The Power of Professional Development on Career Progression

Most of the time, our work responsibilities are tracked like a checklist: this is what is required, that requirement has been met, check it off the list. There is a degree of satisfaction in that kind of accomplishment. As the public sector grows and adjusts to the needs of contemporary communities, the responsibilities of any position in an organization can expand and specialize. That means your checklist grows with your responsibilities and ambitions. The evolution of your occupation occurs just as sure as the changes you encounter daily with technology, communication, and community. Professional development ensures you stay in tune with your increasing responsibilities and helps you focus on a career path toward success in your current or future position.

Evaluate your position

Discovering how you can develop in your current position in the public sector can be examined in three layers. First, look at what your position requires and what you do outside of those tasks assigned to you. If you are a communicator for an organization, when you first took on the position, your main tasks may have been answering questions posed by constituents through email and over the phone. Now, your tasks may have expanded to writing responses to questions on social media or perhaps writing social media posts to help inform the community. Once you examine those on-the-job skills you have learned, you’ll have an idea of what kind of professional development you can focus on. In the case of the communicator above, inquiring about writing or editorial development would certainly be an asset and could lead to an expansion in career paths.

Next, take a look in the mirror. What do you want to accomplish in your current position and your career? Maybe you feel too comfortable in your current position, and you want more responsibility or more money or a more hands-on way of helping the community. Kate Boorer, a leading career coach in the public sector, states, “Often people have the mindset that ‘If I work hard, I will work up into senior positions,’ but this is not the case; you need to articulate what skills you want to develop, as people in your network can’t help you unless they know this.” Self-evaluating is key to your professional development and career. 

Lastly, evaluate what the public needs. Not only do you serve the community, but you are also a member. This gives you a tremendous amount of insight. This insight adds to your professional development checklist and creates an internal dialogue about how your career can enhance other lives. And yours.

Institute and practice professional development

The quickest and easiest way to continue the checklist of your professional development is to inquire about the opportunities your organization provides. Consulting a manager or administrator about professional development illustrates your incentive to further your career and starts a discussion about your role in the group. Some organizations provide Individual Learning Accounts (ILA) that provide resources expressed in terms of dollars and/or hours for your learning and development. ILAs give you ownership of which ways to develop your career while having the flexibility to fit what you can into your schedule. 

While you correspond with your manager, they might bring up an Individual Development Plan (IDP). It functions just as it sounds – a checklist of goals you would like to achieve. This IDP can be revisited to help ensure you are making the progress you have envisioned for your position and career path. IDPs are not meant as an evaluation tool. They are an agreed partnership for encouragement and positive feedback. According to the U.S. Office of Personnel Management, IDPs include:

• Employee profile – name, position title, office, grade/pay band.
• Career goals – short-term and long-term goals with estimated and actual completion dates.
• Development objectives – linked to work unit mission/goals/objectives and employee's development needs and objectives.
• Training and development opportunities – activities in which the employee will pursue with estimated and actual completion dates. These activities may include formal classroom training, web-based training, rotational assignments, shadowing assignments, on-the-job training, self-study programs, and professional conferences/seminars.

You and your supervisor will work together to prepare, implement, and evaluate your IDP, but, in the end, the initiative for your professional development is in your hands.

Keeping in mind that you are not the first person on the path of professional development, using mentoring and coaching is another great way to refine your skills and advance your career. Many organizations and agencies have instituted formal mentoring plans for their employees. This allows the experienced employees – the mentors – to impart advice and guidance while sharing organizational knowledge. Mentoring relationships are your chance to gain insight from the experiences of others who have excelled and show you what it takes to fulfill your current role and the ones you aspire to in the organization.

Coaching for professional development is different from mentoring. Think about the Apple TV+ series “Ted Lasso.” Coach Lasso has no expertise in soccer, a sport he was hired to coach. So, he focuses on supporting and challenging the individual player to develop self-confidence. By supplying this encouragement and support, the players grow stronger. A group of strong individuals forms an even stronger team. Coaching in professional development for career success works the same way. Collaborating with a coach centers more on your creativity, confidence, and ambition to support you on your journey. Many times, coaching occurs in a peer-to-peer, informal situation when helping to raise your coworkers or praise someone for a job well done. There are also opportunities for more formal coaching with a supervisor. Ask around your organization, and you’ll find different types of coaching to help you excel.

If you haven’t looked into it already, your organization might have an outlined career path already compiled for your position. These outlines include succession planning, career development, training, and more. The U.S. Office of Personnel Management (OPM) developed Governmentwide career path guides for certain occupations. They are listed by the U.S. Office of Personnel Management and include: 

• A career progression outline that enables employees to move among and across jobs in the occupation.
• Success factors that enable individuals to maximize performance and career advancement.
• General and technical competencies, which help employees and supervisors plan and sequence appropriate career training and development.
• Common degrees and certifications the interviewed incumbents of the Federal occupation possess.

Even if your organization doesn’t have a specific outline for you to follow, the information outlined by the OPM is a great starting point for yourself or with a supervisor.

Your future in public service

Public service is indeed a calling. Know there are individuals in your community who benefit from the services you provide. George W. Carver is noted to have said, “It is not the style of clothes one wears, neither the kind of automobile one drives, nor the amount of money one has in the bank that counts. These mean nothing. It is simply service that measures success.” It is beneficial to occasionally ask yourself how you serve and if there are more items you can add to your responsibility checklist.

Two elements dictate your future in public service: the effects of technological advancements and your career path. There's little to be done to control how technology influences and changes public service occupations. At this point, the best way to integrate evolving technology into your work life is to examine and embrace it. Waiting or being forced into accepting these changes will only put you behind your peers and slow your professional development. That’s where the control of your career path comes in.

Your professional development can be broad or specific, short or long, but for your career to progress, it needs to be realistic and attainable. The greatest part of outlining your career path is that it can be at a speed and intensity you are comfortable with. You’ve read this far, so clearly you are interested and ready to explore the possibilities. As you brainstorm, bullet journal, or mood board about your future, there are a few things to keep in mind. The Organization for Economic Cooperation and Development states the future of public service needs to be forward-looking, flexible, and diverse. How do your professional development and career path incorporate those qualities? How can you add them to your checklist? What are your true ambitions? Now think about the satisfaction you’ll experience when you’re able to check them off your list.