How to Set Career Goals and Objectives - Examples & Tips - EmployeeConnect HRIS
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How to Set Career Goals and Objectives – Examples & Tips

Although it is a known fact that all successful people have career goals in their lives, yet there are times when you may struggle in making the desired progress in your career. You may already have a career with a lucrative position.

However, it is not uncommon for you to need a little career development guidance when it comes to taking an upward trend in your career progression. In such situations, it is very easy for you to feel confined, stuck, suffocated, or even lack proper direction when it comes to steering through your career path. In order to keep you on track, it is a must for you to set achievable career goals for yourself. Career goals help you to achieve career objectives, benchmarks and milestones in your career.

Let’s take a look at some of the career goals and career objectives for both short term and long term, which can help you set up for success in your chosen career path.

Things to do before setting Career Objectives and Goals

Prior to setting your career goals and objectives, here are a couple of things that you need to be aware of pertaining to goals, since you will be setting them on a number of levels:

  1. Carefully decide what is it that you want to accomplish as part of your professional development or long term career goals.
  2. Split your larger goals into smaller and more achievable ones so that they become relatively easy to achieve and gives you a sense of satisfaction as well when you tend to achieve them. It also helps you to accomplish your career objective easily, as splitting them up enables you to manage and streamline the process to achieve your ultimate career goal.
  3. Formulate and develop a proper plan to achieve your career goal. Create a step by step plan which will enable you to start working methodically towards achieving it.

 

Common Career Goals Examples

1. Start your own Startup

Success may mean different to different people. For a lot of people these days, starting one’s own startup by branching out on their own is a connotation of success. For such aspirations, a viable career goal would be to become one’s own boss by starting their own practice.

In today’s generation the age group of people pining to start something of their own ranges from 18 to 34 (if they have not already started one). When starting your own business, it is advisable that you should outline a series of short term goals which will help you reach your desired goal of success.

2. Get on Leadership Team

It is an obvious career aspiration to scale up the hierarchical ladder after spending a considerable work experience with a certain organisation. For instance if your career goal is to earn a managerial or an executive leadership position, your goal may take on an average from 6 months to 5 to 10 years experience depending on the type of domain or department that you are presently in.

To achieve this type of career goal you need to frame a series of short term goals that demonstrate your suitability which will help you to eventually get a place on the team.

3. Get that Promotion

For every employee it is certainly a wonderful feeling to get promoted to the next coveted role in the organisation. However, a promotion warrants thorough commitment, careful planning, and execution on your part as an employee.

For instance, in order to earn a promotion you may need to walk that extra mile by living and breathing company values, taking up additional work, developing relationships with members of other departments, and update your resume accordingly in order to get noticed. A promotion is usually a long term goal which you can aim to achieve by putting in extra effort and time from your end.

4.Get that great Job

For the majority of people in the present economy, there is a very common career goal is to simply get employment. If you are seeking for employment, there are plenty of short term goals that you can frame for yourself and they can be achieved before you reach your final destination of obtaining your desired career. However, it is important for you to be patient while looking for the right job, as it can be a time consuming and long but rewarding process.

5.Increase Performance Metrics

A lot of organisations and industries these days are seen to resort to using performance metrics in order to evaluate an employee’s productivity, performance, and to gauge his level of effectiveness. The numbers generated by such metrics measure factors such as the performance management of the organisation, the satisfaction index of the customers, the competence of the employees, and cost management.

These metrics are usually measured on a weekly basis, but you can measure them on a daily basis as well. A good career goal would be to augment your performance metrics which will help you display the value that you carry as an employee to your organisation that you are working for. Such a goal helps to increase your value in the eyes of your organisation.

6.Get that Degree or Certificate

One of the stepping stones to jumpstart your career goals and setting you up on a path leading to success is to earn a degree or certificate in your relevant field or domain. Most career paths need an individual to possess domain specific knowledge, qualification, or a specific degree when it comes to pushing them further in their career growth. Once you are able to attain the required certification or relevant degree, you can think of increasing your career goal options.

Additional examples of career objectives…

  • Start building your personal brand
  • Start to write,blog thought pieces
  • Give regular constructive feedback
  • Increase next quarter sales sales efforts by 20%
  • Build a high performance team
  • Introduce Slack into the workplace
  • Find a mentor
  • Become a mentor
  • Learn new soft skills, like leadership
  • Get employee of the month
  • Get in habit of writing SMART goals
  • Become an expert in your field
  • Build that <namesurname.com> website
  • Get Social
  • Learn to delegate tasks
  • Master presentation skills
  • Have regular lunch with your team
  • Do something that takes you out of your comfort zone
  • Recognise your team
  • Learn public speaking
  • Work in another department once a month
  • Take a project management course
  • Surprise your clients
  • Spend time on personal development
  • Use less social media

 

How to Write Career Objectives for Resume

From a hiring manager perspective the resume is the first port of call to identify the value that potential employers can bring to the organisation, and it begins with a well articulated a career objective.

Here’s a couple of career objective examples where job seekers specifically identifies what their past achievements can bring into the new role by articulating what the next working role, describing the environment, could look like.

HR Business Partner: “Studies characterised with consistent High Distinctions along with a number of high achievement awards, demonstrating a dedication to consistently exceeding expectations with superior levels of customer service interpreting complex and detailed industrial instruments in fast-paced retail environments; ideally positioned to add strategic value as a HR Business Partner effectively drafting internal policy on remuneration and benefits for a shared HR service Centre’

CFO: As the Global Head of Finance with 20+ experience success delivering above average growth in mission critical operations across emerging markets for new projects and greenfield sites; a consistent record of challenging the status-quo, identifying and executing innovative technology; strategic and hands-on financial management skills; ideally positioned to build new markets and deliver above average growth for organisations exploring transformation.”

Career Goals Tips

Here are few of handy career goal and career objective tips to help you set a strong career progression:

  1. Be aware of your strengths and weaknesses. It is also equally important for you to accept your weaknesses. Knowing them will help you understand the areas in which you can excel better professionally than others.
  2. Be very clear regarding your overall career goal. It is good to ask yourself questions which give you a perspective as to where your life is heading in terms of achieving your goals within the specified time frame and how it is going to intersect with your career path. There may be several other goals that you are likely to be interested in pursuing with time, so you need to develop a time frame for your goals.
  3. Identify and list down the steps that you would need to take to achieve your goal in the said time frame which you have set for yourself. While doing so, you need to consider any road blocks that you may face and think of the means to mitigate such risk factors or roadblocks.
  4. Always ensure to measure the progress of your goal at regular intervals. This will help keep you motivated and it will also give you with a sense of satisfaction and accomplishment.A career is one of the most crucial things in your life, so it is very important that you properly plan it by setting achievable career goals and think of the ways and means by which you can achieve the set goals in the most efficient manner possible.

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Byron Conway
byron@employeeconnect.com

Content Coordinator at EmployeeConnect