It is crucial to take control and actively manage your career, which is a life-long learning process and might take some turns throughout your working life. Also take into consideration your personal development and sometimes changing circumstances when making informed career decisions. The GAUSS Career Service will assist you in achieving this goal and some hints on how you can get there are listed below. For further tips as well as literature recommendations check out the website of the HR Development Orientation and offers for Postdocs.Career planning
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As a first step, get to know yourself: What are your main interests and values? What are you good at (professional as well as personal skills)? What type of work do you like? Do you feel confident in supervising other people?
There are many online tools available for critical self-evaluation and learning more about your individual skill set. One we are recommending is MyIDP. In addition, it may be helpful to discuss these questions with family, friends, colleagues or supervisors.
To develop a strategy for planning your career, it is essential to know what you want to achieve and in which direction you would like to develop professionally. Postdocs are in a transition phase and many of you are probably not sure how to move on to your next position. Therefore, it is important to critically reflect on these issues and also to make yourself aware of what is available in the non-academic sector.
Knowing yourself does not only help you to figure out your career goals but also to identify your strengths and weaknesses. Being aware enables you to develop strategies for improvement and selecting opportunities to extend your knowledge. Having your career goal in mind this will make you more competitive on the job market.
To be prepared for the job market, you need to know what is required for specific careers. MyIDP can give you more information about how well your skills and interests match the different career paths according to expert ratings from career advisors. Furthermore, active networking can help you in obtaining valuable information on different professions (e.g. participate in one of our Career Impulse Sessions ).
Even if you are fully committed to a specific career goal, do not lose sight of possible alternatives. Re-evaluate on a regular basis if your current job still suits you best as private and professional circumstances can change.
Without doubt, achieving goals without any help is a fantastic feeling. However, do not underestimate the importance of having a strong professional network and make use of it. This network ideally consists of peers as well as mentors and supervisors, who can all – on different levels – provide valuable information and professional support.