by Identifying your career goal is a huge progress toward your professional success. It also helps to provide motivation during stressful or challenging times on your career path. If you’re considering what career goals would be best for your professional growth, this article is here to guide you with career goals with examples.
The best career goals examples will guide you to create your own career goals and help you reach the next step in your professional life.
Reading to this point shows you want to achieve better results in landing your dream job or business opportunity to succeed in your career.
We have been mentioning career Goals, here is what it mean
What is a Career Goal?
This refers to objectives that you like to achieve in your professional career. A career objective can be a career change, salary change, or gaining additional skills.
Setting a career path is important because it can make your career more define for you to focus on. There are two main types of career goals you can set for either short-term or long-term.
To highlight better, any career goal that is achievable in under a year is regarded as a short-term goal, while a career goal that is to be achieved in more than a year is often regarded as a long-term goal.
One of the most used and successful methods of setting effective goals is the SMART method.
A SMART career goal is considered to be a professional goal that is specific, measurable, attainable, relevant, and Timely. Now you see it can definitely be regarded as (SMART), right?
Where are career Goals Used?
- Career Advancement
- Salary Advancement
- Professional Advancement
- Personal Development
- Leadership Advancement
Why is career Goal Important?
Setting career goals is important because they can help you define your career path clearer. They give a better direction to focus on your professional development, providing you with targets and steps you can follow to get more skills, money, or success in your job.
Pursuing a career goal can be in building a lasting focus and help in job satisfaction in your day-to-day work life. They can also help you when interviewing for another job.
Importance of having a clear career Goal?
Having a clear goal can help during an interview for a new role, promotion, or leadership position let employers see that you take your professional success seriously and that you value the experience that you can gain in your new position.
People set different goals, from becoming a CEO to starting a business of their own. Let’s consider an example of a career goal that can be of real-life instances:
Real-life Career Goal instances
Learn a New skill
If you’re in a job position with opportunities to advance, it is a common goal to learn a new skill. For instance, to get a leadership role, you’ll need to acquire good leadership skills. Each position you aim for requires different skill sets, so make a list of the specific skills you need to develop to be the best candidate for that role.
Learn a new programming Language
If you want to make a career change and transition into tech, you need knowledge of programming languages. Pick a programming language to study and practice coding and within a year you can become a basic-level programmer. To expedite this process, you can study at a coding boot camp where you can get mentored by professionals in the field over six months.
Build a professional website
If you want to start a business or a side hustle, building a professional website is a good idea. Having a professional website can help you establish your personal and professional brand. Many people build personal websites to show off their work portfolios or use them as online business cards. You can even create a website without any coding skills.
Get a pay raise
If you want to earn more and get a pay raise, you also need to level up your skills. Go above and beyond to demonstrate high performance and make sure your boss knows it. Networking skills are also essential in developing yourself and finding more lucrative job opportunities and potential employers that pay well.
Achieve a high level of monthly sales
Sales agents or sales representatives set monthly sales targets based on key performance indicators (KPIs), making it a possible short-term career goal. If salespeople want to get bigger commissions, they need to bring in more sales, or higher-value sales deals. Some may even receive additional incentives for closing a deal with huge sales figures.
Become a cyber-security engineer
Becoming a cyber-security engineer can be a short-term or a longer-term goal depending on the course of education you pursue. You can choose to pursue a college degree in cyber security, which takes four years to complete.
However, a degree is not always required, and interested professionals can study a boot-camp program in cyber security to become qualified to land a job as a cyber-security engineer. Boot-camps provide job-ready skills and experience and typically last less than a year. For example, Flatiron School offers a popular boot-camp in cyber security lasting only 15 weeks.
Become a doctor
You need to invest a lot of time and effort to become a doctor, making it a long-term career goal. It can take 10 to 14 years to become a doctor, with four years as an undergrad, two years of post-baccalaureate, four years of medical school, three years of residency, and one year for licensing.
Become a CEO
You can become a CEO by working your way up from a low level within an organization. This way, you’ll know the company better than an outside hire would. However, if you go on this path, it can take many years, sometimes decades, of hard work.
Start your own business
Starting a business is a popular long-term professional development goal. It requires an entrepreneurial spirit, ambition, and hands-on experience. You must learn how to plan your business, find your target audience, network, and do the tasks necessary to keep your business operating
Create a retirement plan
To enjoy retirement, you need to come up with a carefully thought-out plan. You need to decide how much money to save and invest in this long-term goal. It’s also important to revisit the plans regularly so that if your financial situation changes, you can also adjust your investment plans accordingly.
What is a career plan?
A career plan is a thorough proposal of a strategy with specific steps and actions on how to achieve a set of job goals. If you want to attain career goals, you need to create a detailed action plan on how to achieve them. It’s essential to have a career goal in mind, but it’s important to write it down and make a detailed step-by-step plan.
What is a career goal statement?
A career goal statement is a written statement for your future career objective or objectives. You can consider it a vision that you’ll follow to achieve your professional goals. If you have a professional growth mindset, a well-defined career goal statement can enable you to carry out an effective action plan and achieve success.
What are life goals?
Life goals are goals we want to achieve in our personal life. In many cases, career goals can overlap with personal goals. However, when it comes to personal life goals, they are more meaningful and leave a lasting impact on your life. For example, creating a family or improving your physical health are some examples of life goals.
Why is career planning important?
Career planning is important because knowing your career path can give you direction and motivation. On your path to achieving your career goals, there will be ups and downs. Despite any sidetracks or setbacks, having a plan will bring back your focus and get you back on track for your career development.
