In this episode I wrap up the series on Career Planning with a discussion on the components of a successful career plan and how to apply these to develop one for yourself. All of the feedback I have received so far has been incredible and I appreciate all of it! Please keep it coming and share with me your thoughts on the topics I discuss! 

Episode 5 Transcript

Understanding and developing a deliberate career plan

Hello everyone and welcome to episode 5 of BezasTV. Today’s episode is part two of a series on career planning; Understanding and developing a deliberate career plan. As you remember from my last episode, I discussed the three models of career planning: the horizontal specialist, the vertical specialist and the generalist. The horizontal specialist is someone who acquires a discipline that applies across any type of work, such as a project manager. The vertical specialist dives really deep into a field and becomes an expert such as accounting, information technology or engineering. The generalist picks up small pockets of deep dives in different disciplines and seeks to use them anywhere in the organization, like a Corporate handyman.

The first part I want to talk about is what getting a new position requires. This breaks down into three parts: attributes, tenure, and results. It all boils down to these three main things.

What constitutes attributes are subject matter expertise and fit. Subject matter expertise is essentially what is on your resume, your qualifications, your credentials. You have 5 years of this experience, 10 years of this, you’re proficient with this… These are things you’re probably already very used to putting forward. Fit is essentially your personality and what you bring to the team as an individual. Your leader is going to look fairly closely at this as the group dynamic is really dependent on how you interact with others. A failure to meet on personality or fit is not going to be a loss if you don’t get the job as this would just lead to larger problems down the road.

Tenure is essentially how long you have been doing these attributes. Think of this as the volume of your work, it will build more credibility the more volume you have.

Results, these are your achievements, your victories, the medals you wear, what you bring to the table. Think of this as an incentive to the leader for what he’s going to get as a result of your work.

When you’re being considered for a position they really think of this formula: A + T + R (attributes + tenure + results). You can think of this as a 3D model where an over abundance of one can mitigate a shortage in another but there is some substance to all three that goes together.

Applying ATR to something meaningful

Now that we understand what it takes, how do you apply it to something meaningful? Clearly, you will be wanting to accumulate attributes, tenure, and results. There are two aspects to that: managing your learning / doing mix and selecting future positions.

Every position you occupy is going to have some level of doing, and some level of learning. If you are serious about professional development, then every position you select should have lots of learning. When you first start a new position, you pretty much are at full-on learning. Even for such trivial things as how to fill out your timecard or where the restroom is. As time moves on, you accumulate tenure and the curve downward slopes toward ‘do.’ It looks just like that: attributes, results, tenure. (*chart in video on whiteboard*) As you are in the business of acquiring attributes, tenure, and results you need to maximize this curve. When your learn level is high, you’re accumulating attributes and as time moves on and you move towards do, you accumulate results. I’ll leave it to you to find where the sweet spot of that curve is as the mix is going to be different based on your group, leadership, and the nature of the work that you are doing. But, a good rule of thumb is about 18-24 months before moving on to something else.

Now that you understand how to monetize the development of a position, you need to learn how to select which positions to take. The first question you should ask yourself is: What do I have? (in terms of A,T,R) What do I need? What will this position get me? For example, if you’re lacking in leadership skills and the position offers to lead a project, you’ll obtain those skills and fill that gap. This will get you poised for more management positions and responsibility. Think of a series of Venn-diagrams and maximize the one that has the best outlook for you. One circle is what the position is offering, the other is what you need. Clearly, you are going to want more overlap, as the overlap is the learning. You also want to avoid positions that have little intersection, as these are mostly ‘doing’ jobs. If you’re a specialist, you’re going to want to take positions that have you diving deeper into your field and gaining more responsibility. Where a generalist is looking to add more abilities to their stable.

A good strategy to use is to not think of your current qualifications for the job that you want, but to think of the qualifications for the job that you want after that job. Then you’re going to want to picture that job posting, what does it look like? (10 years of experience in this, proficient in that…) Then you want to drive for THOSE attributes in your next job because those will be what your resume will look like after you’re done with that post getting you to where you need to go next. Then you can work backwards from there and even plan out 10-20 years and your plan is starting to take shape.

I hope this concept makes sense to you as I find it very powerful as a way to bring clarity to your efforts instead of just ‘winging it.’ Having a deliberate plan in place will make your focus clear and your strategies meaningful.

In what ways are you planning your career out for the next 5 years?

Until next time, please follow me on Twitter (@StavrosBezas) as I am posting a lot of great links and posts that are relevant to the topics I discuss.

Thank you and have a fantastic week!