This is part 3 of our multi-part series on the importance of figuring out your career path perspective. Click here to review part 2.The second path we will explore in depth is…

SPECIALIST/INDEPENDENT CONTRIBUTOR:

This career path preference is best characterized by those interested in remaining in one career field or profession for much of their working life. Along the way, specialists are able to highly refine their technical knowledge, skills and abilities. Specialists are less interested in moving up as they are in becoming the expert and having autonomy to do things their way.

Anchors and Motives:
Typical career anchors and motives of these individuals include technical and functional competence, expertise, skill mastery, service to others, independence, affiliation and security.

Appropriate organizational rewards:
Appropriate organizational rewards for these individuals might include: job enrichment, continuing education, membership in professional associations, recognition, motivational programs, organizational benefits, sabbaticals, tenure and job security.

To Be Continued…

Technorati Tags: momentor, career path, careers, career, career development, professional development, managers, specialists, specialist

This is part 2 of our multi-part series on the importance of figuring out your career path perspective. Click here to review part 1.

The first path we will explore in depth is…

Path #1 - MANAGERIAL:

This career path preference is best characterized by those interested in continually moving vertically up the organizational ladder into traditional supervisory and managerial positions with increasing spans of control, responsibility, power, and authority.

Anchors and Motives: 
Typical career anchors and motives of these individuals include power, influence, leadership, control, task accomplishment, status, managerial competence, and directing others.

Appropriate organizational rewards:
Those of us who prefer the managerial will typically feel rewarded by: upward mobility, promotion, special perks, titles, and organizational symbols of success (e.g., profit sharing incentive plans, company car, stock options, financial planning, expense account, club memberships, etc.).

To Be Continued…

Technorati Tags: momentor, career path, careers, career, career development, professional development, managers, leaders

A few weeks back I conducted a leadership workshop for about 200 leaders of at a large University medical center. At just about every break the most popular question to me was, “how do you lead talent who don’t really want to be led?”

I’m sure the question was “code” for leaders struggling to unlock the “what’s in it for me” key that will engage their followers. Unfortunately for leaders and followers alike, we are all pre-wired with a set of interests, values and motives. ”Wishing” to simply wake up and start loving what you do will NOT translate into a spontaneous feeling of career satisfaction and overall happiness.

If only we all truly understood how our personal interests, values and motives were wired - and could put it into a simple language that would allow our bosses to understand how to engage us - we could unlock some of the mystery surrounding effective leadership (and followership).

Based on our research, we’ve discovered four major “Career Paths” that we all can fall into at any given time.  They are:

• Managerial
• Specialist/Independent Contributor
• Entrpreneurial
• Generalist.

People who are happy within each career path will be motivated by very different jobs, responsibilities and activities.

We will visit each one of these career paths further in future articles, but it’s important to recognize that understanding where you stand within these groups will help you to determine what kinds of jobs will keep you energized month after month… Or even why you’re unhappy with what you’re currently doing! Couple this with knowing how to identify where others stand will help you find mentors to get you where you want to be. 

For example, if I knew I wanted to be a manager in a Fortune 500 company one day then seeking a mentor that is anchored in the values of an entrepreneur will probably be a lose-lose proposition. The concept may seem simple, not it’s not much different than the highly successful sales person (a tried and true specialist) who gets promoted to Sales Manager (a managerial position) and fails miserably. It’s a very similar situation that happens all the time!

To Be Continued…

Technorati Tags: momentor, career path, careers, career, career development, professional development

Today, the psychological contract between you and your employer is much different than in the past. Job security has been replaced with “employability security.” Careers that span 40 years at the same company ending with a gold watch and a pension are a thing of the past. All of us potentially vulnerable to downsizing, acquisitions and mergers affecting our positions.

Career management is the marriage between preparation and opportunity – we need initiate our own development and seek out employers who are interested in facilitating growth and fostering career opportunities.  Ultimately, we must take actions to continuously relearn and sharpen our knowledge, skills and abilities to remain competitive in our professions and fields.

Momentor provides a much needed platform for self-motivated, success-driven people to harness the power of folksonomy to uncover the best ways to get ahead and prepare for the future. After all, at the end of the day a commitment to continuously learning and developing knowledge and skills valued by our employers can only make us more valuable and will ultimately open doors to more options in the future.

Technorati Tags: Development Planning, Professional Development, Career Development, Career, Momentor, Jobs, Mentors

Momentor is an exciting new community designed to offer a set of tools to professionals that will effectively help each other develop their careers.

While Momentor is currently in pre-alpha stage, we can say that at the core of our community will be a platform for mentees to find mentors based on certain factors (more on all this later) that will help both parties gauge how successful the relationship will be. We will also offer mentors and mentees the ability to recommend, rate, tag, review and browse a variety of types of information with the hope of working together to uncover the best ways to develop our careers.

In the future, you can expect the following from our blog:

• Exclusive updates on the development progress of our community
• A chance to communicate and consult with our developers on features and the design of Momentor
• Cutting edge content on the subject of careering and mentoring written by our president and career coaching specialist Dr. Ken Nowack and other subject experts.

We appreciate your interest and hope you check back regularly as we get closer to the launch of this exciting new community.