Career Development: A guide to your future!

Today, it is not uncommon for a person to change their career choice or completely switch to another career at least once in their working life, and for many they may change careers three or more times. Therefore, it is important to know and understand professional development.

Professional development is the path that an individual travels and the procedures that they follow to choose a career. A career is the work an individual does or plans to do, over a considerable period of time, and something they plan to become good at.

The career development process is the examination of your basic skills, how well you handle stress, your abilities and interests in working with others, and the education or training you complete to enter the career. Career development is the plan you design to help you advance your career, be flexible as needed, and be alert to trends and patterns to help you further advance your career.

Equally important is a careful examination of your current job and professional status. Did you take the job because you needed the money? Does work have a future? Are you progressing in your career? Or are you unhappy, unmotivated, and overwhelmed by stress or other work-related problems? This situation may not be productive for the employee and even less so for the employer.

Now may be the time to do some research on the career field you are interested in. Self-study, on-the-job training, traditional or online learning may be involved. Also, the more you know about a particular career, the more focused your career development plan will be.

As you study professional development, you will learn that it is not just about education. Training and education will always help you move in the right direction and allow you to fine-tune your professional development plan.
However, you will learn through self-examination what your interests are, what you are good at, how well you have the basic skills to perform at a high level in whatever career you choose.

Many educational institutions offer career development classes or assessment centers to help put you on the path to the right career. There are plenty of free career assessment tests on the internet to help you define your interests and career goals.

From this wealth of information, whether you want to advance your current career or make a career change, career planning can be an important strategy to guide you in achieving your career goals.