2025 Checkup for your Career

The New Year brings on all kinds of resolutions for change, and the changes often include career moves. Is this the year you should make a move?  Economists are predicting a growing economy, you’re feeling ready to go – how do you decide when it’s time?

Here are some questions to ask about your job and career. This quick checkup may help you decide if it’s time to think about a change.

What is most important to you? Possible answers include time for family and friends, peace and serenity, excitement or challenge, personal growth or learning, or planning for a future event like retirement, buying a home or starting a family.

What do you like about your current job? If the answers to this question don’t include any of your answers to the question above, it could be a sign of a disconnect between what you really care about and your job.  At the very least, your job should do one of two things: it should provide some of what makes life good (i.e. growth, excitement, challenge) or provide the means of making life good (i.e. time for family, secure income, friendships and social activities.)

Who do you work with every day?  Do you like your boss/customers/coworkers? This is a vital and often overlooked issue in career planning, especially if you’re considering a change.  Some jobs sound terrific until you consider that you may be selling to or working with people who don’t share your values or see things your way.  An instructor who prepares people for medical careers makes sure to conduct a frank discussion on the first day of class about the customers his students will be serving.  “Has it occurred to you,” he asks his students, “that every one of your customers will be in pain and afraid?  Will you be able to stay upbeat around all that negative energy?” For some students, it’s the first time they stop to think about actual working conditions. How do you feel about where you work?

After you consider the answers to the questions above, do an assessment of your current position. What does it provide or nourish in your life?  What does it lack? Can the things you don’t like be changed through your efforts?  Maybe it’s simply a matter of asking for more of some kinds of responsibilities and duties, and fewer of others.

Can the gaps be filled through outside activities?  Perhaps you can’t find a job that satisfies your creative instincts, but you may be able to fulfill them through community service or volunteering, exploring hobbies or continuing your education.  People who develop interests and activities outside of work often find their paying work to be more satisfying.  Perhaps they view their jobs more realistically when they get fulfillment from diverse sources. Community activities are a great way to stretch your skills and satisfy the need to grow as a person, especially if you explore activities that don’t relate to your work – think politics or the performing arts.

If it becomes obvious that you do need to make a change in 2025, these questions provide a basis for discussion about what you really want.  Success  and career satisfaction are defined differently for all of us, but they are definitely within everyone’s reach.

Published by candacemoody

Candace’s background includes Human Resources, recruiting, training and assessment. She spent several years with a national staffing company, serving employers on both coasts. Her writing on business, career and employment issues has appeared in the Florida Times Union, the Jacksonville Business Journal, the Atlanta Journal Constitution and 904 Magazine, as well as several national publications and websites. Candace is often quoted in the media on local labor market and employment issues.
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