You can dream of being a Vice President, but you may not know how to reach that position. If you don’t have a career map, then eventually you may end up being in the same position as before.
Career mapping can be highly beneficial at any stage of your career. Whether you are entering the workplace for the first time or you are a veteran of the rat race, career mapping can prove to be one an invaluable tool – particularly if you are thinking of switching careers.
A career map is a two-piece document that actually summarizes a person’s career strategy. In short, it is like a road map that will guide you throughout your work life. You should refer to your road map when you want to reach a destination; similarly, you should use your career map when you want to go ahead in your career. A career map is particularly handy when you experience job loss through downsizing or layoffs – when you have a career map, you won’t have to panic, because your strategy will already be in place.
Career mapping can help you go about achieving your goals with purpose and clarity, whether that is advancing in your current career or searching for a new one.
Overview
This point clarifies what it is that you would like to accomplish in the future – in as short as one year or as long as five – and gives you the route that you need to take to get there. There are times when you may have to change the map suddenly when you find a lucrative job opening or when you realize that you have taken a wrong turn in your career – so it pays to be flexible.
Marketing Plan
If you are presently working long hours and not making the kind of money that you want, it could be a matter of insufficient focus. Decide which aspect of your profession is the most valuable, and develop a plan to market your knowledge, skills and experience to get a position that’s right for you.
Strengths and Weaknesses
Maximize your strengths through experience and reduce your weakness through education. If you are stuck, then you can consult a career coach or counselor.
Plan of Action
Once you know your goals, then you need to identify how you will get there. You can do this by talking to experts or getting help from a mentor. Similarly, you should seek advice from people in similar positions that are already successful.
Financial Plan
Analyze why you want to change your career and direct your strengths to influence your finances. Look at your present position and then set a pattern to monitor your progress.
If you want to change your career for the better, then it pays to have a plan. Having a career map is one of the best tools for getting you where you need to go.

Career planning entails choices. This means you have to choose a path you would want to lead your life to. A job or the work you do does not only help you financially but also has a great effect on your personal life-psychologically, emotionally, and physically. which is why it is imperative that you give career planning your full serious attention. This holds true, more so today that many new fields and opportunities are available.
Career planning entails having a good understanding of the terminologies of job and career seeking. Try looking and reading at the following words:
• Employment
• Position
• Job
• Occupation
• Career
Reading them for the first time you’d think that they all mean the same thing. There are, however, slight differences. A manager and a machine operator are both employees in one company but the manager would more often refer to his work as a position, while the machine operator sees himself as an employee. Thinking of getting a career? Then it is also of importance that you familiarize yourself with these terminologies:
• Career development
• Career management
• Career counseling
• Career guidance
These are all steps to a systematic approach at making certain that you find the best career path and to progress satisfactorily. Career planning entails that you gauge your own planning capability. It’s you who will have to figure out and identify your short term and long term goals. You do your own decisions, choose your own options, and evaluate your resilience and flexibility. These factors are going to be very important when it comes to meeting career challenges. In the long run, all you have to rely on are your own personal management skills. Career planning involves life changing decisions, and different survival skills as well as role and work-leisure integration. Career planning would also mean acquiring good marketing skills. Do you know your skills and strengths? How about your weaknesses? Can you conduct an effective and efficient job search? Do you know what image you project and should project? Can you sell yourself to the employers? How do you make yourself more marketable? Career planning means taking your own steps at being aware of the opportunities available out there. You should keenly investigate labor trends and get hold of training opportunities. There is a high probability that you will be taking on more than 1 job in your lifetime, and by means of a well designed career planning system, you have a better chance of succeeding at your chosen career path. Through these, you are able to gain skills and experience, making you an even more productive and marketable employee.

Planning a career can be defined as choosing life’s important paths. A careful planning is certainly required when it comes to how you would earn a living. If planning is not implemented it will culminate in not only a financial problem but it might even turn into a physical, psychological and emotional problem. The consequence of ruining our life can be dreadful. There are many experiences of people who have earned a living with nothing in hand. This can happen only with a keen career plan. Hence planning must be taken seriously. New opportunities and career choices are developing every day that didn’t at all exist few years ago.
The career vocabulary has to e given prior importance and a good understanding for the first step in planning. Words meaning the same can then be proved different, though with only subtle difference. For example the words: position, employment, job, career, occupation. They seem to be synonyms, but do not necessarily be so. A paramedic and a doctor both have an employment, but their positions differ. It is important to be familiar with the following words before planning a career: career management, career development, career counseling, career guidance. These have a lot to do with planning a career. A firm structure is required for career building. Career building are steps taken towards a systematic and designed career that fits you perfect. It helps in a satisfactory progress all along the path of a well chosen career. Long term goals and short term objectives are decided and they are the first step towards planning for a good career. Decisions are made based upon one’s flexibility, adaptability and resilience. The response to challenges are decided by these characters. Later self assessment of one’s personal management capabilities is done.
What sort of decisions on lifestyle will you come up with? What are your interpersonal skills and job-survival skills? How good are you at work-leisure integration and role integration? Identification of one’s skills and strengths is important in career planning. Can you do an effective employment search? The want ads in newspapers are not the only way in which one has to search. How do you project yourself? How good are you at demanding yourself? What measures would you make to become more marketable? Knowledge on the source of information should always be in the process of updating. The trends in labor market often change. Training opportunities have to be found out. The years in work force would have given you several positions or jobs. A good marketable individual ultimately does an effective career planning with the required changes.

Improving Your Reading Skills: The key to personal and career progress and success.
Your long term career development will be the sum of your reading over the next five years, and the five years after that. Who knows after ten years someone may develop an implanted chip that will substitute for reading. But for now, reading is the name of the game. After five years don’t be the person who is known as the one who ate 2114 Krispy Kreme donuts and read two books, and one had a lot of pictures.
You don’t have to be a long time reader to only add to your reading inventory. Some of us read fast and have the capacity to remember everything. Most of us read slower and it may take a couple of times for us to get all the required information. If you have a treasured motivational book you may read it two, four or more times, getting more valuable information from it each time. The path to take is to read, and you’ll get the required information.
To improve you understanding and greatly increase your overall enjoyment in reading you should determine why you’re reading the particular book or article or magazine. By determining the reason before you start your comprehension and pleasure will increase, and ultimately your overall career development will accelerate.
Be honest, you absolutely do not have to read everything. Not everything you come across contains information you need. In fact a lot of it is junk. Throw it out or hit the delete key. Use the time you just saved to read the things important to your career and your reading plan.
This may sound contradictory but you don’t need to read all of what you do read. You don’t need to read every article in that magazine or every chapter in that book.
Select the articles in the magazine or the chapter in the book that are important, and ignore the rest. When you do find the book that has something of interest in every chapter, take notes, and after you read it put it aside to reread.
One trick to prioritize your reading is to scan the table of contents, the index, and the headlines. You’ll pick up two important ideas: (1) do you have an interest in the contents? and; (2) what desirable information will you get from reading the book, magazine or article? If it fits into your reading plan go for it.
Your reading environment should be comfortable, you’ll read faster and comprehend more. Of course, there are times, like carrying reading material in your car to read when waiting is the exception to the rule. Once you start reading read it straight through, with books being the exception. With books try and read in chapter bites. If you have questions, take notes and go back and get the answers or do further research.
You’re reading with a purpose, it’s all part of your career development and the reading plan you designed. Set monthly book reading goals. Keep a notebook or journal; write down new ideas for books to read. Take advantage of your commuting time to listen to books in your car’s CD player. So overall you’ll be reading with a purpose so keep your focus.
Remember, the more you read, the quicker your speed and comprehension. In five years, you’ll look back and see you’ve read 120 or more books. Your career will be on track and you’ll be able to point to the many valuable ideas and contributions they have made to your career.

One persons career development needs differs from another. A nurse’s path leads them in one direction while a racecar driver follows another. Even in the same profession one person may take a completely different route than another while winding up near the same goals.

The one thing all occupations take into account when assessing their career development needs is what they already know. Students showing great aptitude for artistic skills may wish to continue by finding a career that incorporates one, or more of their talents.

For example, a person who doodles, draws, and has experience with graphic programs may wish to go into graphic design and logo making for large companies and small businesses. He should sit down and list his career development needs with separate lists for small and long term goals. How much does he already know about graphic design? Has he worked for a client in the past either free or for pay? What programming skills does he have? How far is his artistic range and is he able to keep up with client demands? Is he only interested in creating logos, or will his graphic design skills go further into webpage design, animation and magazine design? These are some of the questions he should ask.

His next step when thinking about career development needs is to decide his readiness to go into the graphic design field. Can he start right away, or does he need more schooling first? Does he plan to attend classes for continuing education even after he starts his career? If he worked for clients in the past, was he professional or does he need to learn more about the professional field?

Part of assessing career development needs is realizing when further education is required for career advancement. It is not always necessary, but it is a great way to keep up with present markets if the individual and company want to advance in today’s moneymaking society.

The serious professional should learn to write good resumes where is listed his skills that will compliment the job he applies. A company doesn’t want to know that a person applying for a secretarial job can keep his house in “tiptop shape”. What they want to know is if the person is good at organization and keeping notes.

Career development needs don’t disappear once the person starts his or her career. There is always room for improvement for the individual and for the company. A person’s career development needs can change slowly over time, or drastically when they decide to try a different career. It’s all up to the individual and what he or she is able to handle.