The work ethos of people have undergone a huge change and while the previous generations believed in building expertise in a certain area of work and staying with it their whole lives, today people want not just new jobs but newer challenges, newer learning opportunities, and newer milestones.

People are more adventurous and happy to take risks in order to give their life a different direction, sometimes to overcome the boredom of a routine job and sometimes to achieve their long held dreams. Whatever, may be the reasons behind looking for a new career, it definitely requires one to polish oneself with relevant skills and personal development. And if you are one of those setting out to carve a new career for yourself, we have a few tips for you that may help you on the way:

 

Objective setting:

• This is the first logical step for anyone planning to build a new career. Unless you are passionate about something and have decided to go after it, you must define clearly what you want to achieve from your new career in terms of learning, money, fulfilment, work-life balance, etc.

 

Do an analysis of your current strengths and weaknesses:

• In the light of your objectives, write down the relevant strengths and identify the weaknesses. This helps you in being realistic about your expectations from yourself as well as in identifying the amount of preparation needed and the key areas of development.

Research the specialized skills needed for your new career:

• While the above is an analysis of your general strength and weaknesses, your new career may require some specialized skills, training, or certification. Chalk out a plan to go about acquiring them in a reasonable span of time.

 

Act on your plan:

• Most of us are good at planning, but execution is another matter! If you are serious about a new career, act on your plans immediately. Your actions may include reading up more about the career you want, researching on the career progression opportunities, chatting up people who are doing similar work, enrolling for a course, updating your job profile, or drawing up a business plan.

 

Draw up a timeline:

• Having time-bound goals helps in making concerted efforts in achieving them. Draw up a future timeline of milestones on way to achieving your goal. Give yourself sufficient time, based on realistic calculations. You don’t want to set yourself up for failure and disappointments but at the same time, you also don’t want to have a lackadaisical approach towards your goals.

 

Overall assessment:

• Once you have started working towards your new career, take stock every once in a while to see if you are on the right track, if you need any course correction, or tweak your plans due to a change in circumstances, etc.

 

Many a times, people start working towards a new career only to be daunted by the road ahead or challenges and obstacles on the way. When that happens, go back to your initial reasons for seeking a different career, see if those reasons still hold true, and if so, maybe you need to put your head down and get on with the hard work.