Imagine it is the start of the week and you arrive at your office and have a pile of tasks waiting for you. You get your head down to work, answer your email, head for a meeting, and make a to-do-list for the day, chat with your colleagues and most part of your day is consumed. It is no different if you are a college student, and for the most part of the day, you’re scheduled too. This is a universal phenomenon that we tend to be overwhelmed by the tasks that are in front of us, and it drains most of the productivity, hence we fail to zoom into the bigger picture and the things we are actually striving towards.

This is where a Career Goal Statement comes in. It constantly reminds you of your objectives and steers your career into a streamlined direction. These goals make you focused, retains your objectivity, and doesn’t let you sidetrack. Having a focused vision is all about modern productivity.

Benefits of Writing Career Goal Statement

This question constantly arises when you talk about a career goals statement and why they matter. And why an individual must spend time and resource to draft one. At the first glimpse, this might not be a promising step and make no mistake, this will surely help you manage and make the most out of your time.

1. It makes you question yourself

You probably are fond of questioning yourself when particularly planning your day ahead of time through constant interrogation of oneself. What to wear for that meeting, where to take your client for lunch, what to gift your dear ones on their upcoming events, whether to hang around for another round of drinks? These queries pop in your mind when deciding.

Although, have you ever questioned yourself about where you envision yourself in five years? How can you work towards that goal? What tasks you need to spend more time on and what things you need to opt-out of? All these questions need to be addressed if a person wants to settle for a brighter future. More importantly, these are the type of questions you need to answer when making a career goal statement.

2. It steers you in the right direction

Have you ever found yourself so adrift in your life that you have nothing to work and strive for other than a paycheck at the end of the month? Or being a student, does it bother you that you have no aim for your future career once you complete your studies. More appropriately, a career goal statement; makes you opt-out of monotony, droops a carrot in front of your face, motivates you to work those extra hours.

You stay motivated to work when you know you are in striving to achieve the milestones you set forth. By focusing on the end game, it lets you concentrate on developing the skills you need to shape the future YOU!

3. It promotes self-accountability

Writing things down is the best self-accountability a person could achieve. Isn’t it so daunting? Having written goals on a piece of paper is the closest to the reality it could ever be. Research has shown that people who write their goals down have a 40 percent chance more chance of achieving them than people who do not write them down. Consequently, written things stick more to your memory and pings you from time to time.

Career Goals in Resume

Career Goal Statement acts as a pitch of your resume, it highlights the goals you want to wish to pursue while working in that specific organization. A well-versed career objective can highly improve your chance of catching the attention of the recruitment firm

The best way to write the career goals in a resume is to be objective and precise in what you put inside your resume. To get identified by the employer and get them to hire you, you need to be straightforward and fulfil the requirements set by the hiring agency. If you know you can be competent enough to achieve the job description, you can boost about one or two skills you own to gain attention, but never put things in there you cannot defend.

The employer or the hiring agency is specifically looking for skills they need for the job, your only chance of getting highlighted is to display yourself through words and highlight yourself. A specifically tailored career goals statement must be given time to write. It provides insight to who you are and how can you fit as the solution to the problem.

Here are a few tips of how you can improve your resume by putting these things in your Career Goals Resume.:

1. Your resume goals must highlight that you are challenging individual and will tackle whatever they throw at you.
2. You need to assert that you are a learner. Whilst working you will be working hard on your skills.
3. You need to communicate that you are a responsible person and the company can count on you.
4. Do not praise yourself too much that the recruiter is hit by boredom due to your self-congratulatory applause.

A general example of a good Career Goal Statement in a resume would be,

“A responsible individual aiming to secure a challenging position at a reputable firm to maximize his/her potential and expand the knowledge, learning and skillset whilst providing benefit to the firm”

Careers Goals Examples

Career Goals Statement vary from a wider range of subjects that are specifically related to one’s professional domain, but the idea is the same. You need to be very precise in what you want to do, and how your goals and objectives would benefit you and the others you work for.

For example, a person in the domain of accounts and finance would want to transcribe their goals in this way

“A graduate looking for a position of Accounting and Financial Analyst, to utilize the learning and experience to provide valuable analysis using modern accounting tools and derive solutions of data analysis from various sources”

Similarly, a person working in the sales and marketing industry would want to write their statement like this.

“An experienced individual with X years of experience in lead generation and deal closing, with proven customer service, proficient communication skills to effectively fulfil the criteria of the job of Sales and Marketing Manager”

Consequently, a person looking for a job in the IT industry would want to set his/her goals as:

“Looking for a challenging job in a tech firm to utilize my database, technical and scientific expertise to deliver technical solutions and advance my knowledge in the emerging trends in the IT sector.”

There is a long list of sample career goals but one must write according to the skills they know and the work they can deliver.

Career Development

Career development is the sequence of activities and events that define the process of your career. The term usually refers to achieving something through managing one’s career by still being in an organization. It involves learning new skills, handling new roles, making career-changing decisions inside an organization or entirely shifting your role or moving onto a next organization.

Career development is an essential exercise in your path to success and starts right after you set your goals and objectives. By actually realizing where you stand at the moment, and what skills and career paths you need, to achieve the goals you set forth. finally outperforming your duties and responsibilities in order to accomplish the goals.

Career development is specifically linked with individual success and growth and must not be left at the fate of the employer. It helps to develop new skills, outgrow your fears, take new responsibilities, polish your communication, and dialogue, therefore a chance to improve your leadership qualities. And last but not least, steers your career in the right direction.