Self Assessment

The career planning process is about determining your priorities and objectives, and assessing your opportunities. The process includes the following steps:

1. Identifying and determining your values and preferences.
   
   
2. Identifying and determining your professional goals, the ones that will lead to job satisfaction, in line with your values and preferences.
   
   
3. Identifying and determining where you stand professionally, what is the path to follow and what are the skills you have and want to use, as well as the skills you don’t have and need to acquire, in order to achieve your goals.
   
   
4. Determining the best way to acquire new skills and to apply your old and new skills to reach your goals.
   
   
5. Undertaking reality checks.

Identify and determine your values and preferences

At a primary stage, career planning must examine your lifestyle, values and preferences and then evaluate them, as all career choices have costs.

In order to determine your work values, write a list of ten work values that will influence your choice of a career: five that are essential and five that are desired. You may use the list of values for your inspiration and to help you in determining your values.

Identify and determine your professional goals

...the ones that will lead to job satisfaction, in line with your values and preferences.

Another universal theme is that individuals at every level need to know how to maximize day-to-day satisfaction from their jobs. Therefore, any career plan must address the need for job-related satisfaction and the work objectives.

Furthermore, determining your work objective will help you to prepare a focused CV. It tells the CV reader what you want to do and where. It focuses the reader's attention in a specific direction and may provide information about the skills you offer.

Below are some sample work objectives:

• Programme manager in Governance, supervising approximately 3 staff in a country office within the Asia-Pacific Region;


• Assistant Resident Representative in Africa, specialized in conflict prevention;


• Deputy Resident Representative - Operations, specialized in the UN common system, harmonization and Atlas implementation;


• UN Coordination - Assistant to RC in a new pilot UN office initiative, based, preferably, in a French speaking country.

In order to determine your work objectives, think about what you have discovered during the process of identifying and assessing your skills, experience and values and write down what you want in the form of a work objective. The work objective worksheet  may be useful to guide you through this process.

Identify and determine where you stand professionally

Determine the best way to acquire new skills and to apply your old and new skills to reach your goals

Once the skills you need to master in order for you to attain your professional objectives have been identified, where and how to do so is next. Can you get them hands-on work in your current position or do you need a specific training instead? Does your organization offer related courses or workshops? May you need to look for such training elsewhere? Do you have a supervisor or colleague that might coach you?

Undertake Reality Checks

Assess your current performance

Career planning encourages the individual to assess if he or she is technically proficient in his or her present job.

• Are you ranked as a top performer?


• Do you work well with others?


• Do you see a gap that could hamper your progress?

What is your reputation?

• What is your reputation in the Organization (from above, from the side and from below)?


• Would your manager and colleagues agree with your self-assessment?


• What is your reputation in your occupation?

Whose opinion do you value?

You may want to get additional information by getting feedback from others - your (current or past) manager, a colleague, or your spouse or partner, for example. You want to get feedback or additional information to test your ideas, to see if your assessment is accurate and realistic. If you do your homework in advance, and figure out what questions you may want to ask, you will find the feedback to be much more helpful.

In choosing whom to talk to, answer the following questions as a guideline:

• Who has observed your performance in different situations?


• Who knows you well and knows how you tend to react to different circumstances?


• Does this person have your best interest in mind?


• Is this person perceptive and do you value his or her opinion?

What is your motivation?

As time goes on, people's motivations tend to change. Based on these new motivations, individuals can embark on a journey down a different career path, which suits their needs better than the one they chose to begin with.

Career Planning Goals

Career Planning is Personal Strategic Planning.

Career planning is not only about how others see you, but more importantly, how and where you see yourself. It also involves looking for opportunities that match your qualifications and the requirements of the Organization.

• Career planning involves a match between what an individual wants in the future with what the Organization will need;
  
  
• Individuals need to be clear about potential jobs as well as the required qualifications.

Goals, Plans and Implementation - Learn from your experience

It is not easy to turn analysis into actual career goals. However, after working through your self-assessment and considering your current performance and potential opportunities, you are ready to start planning.

Always remember that your career plan will need to be reviewed and updated from time to time, as you can change and adapt your goals as necessary throughout your career.

Focus on what you want to achieve and what you feasibly can achieve:

• Learning goals - skills and knowledge you need;


• Work assignments you want;


• Work-Life Balance - weigh professional life vs. personal life;


• Personal development goals.