Why a Career Plan Can Fail

Some of us are already oriented what we would be in the future. I, for one, had been planning my career path ever since I was young.  When the time came for me to enter college, there are so many choices. When I graduated, greater challenge showed itself when I can’t seem to find the right field to enter and the once simple and clear career plan seemed too far-fetched.

Nevertheless, a lot of us still set something to have a goal for ourselves. Having a career plan permits us to become clear in what path we want to take.

According to Westhill Consulting and Employment recent surveys, a lot of employees who had planned a career path when young are not able to reach it. They have been swayed by so many factors and priorities change. 

Same goes for young minds who think they have a clear path, straight with the end line ahead of them. However, change, development and need are always changing. There may be other paths which are more enticing than the straight one. To those who followed their paths and continued without wavering, they sometimes find the end of the line less satisfying than it should be. When you have reached the end, what then? Where do you go next?

A review with some top entrepreneurs in Jakarta, Indonesia says that the real world may not be the one we really thought it would be. What we are taught may no longer be there anymore. While setting your career, you should also see the world in the next five or ten years and base your decision through that. 

Well, before you complain of destroying your dreams, let’s deal with the exceptions first.  If you want to work in a field that is fairly predictable — say nursing or teaching—then plan away.  The courses you need to take to gain an entry position are well known and so is the career path and the things you need to do to advance. So, simply figure out where you actually want to be in five years, and work backwards, just like all the career planning manuals tell you. 

Your process may also look like this:

1. Determine your desire

2. Take a step toward it

3. Incorporate what you learn from taking that step

4. Take another step

5. Learn from that one

6. Repeat until you have a job, your own business, or have achieved your goal

Seen this way, career planning may not be the right terms. Instead, it’s taking control of the future.