Career planning for Directors
As a Director the path to move forward within a business may not be as obvious as it once was. The more senior the role, the more challenging it can become to plan what might be next in your career. This necessitates the need for career planning for Directors.
Here at The Salary Coach, we’ve worked through a number of sessions with senior management looking to forward plan for their next progressions opportunity and here are our 8 tips to help you plan for success.
Planning the next move in your executive career
#1. Set your goals. What do you want to achieve and when?
#2. Imagine the type of role you want to be in, the kind of leader you want to be, how you will act and write it down.
#3. Think about what you want to be known for – your employability brand. The higher up the ladder you go the more strategic you need to be. Don’t just use the word, explain to yourself in your plan what that actually means, and how you will go about it.
#4. Get yourself a coach – someone you will build a long–term relationship with who will challenge you, work with you on your plans, and be a trusted person you can develop an ongoing relationship with.
#5. Build a detailed plan of how you will go about achieving your goal. Be very specific. I want to become a partner in the firm requires different actions to becoming a manager, senior manager or director
#6. Take action with your plan. Make sure it contains a balance of:
- doing the job
- leading others
- germinating ideas and then delivering on results
- what the results will be and how you know you will have achieved them
- building your network within and out of your organisation, and
- how you will go about raising awareness of yourself and your value.
Be as detailed as you can.
#7. Be sure to check in with your plan regularly – monthly to begin with.
#8. Set yourself up with mentors who can help you with the technical side of your work.
