The Career Development Process

In the previous blog post we saw that career development is a three-way matching process linking an educational component, a vocational component, and a personal goals component.  The same process applies equally to current as well as to aspiring employees, e.g., college students.

Current Employees

For current employees, their educational component is largely defined by the academic history they have accumulated in terms of degrees, certificates, internships and transcripts. 

Career development success for these employees will require both an initial and an evolving win-win arrangement between the employer and the employee. For that to happen initially and over time will require that the goals and expectations of both entities be met, both initially and over time.

Career development success—in both the short and long term—clearly requires great self-awareness and other-awareness of the initial and evolving goals and expectations of both entities.  

Aspiring Employees

For aspiring employees, e.g., college students, their educational component is incomplete and may still be carefully shaped to provide advantages in the career development matching process cited above.

As with current employees, students will eventually have to seek and forge win-win agreements with future employers in which the goals and expectations of both entities are met, initially and over time.  

Career development success for students will also require great self-awareness and other-awareness of the initial and evolving goals and expectations of both entities.

The Career Development Process for College Students

Consider two likely expectations of college students: 1) having to become financially self-sufficient after graduation, and 2) receiving good career development support toward that end from their university. To understand the career development process at a basic level, one must study it from the point of view of the three entities representing the three components: the university, the employer and the student.

First, each entity typically desires a mutually beneficial relationship with the other two!  For example:

What Students Seek

Students seek to connect with universities that will provide: 1) the right major; and 2) effective career development support while they are students and up to that first great job after college, and beyond.  Students also typically seek to connect with future employers who will provide fair compensation and job satisfaction in exchange for employee competence, dedication and hard work.

What Employers Seek

Employers seek relationships with employees that bring value to the employer’s enterprise, in exchange for the large investments employers must make into all employee positions that are created and filled.  Employers also seek relationships with universities that can help them recruit the best and brightest new graduates coming out of the universities and into the job market each year. 

What Universities Seek

Universities seek to connect with students who will commit to a lifelong relationship of “giving back” their time, talent and treasure to their university, in exchange for a marketable degree and lifelong career development support.  Universities also seek to connect with employers who will hire their graduates and provide financial support through corporate or associated foundation giving programs.  

The National Career Development Association definition of the career development process describes the interaction between the three components as follows:

“Career development occurs as educational and vocational pursuits interact with personal goals.”

These three components must be treated differently, with the first two seen as pursuits, or quests, happening earlier—though perhaps at the same time—with personal goals coming into the picture later as a decision criterion.  This assumes of course that the career development process has produced multiple offers from which the employee then chooses the one best meeting his or her personal goals.

Complicating this rosy picture is the fact that the other two entities also have goals, some if not all of which differ from those of the employee.  We must recognize, however, that the three-way matching process is itself a quest, the goal of which—that all three must achieve a win—may not be fulfilled.

Believers in Stephen Covey’s Habit 4: Think Win-Win, know this dynamic well and, while always ready to think win-win, are prepared for “no deal” if the circumstances are not quite right at that particular time. There is no guarantee that the three entities will share enough common goals to allow a win-win-win.

The definition of the career development process suggests what’s needed for employee success in landing the right career path:  To achieve it requires a clear understanding of the employer’s goals, both generally and specifically with respect to the career opportunity in question.  Unless the employee’s credentials and experience align with the employer’s goals and expectations, success is simply not likely.

A successful career development process is one in which the employer and employee share enough common goals to forge a win-win scenario, in which each gets to decide what is a win for them.