CAREER DEVELOPMENT PLANNING

A well-developed career plan will consider the following five elements: direction, career time, transitions, career planning options, and projected outcome. If it does, it will be sufficiently flexible to accommodate changing opportunities for development and multiple (where several exist) ways of arriving at your goals. At the end of the career planning process, you should have set realistic career goals which lead to planned goal-related training and developmental activities that can be set forth in an Individual Development Plan and can reasonably be accomplished during the next year.

Direction

This involves career goals. Goal setting has two components: what you want to do (involving your knowledge, interests, and needs) and what the Coast Guard needs to do. Goal setting has to address both components through self-assessment and an assessment of the organization.

Self-assessment refers to your role, relationships, personal attributes, personal limitations, and job identification. It asks, "Who am I?"

Assessing the organization refers to looking at the boundaries set by the Coast Guard which influence your perceptions of available alternatives and the extent to which your aspirations are realistic and timely. (Boundaries include the Coast Guard's hierarchy, the functions of your work unit, the degree to which you identify with a particular group or specialty, your supervisor's technical or interpersonal skills, and the Coast Guard's culture.)

Any combination of these factors and the Coast Guard's norms can lead you to feel "boxed in" or frustrated. This means you must weigh the impact of organizational goals, values, and orientation on your plans.

Career Time

This relates to distance and speed factors, that is, how far you want to go on the career path and how fast you expect to get there.