Navigating the Future: Defining and Achieving Your Career Aspirations

Career aspirations are bigger and loftier than career goals.

With this question, interviewers are asking: What kind of career would make you happiest and most productive.

Your aspirations might revolve around what kind of company you’d like to work for, what tasks you’d like to do, who you’d like to help, or how you’d like to be seen by your colleagues.

?So, to answer this question, talk about what would energize and fulfil you and connect it to the position you’re interviewing for. Be specific about how this job will help you achieve your career aspirations.

Why Interviewers Ask, “What Are Your Career Aspirations?”

When interviewers ask about your aspirations, they’re trying to learn about your longer-term career wants. Interviewers are looking to see how well your answer matches up with their needs, the position, and the company. They “want to know if you’re planning to remain loyal and grow with their organization.

Ask yourself a few questions, such as:

• What kind of work motivates your energy (vs. draining your energy)?

• What tasks when doing you lose track of time?

• How do you love to contribute to a project, team, or workplace?

• Who/what kinds of people do you love helping?

• Does managing and/or training people appeal to you?

• What would make your career and professional life fulfilling to you?

How to Talk About Your Career Aspirations in an Interview

Get Clear on What Your Aspirations Are

?It might seem obvious, but before you can answer questions about your career aspirations, you’ll need to figure them out for yourself. This involves thinking through what you’re passionate about and what sort of career would make you excited to go to work each day.

Connect Your Aspirations to the Company and Position

Knowing your career goals allows you to seek out job opportunities and companies that align with your aspirations.

For the position, the best resource is usually the job description, unless you happen to know someone at the company who has more knowledge. If you’ve already had initial rounds of interview, you can take into account anything you learned during that conversation. When researching the company, take a look at their website, social media, and news mentions

See how the company and position align with your career aspirations either directly or as a stepping stone for the future.

Be sure you hit on what your aspirations are, why those are your aspirations, and how this job relates to them.

?Avoid Common Pitfalls

As you answer, “What are your career aspirations?” there are a few mistakes you should avoid:

• Talking about aspirations that aren’t related to the job you’d be doing:?Don’t talk about what your ambitions outside of work. Interviewers are looking for career aspirations, not life goals
• Implying that you’re going to leave the role quickly:? Hiring Managers and Recruiters goal is to find someone who wants to genuinely contribute to the company’s mission, not use the company to learn something” and then leave.

So, think through well and identify your Career Aspirations and find the suitable role in the right company and confidently answer to the interviewer and impress them to crack the interview.

?