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The importance of long term career and life planning

1. Think about your personal goals over the longer term – e.g. buying a home, having children, studying for a qualification.
2. Think about how you want your career to progress over the next five to ten years. Are you happy in your firm and looking for future promotions, do you want to move within your industry or branch into something new, do you want to consider a international move?
3. If you have a partner, talk to them to understand their long term aspirations and then draw a timeline to see how your collective goals match up.
4. Build in some simple activities now that will help you in the future. For example, if you are looking to change roles, this might be the right time to start networking or researching. It’s easier to do these types of activities little and often. If you don’t have time to go out and network in person, can you achieve similar goals through networking on social media.
5. Think about your passions and what you are good at and what type of work life balance you want to achieve. For example, if you want the option of flexible working, is this possible in your job or on your career path. If not, what could you do to incorporate this into your longer term plan. Think creatively about how you can honour each of these drivers.
6. Be clear about what is important to you; what are your drivers or values at work and at home? Use these as a ‘compass’ to help you choose a path ahead.
7. Create a timeline on paper. This can often give you a clearer perspective and realise there are small or simple changes you can make now to invest in your future and put you on a path that seems too difficult to accomplish in one step from now.
8. Keep your timeline and make sure you refer back to it every six months or so. You can then see where you are making progress, further changes you can make or amendments that should be included.

• If you were to keep following the path you are on now, how will things look in a year, 5 years and 10 years time.
• Are you happy with that?
• For you to get to the future you want, what do you need to stop, start and continue doing now?

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