Mapping your career stage
I was raised in a Big Blue family. Both of my parents were employed by IBM and retired after 30 years -- the only organization either of them ever worked for. My brother and sister-in-law followed suit, retiring from the company in a different generation, but with a similar orientation to a single employer. I was the renegade in the family, having had a succession of different jobs and careers throughout my adult life. And while I may have been an aberration on the home front, I have certainly been consistent with the larger trend in the world of work these days.
Experts say that the average person entering the workforce will experience three to five careers during her working lifetime. That's separate careers, not jobs. If the question is, how many jobs will the typical person hold during her adult life, the number bounces up to something like 12 to 14. That's a lot of movement compared with the old days, when most people worked at one job until they collected a gold watch and pension paperwork, and rode off happily into the sunset.
Obviously, times have changed. The employment landscape has become a virtual minefield of transition, as people move from one situation to the next, either by choice or by circumstance. Career mobility, and in some cases, volatility, has become the new norm.
While it's clear that the trend in work demographics has shifted significantly, I believe that what hasn't changed is a pattern of fairly predictable stages of career development that most people experience, regardless of the mix of careers and jobs they have along the way. To a large extent, these stages are age-related and chronological, although what we are seeing that is relatively new is people moving through the entire sequence fairly rapidly, only to start all over again.
Where do you and your family members stand relative to the following stages of career development?
1. Self-exploration. This stage is characterized by a self-centered and idealistic orientation to careers, and is typical of where many college students and young adults are situated. The approach to this stage is a very pure and innocent orientation around values, what matters to you, what you care about, what you believe in. Practical matters of employment prospects, income potential and other pragmatic considerations often take a back seat to the philosophical questions that tend to prevail during this initial phase.
2. Investigation. In this stage, the realities of having to earn a living and the competition for jobs begin to set in. Faced with the prospects of having to pay rent and the electric bill, many young adults at this stage begin to get serious about researching career possibilities and learning as much as they can about the various alternatives that exist. This phase often plays itself out in the college arena, as young people, either by choice or by parental influence, begin changing their majors from philosophy and history to business or education or pre-med.
3. Serious preparation or trial and error. There's a fork in the road that happens in the third stage of career development. Some people choose to go down a well-defined path that involves intentional preparation for a specific career, often in the form of graduate or professional school. This is the case for people who have chosen to become doctors or lawyers or concert musicians. Just as often, this stage is about surveying the available alternatives and diving in somewhere, which then evolves into something else. When I ask people at midlife how they came to choose the careers that they are in, they often tell me it just "happened" bunny-trail fashion. They started a first job out of school or college, one thing led to another, and boom, a career was born.
4. Amassing experience, developing expertise. This stage is one of the longest phases of career development, and can last as long as 20 to 30 years. The early experience of this phase is often expressed in the "ladder climbing" phenomenon. The name of the game is developing skills, building a track record, and achieving vertical growth, along with the compensation and benefits that accompany promotion. In the later years, a level of competence and confidence emerges that enables the seasoned professionals to begin mentoring those just entering this stage.
5. Restlessness and transition. Some people manage to skip this phase and cruise right on into retirement. But for others, it manifests as a need to "do something different," to shift gears and focus the remaining career years in a new direction. This can happen when the pressures of supporting a family and building a nest egg are no longer the primary drivers, leaving room for elements such as personal passion and a yearning to express life purpose to become more significant influences on career choice.
6. The Golden Years career. It used to be that by the time a person reached 65, there was an assumption that his or her career was over. Extended life expectancies, volatile economic conditions and the choice to stay active have converged to set the stage for people continuing to work well into their 70s and 80s. This is often the most rewarding of all the stages of career development because it stems purely from a desire to stay useful, be connected and have fun.
What stage of career development are you in? How is it affecting your choices? And what's your game plan for what's next? Mapping your career stage can be useful in helping you to understand your own professional drivers and develop appropriate strategies for directing your next phase. All important things to consider as you make your way into the office today.
Barbara Poole is a master-certified coach and leadership/team development consultant. She is president of Success Builders Inc. and Partner/Co-founder of Leading Deeply LLC. She can be reached at Barbara@LeadingDeeply.org.The Job Coaches are volunteers from the Center for Women's Job Counseling Program. Ask a question by calling 763-7333 or emailing info@c4women.org. For more assistance, make an appointment; a donation of $35 is requested.
