Personal Development

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  • Thanks Steve. This is yet another poignant reminder in the realm of goal setting.

    Jason...AKA CirqueDeSQLeil
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  • Having a plan and working a plan is one of the key traits of successful people. Nice editorial, thanks.

  • This is essential for those who work for a consulting organization.

    Time spent sending you to training is time not spent billing you to a client. Plus, not only does the consulting company lose the income for your time, they have to pay to train you. They don't like to do that, period.

    Customers hire you because of what you know, not for how well you learn.

    This means that, over time, you will only get hired to do things you already know how to do - until no one wants to hire consultants for that skill anymore.

    In effect, your skills go stale and you end up unemployed.

    Planning to keep your skills current is essential for long term employability. It's much to important to trust this will be done by your employer for your benefit!

    Incidentally, if you write articles and publish them in user group publications, plus start presenting at local user groups, you'll get sales leads you can pass onto the sales people. Try to get accepted to present at software conferences. Your boss will be much more willing to send you - it's a marketing expense not a training expense. Marketing expenses are investments by the company for itself.

    Even if you're not a consultant, getting accepted to present at a conference doubles the chances that your management will send you to the conference.

  • A key thing in a long term plan is understanding the difference between goals and aims. A career plan, which probably covers decades, should include both.

    Goals are achievable objectives. They are usually short to medium term. These can be positional (e.g. make team leader), skills based (e.g. learn the theory of relational data), fiscal (e.g. earn $1,000,000 in the next decade).

    Aims are more fluid, can be turned into or broken down into goals and are unachievable due to their less deterministic status as well as being long term objectives. (I am usually rubbish at coming up with examples for these but one could be "become a well respected author").

    I don't think that one could write a long term plan, or roadmap, without these two distinct type of objectives.

    Gaz

    -- Stop your grinnin' and drop your linen...they're everywhere!!!

  • I don't have the memory or the ability to work without a plan.

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