Your 2022 Career Check List for More Fun and Less Stress

I hope you’ve had a good Christmas, switched off from work and spent time doing things that make you feel good. Here’s a checklist for you spanning the 5 Summits of Career Success for your career in 2022.

If you pay attention to even half of these things you're going to have a lot more fund at work and a lot less stress in 2022. 

To keep things simple, I've suggested only one action for each summit. This will get you taking the first steps towards success on your terms.

Summit 1: Your perfect job

Your perfect job is a combination of your contributions (using the skills and qualities you love using, making the difference you want to make), and understanding exactly what work needs to do for you (your work values). 

Once you know that, the next step is to identify some options of places that you’d like to do that ideal role. This can include industries you’d like to work in, environments that suit you, professions you’d like to be involved in. 

Action: Make a list of what your ideal job looks like in terms of contributions and values

Summit 2: Get in the Zone

These are the skills that you’ll use to bring your current role closer to the ideal as well as when you’re changing job, company or career. 

Firstly, adopting a mindset for career success helps you to ask good questions and make good career choices, reducing stress and increasing enjoyment. 

Then you need to make sure that your career goals are your career goals, not the organisation’s (although if you’re in the right role they will be aligned). Your goals in your career also need to align with and support you in achieving the lifestyle and ambitions you have outside of work. I call this Personal Professional Goal Setting. 

The final part of getting in the zone is knowing how to build and engage with your networks, online and offline. It’s not as scary as most people think, and you’ll be surprised at how much you have to contribute and how valuable your network will be to you, both when you’re in a role and when you are changing job or career. 

Action: Update (or create) your LInkedIn profile to tell your network about the difference you make

Summit 3: Enjoy the Journey

Part of this summit is about having the skills and strategies to keep your job as close to an ideal as possible. The most important part of this is making sure that every couple of months you take an hour for you, to work ON your career. You use it to check in with your ideal role (Summit 1 above) and notice whether your role is still a really good match. If it’s starting to drift, this is the time to take action to bring it back in line. Before it gets too far out of alignment.

The rest of Summit 3 is about what to do when you want or need to make a career move. How to craft a CV that speaks to the people you want to speak to, and causes them to invite you to interview. It needs to say more than what you do, it needs to get across the difference you make. Once you’ve got that conversation how can you prepare for interview so that not only will you give yourself the best chance of a job offer, but you’ll feel confident and maybe actually enjoy it. 

Action from Summit 3: Book an hour in your diary once every 2 months through 2022 to review your role against your ideal and plan any actions you need to take.

Summit 4: Taking New Paths

This summit is all about when you are making new career choices and starting out on new paths. Making sure that you do the things that will set you up for success (however you define success, of course). 

If you are starting a new job, in a new organisation, or in a whole new career, what are the things that you can do to ensure that you thrive in that new role. 

If your next career choice is self-employment, what do you need to know as a business owner about running a business that will allow you to enjoy that journey rather than becoming one of the many business owners who end up stressed out by it all. You might be brilliant at what you do, but if you don’t know how to run a business it could all go horribly wrong. 

For some that new path is retirement or semi-retirement. People who take the time to consider things like relationships, finance, how they will spend their time, and so on, set themselves up for a long and happy retirement. Sometimes this even includes versions of CVs which even voluntary roles sometimes require. 

Action: even if you're not starting a new path now, at least decide how you want to start 2022, the next stage of your career journey on your current path

Summit 5: Carry on Enjoying the Journey

I like to think of this summit as the happy summit, though they all are in their own way and summit 5 links to all of them. Here we add more key skills and strategies and gaining additional resources to ensure that you are taking full ownership of your career and that you keep going to work with a smile on your face. 

 Thinking of your career with a Systemic Win frame of mind ensures that you enjoy your career and by doing so, it benefits your organisation, your family and friends, your community and the wider systems of society. 

Action: Some of the resources on Summit 5 are about your wellbeing. Once activity a lot of people find very useful is this (because it forces you to focus on the positive things that are happening in your career): every night whilst you brush your teeth, think of at least 5 things you are pleased about or grateful that happened during the day. 

What's next? 

Find out more about and get some more great career trips in this free half hour on-demand training: The 5 Summits of Career Success