard work; devotion to the work you are doing and the job you are in; and the determination that whether you are successful or not, you have applied the best of yourself to the work that you are at. You may harbour apprehensions, however, your desire for success should be greater than your fear of failure. 

Gear yourself to achieve your career objectives

“It is all too easy to speed through life with our eyes focused only on the road ahead. The challenge is scanning the horizon from time to time to determine where we are headed.”

~ Christopher Gergen

One major objective that you must invariably have in life is to be able to boost the possibility of becoming an outstanding human being – somebody who accomplishes impressively and brings about a monumental difference in his or her life. Difficult it may sound, but it is not so. It is very much possible and can be masterminded by none other than you. 

In order to harness and accomplish your maximum capacities, it is necessary that you do not lose sight of your career objectives and do not let your efforts weaken. All issues and influences that are visualised for success should be clear in your minds and remain the focus of your attention. You also should make it a point that you do not fall prey to the adverse ramifications of chance, haphazardness, unpredictability and vagueness. This will be rendered possible only if you put in order your schedule and systemise your routine; by doing so, the chances of attaining your career objectives will be pitched at one hundred per cent. 

Each and everything that you seek to attain and the means for the same have a connection; and which you should comprehend fully. The most important aspect of the connection is formulation of objectives alright but the need to work hard also cannot be underestimated. This calls for being at the wheels of both your life and career; and leave nothing to fate for engineering bright times ahead.    

What brings about success – luck or hard luck? It has been generally observed that when people become successful a little earlier than others, the success is attributed to good fortune rather than to the hard work put in. And similarly, if they finish botching up their career or lives, the reason attributed is bad luck. Why people do so is more on account of ignorance. People do not appreciate the thin dividing line between chance and luck. In the case of chance, there is nothing that there is in your control. Additionally, the result that follows has no link whatsoever with success factors talked about.

The word ‘luck’, on the contrary is poles apart from what is chance. Chance, in actuality is the Law of Likelihoods being enacted. An individual who is deemed fortunate may have done several things that singly or jointly dramatically increased the likelihood of career goals being accomplished. If we were to evaluate the history of any great realisation and review several activities that preceded it, you will find that the success factors are part of them. A definite pattern would be visible. The so called patter would indicate that the individual displayed for over a year, continued hard work to be successful.

How do you go about accomplishing your objectives? There is one thing that can be asserted; there is a direct relationship between various things that you try your hands on and the probability of eventual success in achieving your career objectives. The more efforts that you put in lead to better performance and output. The results and consequences that follow (better earnings, better quality of life and a higher degree of contentment) simply cannot be attributed to good luck. On the contrary, the only thing that contributes to success is hard work and nothing else at all. And if you didn’t work hard and resultantly got no success, is your luck to be blamed?

A good education together with the career option that you exercise solicitously matching your innate qualities and skills is single-handedly the best factor. Next of course is the hard work you put in and the efforts that you make to augment your skills and qualifications. Luck, as is seen is not a factor at all – not even in the remotest possible way. While you cannot prognosticate what precisely will lead you to success, you can always tell doing what for a specific duration of time is likely to produce some positive result or the other. 

If you display ingenuity, drive and determination; and concurrently make efforts to achieve your intended goals or resolve workplace issues in ways more than one, you evidently stand more chances of success vis-à-vis others who display limited enthusiasm. Remember that anybody who has achieved excellence in any form knows that it is a result of ceaseless concentration. Therefore, do not be a product of your circumstances and instead be one of your decisions.

Reach your career zenith still young

If you look into various organisations and companies, you will find people who are still young but fairly senior. There will be many who would have held key appointments already and are perhaps at top slots today. The impression that one gets at first sight is that they have been able to build an unreservedly successful career for themselves. What was it that they did to achieve whatever they achieved when they are barely into their thirties?

Young successful people, both men and women will tell you that the secret to a passionately successful career lies in your exclusivity, in that you should not ever try to imitate others. They will also tell you that there is no specific recipe or plan either and any effort to copy someone else will herald your defeat before you even take the first step out. If anybody thinks that success can be reinvented, it is a mistaken belief. Success can be created but not recreated.

There are generally five major strategies that can be utilized by any person to craft a successful career before they even hit middle-age and are equally applicable to people of all age groups.  They are:

· Origination & Invention: There is no point in waiting for things to change and trying to then locate you. In fact, you should modernise and update yourself on a continual basis so that you can make certain that you are always at an advantageous position. You should try to stay ahead of your job rather than with it. And that implies taking fresh initiatives and putting forth newer ideas to do work effortlessly and efficiently. Origination and invention do not call for any prior experience at all. You ought to have an out-of-the box approach as also an ever-willing approach to make useful contributions.

· Cooperation & group effort: If you periodically ponder on how you can assist in the success of others, you will surely taste success yourself. Today, the workplace is all about teamwork, camaraderie and collaboration. As an individual, you are out; it is the team-player who is in. Conjecture this. Your team completes a project ahead of the deadline given and does it exceptionally well. The management is all praise for the team. Now, haven’t you done well also and also been complimented? The issue of somebody getting acclaim for a job is immaterial because it is your team that has collectively fared well and achieved objectives set for it. You should therefore, try to show direction to others and make certain that they remain gratified. If you play your cards well as a genuine member of a team, success will never elude you.

· Initiative and Endeavour: Today, technological advancements make it possible for you to be conversant with any aspect of any matter. The internet has definitely been a boon. There is now no requirement to draw a blank if you are queried about anything. There exist opportunities and opportunities today that did not exist a decade back. You just have to take initiative and click the internet to at least know the fundamentals of any subject.   

· Think big and beyond: Whenever a task is assigned by a boss to any employee, the actions that follow are generally sacrosanct. One has a tendency to plunge into the task straight away, occasionally without even considering anything. Such an approach is not correct. You should ponder of the situation and resources available for brief while and then plan to excel at it. Any immediate action by you will speak of your keenness and steadfastness alright, however, you should think beyond and ruminate if the task can be executed in a different way. You should proceed in a cogent and coherent manner; and when you finish, the results should be more than what were expected. The point to be noted and followed is that you should function smartly and not necessarily slog. In this way, you will outwit all your challengers and opponents; and make good career advancement.

· Hunt & hound skills but not any job titles: There is nobody who goes to work and does not seek recognition and promotion. Everybody wants to achieve job designations that go with the promotions. This may not be the correct disposition always. People in their over-enthusiasm to do anything tend to forget about their very potential or capability. It should be remembered that designations and the like do not matter at all; what is of significance is the fact that whatever you attain is contingent on your capabilities and qualifications – things that you acquire on a continual basis and make use of them to find practical solutions to issues on ground. You should regard your career as comprising different parts and each part symbolising an array of skills; and then proceed to undertake the task allotted. You should work hard to and make certain that the expertise that will place you on a higher pedestal is acquired by you. All this requires great courage and also a willingness to do things differently.

You should understand that you simply cannot duplicate success, though you can always plan to originate it. You stand the best chance of success at work if you can discern responses and reactions from people; they will serve to indicate to you whether you are on the correct path or not. You cannot afford to have your determination waning. But the bottom line however, is enjoy whatever you do.

Etch your career development plan

There are many people who dream of getting somewhere in life but remain lost in thought on how to reach there. Are you one of them? If yes, then you can initiate few easy steps to etch your own career development plan. But the word ‘easy’ can be rather mystifying and befuddling too. 

You should appreciate that occasionally the easiest and effortless of all ideas can be rather difficult to execute. This is largely because all actions call for some amount of reflection and exertion. Nonetheless, the time that you spend contemplating and deliberating is actually an investment to make your future triumphant and joyful. To that extent, this investment is justifiable and defensible.

You should be absolutely clear about certain issues to make your career development plan a sound one indeed. These issues pertain to:

· Knowing where you want to eventually be: It is inescapable for you to know in no uncertain terms the course on which you and your career are moving. Like all journeys, your destination cannot be left undecided. And surely, you do not want the journey to be problematical affair. First and foremost, you should be clear about where and what you want to be in the immediate future. Immediate future implies a period of two years hence and therefore, there should be no problems in picturing this as this slot is quite close to your present-day actuality. In case you feel that the objectives of your immediate future are simply steps in a general bearing, then you will be better poised to define an objective that may be extending into your longer term. It may not be that easy envisioning things so deep into the future because unexpected turn of events may cause you to alter your plans. But then, there is no harm in planning a little into the future. However, you need to be cautious enough to ensure that the objectives you set for yourself are indeed pragmatic and logical. Your bearings and objectives should be inspiring enough and not based on what others seek of you.  A good clarity of your direction means that you get driven by the course that you are on as also what exactly brings about that inspiration.

· Identification of qualification deficits: You should be able to figure out without any ambiguity additional qualifications that you need to acquire to be able to reach the position that you have envisaged for yourself in the immediate future. The best way to do this by carefully analysing the qualitative requirements of the position that you are aspiring for. It will be in the fitness of things to analyse them as pertaining to your company and also of another organisation to make certain that all aspects are considered. When you rate your present qualifications vis-à-vis the ones expected, you will have before you voids that you need to fill. There will be certain common voids and they could well be grouped together as a class. You will realise the voids that you identify will also have distinct ‘signature tunes’. There will be instances when you may not find yourself well-qualified for your next envisioned position and that should not be a cause of any consternation. On the other hand, the gap should serve to make you a competitive contender. But most importantly, you will have in front of you well-defined and clearly defined items for improvement. 

· Creation of the development plan: Now that you know what you ought to possess to attain whatever you set for yourself in the immediate future, you need to discuss them out with your mentors or even your manager. Such discussions will offer you better recommendations on how to go about improving your expertise and qualifications. You may have to prioritise your actions for acquisition of the desired qualifications. Creation of a development plan for your career will also call for some amount of explorations and studies too so that you are clear on how to go about in your endeavours. All your endeavours should be time-bound and that would call for strict self-accountability. It will be rather difficult setting deadlines, but surely you can set for yourself the date when you should start with the initiating actions. But most importantly, when you start off with your efforts to acquire a specific qualification, you will have to be acquitting yourself with due sincerity and seriousness; and have full control over your initiatives. This will help you to be steadfast and also serve to remind you of your subsequent moves.

Career development is something that people generally continue to overlook till one fine day when they wake up from their slumber to appreciate in real terms the stagnation that has been brought about in their life and careers. And that, for sure is never a happy situation. Remember that the direction in which your career takes you is totally your responsibility and that no planning undertaken by you ever goes waste. 

Vital approaches for career success

It is no surprising fact that an average person works for his livelihood for anything between 80,000 to 85,000 hours during his or her lifetime. And as one gets to be at a recognisable level in the pecking order, around half of your day is spent at the workplace.

The above facts definitely warrant some introspection to discern if you are genuinely engaged at work and whether success is coming to you or not. Two things that you should have a fair amount of idea about is if you are deriving the desired contentment from your career and also if you are doing well or not.

There are certain approaches, adoption of which can facilitate your career success. Ten actions that you should invariably engage in are:

· Flourish in uncertainty: That the only thing that is constant in this world is change should be recognised by you. With change, there is always uncertainty and which should be tackled with boldness. When you anticipate change and are flexible enough to absorb it, it will be your resourcefulness and expediency that will be seen by others. And additionally, you will generate better prospects for yourself too – something that will make you better poised for success.

· Nurture & promote inquisitiveness: If you just look around you, you will find a minefield of data, facts and ideas. And with internet around, the sky is the limit for knowledge. If you foster and stimulate your desire for knowledge, you yourself will be a fountainhead of information. Your endeavour should be to remain concerned and mindful; and be smart enough to apply whatever knowledge you acquire to ground situations. This will make you a sought after individual too – somebody who would be in demand whenever and wherever intervention becomes necessary.

· Query yourself for tips & advices: Career success varies from person to person because of differing perceptions and significance of oneself. When these two aspects are in harmony with the course that you are moving on, career success is automatically achieved. You should have a clear image of what success means to you. Having done that, you should also build your distinctive individual marque and then proceed to accomplish various objectives that you may have set for yourself. If you are able to get to grips with this approach, you will find that you will work in the right direction to derive contentment on private and professional planes.

· Connect & cooperate with all: Good communications – verbal and non-verbal – promote career success. You should be adept at articulating yourself lucidly, unambiguously, unswervingly and tactfully. When you communicate effectively, there is no room for misrepresentation or misinterpretation. Even when you connect with anybody, your communications help in resolving difficult situations to the advantage of everybody. A cooperative approach helps you to attain your objectives because the goodwill and trust generated by you will serve as a massive support base for the development of your personal image projection. 

· Improve your mind-set: Impressions generally get to be formed based on your actions and words; and sometimes on your appearance and gait too. If you focus on your appearance and take care of yourself; and take all due precautions to not fall prey to various mental tensions that afflict people, you will be viewed as an amiable personality. People will like to talk to you and have regard for you only if positivity radiates from you. An ability to be a champion of this career pre-requisite will bring about more robustness and cheer to your personality. Remember that an upbeat personality is better poised to attain his or her objectives and is thus more prone to achieve career success.

· Draw inspiration to learn from everybody: Each and every individual has certain innate qualities and which serve to teach something to others. One major prerequisite of success is the inescapable need to be a patient listener. When you pay attention to others, shed light on your anticipations and proceed to act after considering what others have to say, you always stand in good stead. When you draw inspiration to learn something from everybody, you get to enjoy the advantage to view things from the perspectives of many. Resultantly, you receive feedback and are exposed to opportunities that facilitate networking and mutual understanding.

·  Be at the wheels: Pointing fingers at others when things do not unfold in your favour is indeed a alluring proposition. But when you are at the wheels of all your career activities, you realise that the onus is on you and that you are responsible for your achievements and gaffes alike. You are accountable to yourself for whatever takes place. By being so, you link all your endeavours to success and regard all blunders as learning experiences. This outlook also projects you as a resolute, dependable and devoted individual – the attributes listed being much sought after at any workplace.

· Unravel your feelings: At work, there are bound to be difficult and testing times. To be successful, you will need to resolve such situations diligently. You will have to adopt the most appropriate method and ensure that no problem gets out of hand. When you do this, others will regard you as a ingenious and hands-on individual.

· Surpass expectations at work: A successful individual far surpasses the expectations placed on him. That is how, people regard you as trustworthy. Towards that, you will have to be decide on the precedence to be accorded to your time and various activities; and be resolute enough to bash on regardless. It is essential that your output should always be of a high standard so that your colleagues view you as somebody who is tenacious, proficient and valuable. It is also necessary that you display adequate pride in your work and not regard work as a sore operation; such a disposition will earn you the reputation of a willing worker and important projects will thus automatically be assigned to you.

· Endorse headway made by you: If others do not get to know what your objectives and ambitions are, they will be reluctant to come forward and lend a helping hand to you. To be able to craft success, you need to make your aims and goals known to others, but without unnecessary bragging or blowing your own horn. Diligent self-promotion is what you should engage in; doing so will tell people about you and your capabilities.

The only thing that is deficient in a person who does not succeed is a relative lack of drive and determination. You must have faith in yourself and your capabilities. It is only then that success will be yours to kiss.