Unclear About Your Next Step? 3-Step Framework to Clarify Your Career Direction

How often do you think about your next career step? And when you do, how clear do you feel about what it looks like? Clarifying what we want to do next can be challenging for a number of reasons:

• We’re so busy focused on our current work that we’re not taking the time to think about the future.
• We don’t know what we want, so it feels easier to just keep pushing it off.
• We’re afraid to acknowledge that we’re not on the right path because that would require us to make decisions we’re not ready to make.

Whether you’re actively seeking your next role or you are perfectly content in your current role, getting clear on what you want will help you make more confident, intentional choices about how to advance your career.

If you’re not sure how to get started, here’s a framework to help you.

1.??Define what you want and don’t want.

While you may struggle with what you want, you likely know exactly what you don’t want. Start making a list. Consider everything from functional responsibilities to workplace culture to number of days in the office.?

Once you have a list of what you don’t want, you can use that to determine what you do want. For example, don’t want a micromanager? What does that tell you about the type of manager you do want?

If you’re struggling with this question, pay attention to yourself in action for a couple of weeks. Tune in to what types of situations and activities bring you satisfaction and energy. And notice which ones feel soul crushing. Add these to your lists to further flesh out your vision of what you want and don’t want.

2.? Identify your questions.

Oftentimes the reason we get stuck is that we need more information before we can determine what we want to do. Compile a comprehensive list of questions you need to answer before you can move forward. Examples might include: “What type of training do I need to prepare for this role?” Or, “Do I have the right experience to step into this role immediately?”

As you create your list of questions, notice your assumptions as well. Where are you telling yourself no? For example, perhaps you’re telling yourself that you’d need to take a substantial pay cut to do the work you really want to do. Or maybe you’ve convinced yourself you don’t have the right background. Unless you’ve done your due diligence and gathered evidence to support these conclusions, these thoughts are currently assumptions. Convert them into questions to ensure that you don’t make decisions based on incomplete or inaccurate information. For example, in response to your assumption about taking a pay cut, ask, “What is the average salary for this position? What other benefits would this job provide?

Once you’ve defined your questions, you can use this list as a roadmap for your networking efforts. Map each question to an individual who can help you answer it. This will help to make your networking process feel more actionable and quantifiable.

3.??Examine your core values.

Each of us has core values that guide us but we don’t often take the time to explicitly define them. Understanding our core values allows us to better vet new opportunities and ensure that we’re making decisions that align with how we want to show up in the world. Oftentimes it’s not the work itself that troubles us; it’s the culture in which we’re working. When things feel harder than they need to be, it can be a signal that we’re in an environment that’s out of sync with our values.

To clarify your core values, identify your non-negotiables. Where are you unwilling to compromise. For some, that might mean that you’ll never work for someone who asks you to engage in unethical behavior. For others, that might mean that you don’t work evenings because you want to be available to your family.

Another way to recognize your core values is to pay attention to what frustrates you. Moments of friction can often represent values differences. For example, if you get irritated every time a meeting starts late, that indicates that you have a value around timeliness. If you work in an environment that disrespects people’s time, that’s likely to make your experience more challenging than it needs to be.

Once you’ve taken these steps, you’ll likely find that you know a lot more than you think you do. You’ll also notice that you tune into your work differently because these questions are marinating in your brain. As you uncover new information from your network or new insights from your self-reflection, add them to the mix. Soon you’ll notice a clearer picture begin to emerge.

Kim Meninger is a leadership coach, consultant and TEDx speaker who is on a mission to make it easier to be human at work. Reach out to Kim on LinkedIn to bring the "Your Career Is Your Business. Own It!" workshop to your team.