Image provided by freepik.com
Dear friends,
I hope your fall is going well. This is usually my favorite time of year, and I am trying to find moments of solace in familiar seasonal rituals. This month I am sharing a concrete career development exercise, in response to a mentee question.
I have a graphic posted on my office corkboard (so pre-pandemic, I know!) representing a conceptual model of my work/ career. She asked me for a guide on how to develop a career diagram. The purpose of a career diagram is to communicate to others visually who you are professionally, and to help keep your daily activities aligned with your career goals. To get started, here are some guiding questions:
What is your professional mission? If you don’t have a mission statement, don’t get stuck! Use the simple verb/ target/ outcome method described here. It doesn’t have to be perfect.
What are your skills and expertise? Include your methodologic training, subject matter expertise, and clinical or disciplinary background. Every person reading this email has skills and expertise. Don’t let self-doubt creep in here!
What is your daily work? Think about how you spend your time and if there are activities or values that aren’t reflected in the answers to the prior questions.
Now, think about how to put these elements together visually. You don’t need to have an artist’s eye or use a sophisticated graphics program. I like to scribble on paper, and when I want to move to a digital version I use the SmartArt tools in PowerPoint.
Your career diagram won’t be comprehensive, and it will evolve over time. Like your elevator pitch, it only has to have enough information to get a conversation started. Here’s my most recent version:
Making a diagram like this is a useful self-reflection exercise. Print it out and put it where you can see it, and let me know how it affects your decision-making and day-to-day. As always, I look forward to hearing from you! Please reach out, share widely, and sign up here if you want future posts via email.
Warmly,
Urmimala