What Did You Want to Be When You Grew Up?

What did you want to be when you grew up?

I wanted to be an orange juice lady.  It’s not your standard career path, I know.  And you may be wondering exactly what an orange juice lady does.  I had this brilliant idea to push a cart along the beach selling orange juice to beachgoers.  Yes, just orange juice.  I wasn’t creative enough to branch out then.  If I were to be an orange juice lady today, I’d upgrade to probably driving a cart and selling much more than orange juice.  I’d branch out into other juices, water, maybe popsicles, or ice cream.  But back then, it sounded like a great job and I’d get to be on the beach all day pushing my orange juice cart.

My career took a MUCH different path and far, far away from Orange Juice Lady.  We moved away from the coast and away from that dream.  I grew older. I took the standard path of graduating from high school, attending college, and then joined the corporate world.  After that, I was responsible for my own career path.  And I didn’t know what I was doing.  I bounced around in different jobs within the same company.  I left companies and joined new ones. I sure wish I had the opportunity to sit down with someone to have a career conversation.  Where did I want to go with my career?  What were my next steps?  It could have saved a lot of headaches.  

Companies now are realizing that these career conversations are critical to employee retention.  Career pathing is meeting with employees at any stage of their career and asking them questions about their career.  Where do they want to go?  What do they want to do?  What interests them in their current job?  What strengths do they have that aren’t being used in their current job?  

Meeting with employees and plotting out their career path doesn’t mean that they will be promoted immediately.  It lays out a possible plan to follow and adds clarity for the employee about their future and outlines clear objectives.  It gives the company an idea of people that want to be promoted in the future and helps with succession planning.  It balances the company’s needs with the individual’s wants and needs.  

This job market is unlike any that I have ever worked in.  This job market requires that companies are flexible and adaptable to adjust to the job market’s fluctuations and having career conversations give companies that flexibility.  Laying out a career path for an employee helps identify skills they need to develop to get promoted to the next role.  It increases job satisfaction and can lead to long-term career growth.  

Yes, career pathing can be challenging.  Some managers may now know how to have these conversations or may not have the resources to conduct them.  That’s an opportunity to help develop those manager’s skills, too.  Employees may shy away from career opportunities because of a fear of failure, lack of experience, or work-life issues.  These are opportunities for companies to shine and help develop those employees skills.  

Having these career conversations can help an employee develop needed skills, can help improve job satisfaction, and help reduce employee turnover.  It leads to a lifelong process of personal and professional growth.  

What’s the next step in your career path?