Career Development

When goal setting, you can sit on the sideline or you can play in the game. I personally prefer to play in the game. That is what goal setting allows us to do. It enables us to create our life instead of letting life be something that just happens to us. Career interest continually changes in a person's life. By defining my career objective, possible career objectives for my future, taking an inventory in my current career attributes, and identifying what makes me happy and barriers to reaching my career goals, I will develop a five-year career development plan.

When I was younger, I measured my success by how much money I made. More recently, I measure my success by a balance between my work life and the amount of quality family time I can obtain. When I started the University of Phoenix, last January, I wrote a paper similar to this discussing my career goals and why I was returning to school to obtain my degree. My goal was to become a sales manager in the New Home Building Industry. I wasn't sure how I was going to get there, but I wanted to make sure that I had all of the needed qualifications to achieve this goal. Obtaining my degree was one of these qualifications.

I determined my career goal about five years ago. When I obtained my real estate license and started selling new homes I knew where I wanted to be and where I wanted my career to go. I had so many questions and it seemed that no one had the answers. I decided then that my short-range career direction was to become a lead sales agent, because I was a junior sales associate at the time.

My strategic goal was to become the sales manager and the one with all the answers. I started my career a little late in life so my strategic goal seemed out of reach. I was married with two small children and did not have any past experience in the industry. However, I decided I would learn everything I could about all aspects of the business. I was always observant of who was moving up the corporate ladder and what positions they where coming from. Though my career goals where important to me, I decided that time with my family was more important.

I reached my short term goal of lead sales associate and obtained the sales team member of the year award. Due to my decision to spend more time with my family, I made the decision to get out of sales. New home sales associates are paid very well, however they are required to work every weekend and must be flexible to drive to distant communities. My family has always been top priority and I could not make them second to my job.

When I gave up the money of sales to be with my family on the weekends, I stayed in the industry and became and escrow officer. An escrow officer's duty is "a neutral third party who ensures that all conditions of a real estate transaction are met before any transfer of funds or property is recorded" (Unknown Author, 2005). This was a step down in many ways, however I had observed that this was a good route into management and having additional skills always makes a prospective manager more attractive.

As an escrow agent, I worked side by side with the sales manager. This form of work allowed me to learn many of the necessary skills for management. I observed what worked and what didn't. Although the sales associates did not directly report to me, I played the role of management in many ways.

I continued on this path of learning and observing, while I was making changes and sacrifices for more family time. Though I kept my eye on my long term goal, there where many times I doubted that I was on the right path, I even started investigating a different career path in the same industry.

Through the learned experiences and training I received, I was ready for my role in management. I recently accepted the position of sales manager with one of the countries largest builders, Lennar Corporation. They were