Career Pathways

My summer student asked me how she could become an executive in a company. How could she move up? This is a great question.  If you are trying to get to a certain level in your career, what is the pathway to get there? Do you have a line of sight to where you want to be in your career? If you want to be a manager, an entrepreneur, a vice president or CEO, can you visualize the required steps? If we consider the highest echelons of organizations, they are generally structured in a similar way. There is the leader (CEO, Executive Director, President, General Manager) and that person has a team reporting to her or him, consisting of leaders in operations, along with key support areas such as finance, human resources, information technology, sales and marketing, etc.

Finding Your Career Pathway
Consider if you have the background and skills to ascend through an organization by way of direct operations. Direct operations mean different things in different sectors; for example, in healthcare, direct operations usually entail interaction with a patient, so a clinical background is important to enter management through this pathway.

Alternatively, your skills and background may provide a pathway through a support function such as finance, technology, human resources or sales marketing. It may also be helpful to eliminate pathways that are not feasible for you. For example, if you do not have a finance background, it is unlikely you will rise to executive ranks as the Chief Financial Officer. What are the pathways that are closed to you because of your interests, background and skills?

To help you explore your career pathway, try to understand the structure of your organization. Look for opportunities to learn about other divisions and departments; for example, speak to people who work in operating and support areas. You can ask to job shadow someone in areas you are interested in, or ask a senior executive for an information interview to learn more about how the person got to her or his position.   

Having a line of sight to your career goals will help you achieve them sooner. Happy climbing!

More Career Sites
http://careercommuniqueradio.ning.com/
http://www.jobseekersadvice.com/
http://talentegg.ca/incubator/
http://www.careerjoy.com/