Your Career Development Is in Your Hands: How to Take Charge of Your Career

Mindy Thomas
Thu, 07 Nov 2013 00:00:00 +0000

The front cover of Philadelphia Magazine’s November issue screamed, “We Are All Entrepreneurs Now.” I’ve also heard this concept referred to as "YOYO land" (You’re on Your Own). Being on your own in the work world may be the wave of the future, but you don't have to stay on that career island. Instead, understand that you won't get help unless you ask for it, and that you alone are responsible to take the steps necessary to stay ahead of the job market curve. Perhaps the biggest step in taking charge of your career is finding a mentor.

Take charge of your own career by finding a mentor

As we take steps to achieve success in our chosen careers, we sometimes search for mentors as well as role models. We quickly realize that many celebrated individuals who have been catapulted onto the world stage arrived there not only as a result of hard work, but also after being closely mentored. In the past, men have been dominant in business, entertainment, sports, and politics. They arrived at the top of their game often as a result not only of their hard work, but because they had someone in their life who gave them sorely needed direction.

While mentoring has always been available in some small way to women, today the availability of role models and mentors is without limit. There is no excuse for any career person (male or female) to plod on without guidance or mentoring. All we need do is look for those successful women who can attest to the power of effective mentoring: Oprah, Angela Merkel, Barbara Walters, Hillary Clinton, Condi Rice, Megyn Kelly, Golda Maier, Serena and Venus Williams, to mention a few.

In 2008, Helen Harkness wrote about the term mentoring in an article where she claimed that we are all working in a world where we are on our own (YOYO land). If you wait around for someone to drop out of the blue to mentor and coach you in the management of your career, it’s just not going to happen. You are probably thinking, yes, this sounds really interesting, but I don’t have the time nor do I know how to obtain a mentor. That may be the case. But, if you want your career to progress rather than stagnate or come to an end, you will find the time and learn how to find one. The first step is to take a chance and reach out to someone who might have good career advice relating to your goals.

No matter what the job market is like, in order to remain competitive and move forward in your field, you have to develop multiple strategies with close confidants and professionals and engage in networking with associates and friends to help you move in the direction of career satisfaction.

More articles from AllBusiness.com:

How Becoming a Mentor Can Help Your Own Career Development

5 Signs You’ve Picked the Right Career

Here’s Why We Should Normalize Spirituality in Business

Benefits of Establishing an Employee Mentoring Program

How to Successfully Develop and Improve Your Soft Skills

Progress in your career by developing adjacent skills

Long gone are the days of a traditional career ladder. Instead of climbing up the ladder, the new strategy for career progression is identified as a career lattice. Joanne Cleaver, author of The Career Lattice, defines it as “a diagonal framework that braids lateral experiences, adjacent skill acquisition, and peer networking to move employees to any of a variety of positions for which they have become qualified.”

Ms. Cleaver believes that one’s ability to “lattice” across, up and down different positions will be a critical skill in the years to come. I believe this author’s rationale is spot on because this is the wave of the future. This strategy is transdisciplinary, being defined as “the ability to integrate different sets of knowledge and fluency across multiple disciplines.”

You have heard the adage “jack of all trades, master of none” which may have provided work for Jack but really never did much for his career. The time, however, is approaching—if not already here—when “master of all disciplines” will be the prerequisite for a successful career. Employers, in an effort to trim budgets, will hire the multi-tasker capable of combining his/her education, expertise, and work experiences to meet the varying demands of the position. The ability to effectively weave these various assets into an “am qualified, can do all, will do all” offering to a prospective employer will ensure success on a continuing basis.

Clearly, taking charge of your career is an absolute necessity. YOYO land is here to stay, so accepting that you need to manage your career will give you the best possible shot at advancing in one of the most competitive climates we’ve ever seen.