Whether you are fresh out of university or the freshly appointed vice president, today’s workforce is a complicated challenge for everyone. With structural changes, developing technology, increasing opportunity and shifting demands, career savvy is now more essential than ever. But advancing beyond our knowledge of standard business practice and combining a new set of skills in a self-directed approach, career intelligence has evolved to beyond a strategic career plan. It is now the sharpest career tool to achieve the most success.
Career Management 101
No matter how much education, training and experience is indicated on a resume, it does not determine the employers who read it, their decision to hire you, or the potential for you to succeed. As important as it is to be equipped with the right credentials, we must also recognize how career intelligence starts with ourselves. Only we can choose how we approach our career plan, how we present ourselves and how we perform at our jobs, and these choices are becoming more relevant as we evolve into a world of increased opportunities for self-directed success.
Some important steps to taking an active approach to developing a career plan that includes strategic self-management are as follows:
Self Knowledge: Assess personal/professional interests, goals, lifestyle and career choices
Self Image: Develop a self confident and positive attitude, physical appearance, behavioral and verbal skills
Self Direction: Research labour trends, update resume and interview techniques, network, pursue opportunities most suited to your interest and highest potential for advancement.
Advanced Career Intelligence
Self-management also relates to the area of knowledge required to finding and keeping a job in today’s workforce – Emotional intelligence. Not only are high EQ individuals more competent at creating positive results, they are equipped with interpersonal skills that are proving to be more relevant to career success than levels of IQ, education and expertise. Conducting a study of all job categories in a variety of organizations, Professor Daniel Goleman reported that sixty-seven per cent of the essential tools for effective performance were emotional competencies. Describing the importance of workplace behavior in his book Working with Emotional Intelligence, Goleman focuses on the key competencies demanded by today’s employers:
Self-Awareness
Self-Regulation
Motivation
Empathy
Social Skills
Recognizing the need for superior performance in a fast-paced and highly dynamic economy, more and more employers are using competency models to increase their chances of hiring the talent most likely to succeed in their organization. In a recent interview with CareerOne.com, Sidney University Professor, Anthony Grant cited Lóréal as an example. Using it as a tool to select their sales staff, the company found that the competency model hires significantly outperformed the other sales staff, and could also be retained much longer than employees recruited with out the competency model approach.
Executive E.Q.
Emotional intelligence becomes even more important as you progress up the ladder and according to Goleman’s executive level research, it accounts for ninety per cent of leadership success. While he found insight and empathy to be the common traits of a good manager, the inability to handle change or stress and poor interpersonal relations were the primary reasons for leadership failure. And when corporate restructuring and the need for staff retention is more apparent than ever, we can certainly see why more companies are requiring EQ in management.
But in addition to advancing their personal careers, emotional intelligence is a leadership tool that is used to motivate employees and increase productivity. Reporting the results of EQ management training, the Center for Creative Leadership claimed that American Express managers increased business by eighteen per cent, compared to the sixteen-per cent increase of those who did not receive training.
Knowledge that starts with a strategic career plan can increase job opportunities, enhance work performance and advances a career, but what qualifies valuable leaders is emotional intelligence - the wisdom of today’s workforce.
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