Up Your Career

Up Your Career

My name is Anita Newson (Page) and I help individuals align their career and life goals by creating and utilizing traditional and non-traditional methods.  This is accomplished by, establishing and reaching milestones, building their portfolio and marketing their talents, as well as providing guidance in career development and gaining professional employment.

Career management?? You may ask, “What is career management?”  Well Wikipedia defines it as:  The combination of structured planning and the active management choice of one's own professional career. The outcome of successful career management should include personal fulfillment, work/life balance, goal achievement and financial security.
First, let’s pull out 3 key things mentioned in the definition—structured planning, active management, professional career.

1—Structured planning—Each job you have, class and training you take, certification you earn, personal, professional connection you make with people you meet, should all be building upon a strong foundation that’s getting you closer to your ultimate goal—Your dream career. (Notice, I didn’t say dream job—there’s a difference between a job and a career.) Sometimes you WILL have to get a “job”, but that should just be another method to your madness, getting you closer to the end results you’re looking for.
I remember it like it was yesterday.  My “plan” was to get a part-time job to finance my goal of becoming a certified grant writer.  I’d helped to write grants before, and felt I was good at it. People requested my consultation for writing grants, so I wanted to become a “professional” in the field.  After obtaining a good part-time job where my boss was supportive, yet demanding, I started to focus on my daily duties, and help to grow the department where I worked.  “Life” started to take over—family and ministry responsibilities, etc.—then I was asked to re-open our church child development center, and my “plan” went out the window with earning a decent pay for my hard work.  That was ten years ago, and I still don’t have my certification.  Moral of the Story: Never lose focus of your “WHY”.

2—Active Management—A continuous process to ensure long-term career success. This takes time to build.  Once that strong foundation is established (setting goals, looking at what you need to reach each goal, and create a timeline for it, etc.), obtaining those goals and developing new ones will become second nature.  Each job you have/do, should strategically be a stepping stone to where you want to be—and remember, the sky is the limit.  So don’t make some great accomplishments, and then think you’re done.  Keep your momentum, keep moving toward whatever ultimate goal you want—CEO of a Fortune 500 company, or CEO of your own—your options are countless and up to you.

3—Professional Career—We’ve all had to work a “job”—that could be in a high profile company or at the local car wash.  NEVER DISPISE YOUR DAY OF SMALL BEGINNINGS!!!  Work your job, do whatcha gotta do, even if it’s shining shoes.  (I’ve been there, done that, literally)!  If that’s your dream career/job, you better be the best shoe shine queen on the east coast!!! You better make ‘em see their face in those shoes—OKAY???!!!  Who knows whose shoes you may end of shining, and they make you an offer, you can’t refuse!  You can have a bi-coastal shoe shine shop on all military posts nationally, and even internationally.  The point is, BE A PROFESSIONAL WITH IT!!! Be the expert at it—create new formulas and methods that no one else is doing.  BE THE PRO in your career!!!

When you’re serious like that, you can move on to what I like to call the 3 M’s in career management— Movement, Monitoring, Migrating.
Movement—Establish/Set Goals—takes action on your part.  You have to ‘move’ and take action to #1 write your vision/plan, and make it plain. Use visuals (vision board, pictures of you on vacation, house/car you want, jar of credit cards cut up). Write those goals down, and look at them daily.

Monitoring—Tracking your progress is vital—It’s meant to encourage you, and allow you to see if you need to re-establish timelines, or take a different course of action all together. (Remember, the definition of insanity is doing the same thing over and over, expecting different results—job, relationships, finances.)  You will be able to ‘monitor’ if you’re being stagnate or allowing your career goals to be incorporated into your daily lifestyle.

Migrating—Changing course.  Sometimes, like stated previously, you may discover something you’re doing isn’t working (working more hours, but having to pay more for childcare when you work, now you’re just working to pay childcare).  If you’re working just to pay the daycare bill, then you need to change jobs, get a promotion at that job, change your mindset/goals altogether.  ONLY YOU can say if it’s time to adjust.  Nothing’s written in INK, write in pencil, so you can erase and make corrections/changes.

Career Management/Development is the key to helping you achieve personal goals—traveling, starting/expanding your family, buying a house.  Since having a career takes up a big amount of time you spend, it only makes sense to “invest” in it.  Just remember, Career Management is just like financial management—disciplined investment, made on a regular basis, yields a greater reward.  So, Up Your Career!