Career Development & Employment Readiness
As a student, graduate, and job seeker you are committed to finding valuable work and life experiences that will contribute to your overall employment and career success. When you engage in a process of self-discovery, knowledge-finding, and action-planning, you set the stage for ensuring your career goals come to life. The Career Professionals of Canada explain that this process of career development is not linear, but rather cyclical, and you may find that you circle back again and again as you identify, evaluate, and re-evaluate the employment and career paths that are right for you throughout different times in your life.
As you transition from school to work, or as you move from job to job, the goal is to be “employment ready.” Valerie G. Ward Consulting explains that the concept of employment readiness depends on your personal ability to find, obtain and retain employment with minimal support from outside sources. Achieving a state of overall employment readiness results from a combination of several factors. Ask yourself the following questions:
- Do you have the appropriate career-decision making abilities, qualifications, education, job search skills, and ongoing career-management skills to manage your work life?
- Are you able to perform well, take responsibility for creating your own successes, access support from your social networks, and maintain a job?
- Do you have an awareness of the personal, environmental, and general challenges that you might face?
You may not be able to answer each of these questions yet; however, this book is designed to equip you with that knowledge and help you to develop the skills that you will need to achieve employment readiness.
